AIR RAID AT HANKOW

Greymouth Evening Star, 30 April 1938, Page 7

AIR RAID AT HANKOW

NOELS WHIMS h ' Cut cable —bbess abstt. —cimxßittHsl i Reed. April. 3D.. noon.) HANKOW. April 29. ! Nearly a thousand were killed or ’raimded at Rtnrnng; a. suburb of. Hankow. as the result of a Japanese air raid, staged to mark the Japanese Emperor’s birthday. The Chinese anticipated the raid which culminated in a spectacular air battle between 50 Chinese and 39 Japanese planes. The Chinese lost three machines and the Japanese 20. The Japanese air raiders’ objective was Hanyang arsenal. China's biggest, but it entirely escaped damage. The populace cheered the fall of flaming Japanese planes, but owing to the release of a chain of bombs right across the city’, half a mile, the section is full of dead and wounded, and is a scene of mourning. Houses collapsed like cards, burying the occupants under tons of debris. Thirty charred unidentifiable bodies were recovered from a single shop. EMPEROR’S BIRTHDAY. TOKIO. April 29. In celebration of his 37th birthday, the Emperor has reduced or cancelled sentences of 319 prisoners, including a judge and an army surgeon involved in attempting a coup. This is additional to the general amnesty of February 11. GERMAN PLANES FOR JAPAN (Rec. April 30. 10 a.m.) TOKIO, April 29. Two Heinkel monoplanes, piloted by Japanese, are reported to have arrived from Berlin.