NEW YEAR GAIETY

Grey River Argus, 3 January 1940, Page 7

NEW YEAR GAIETY

SYDNEY CELEBRATIONS. SYDNEY, January 1. The city welcomed the New Year in traditional style. Crowds of people poured into the city and at midnight Sydney gave itself up to the most remarkable celebration seen for many years. Attendances at church midnight services were the largest for years. PARIS, January 1. New Year’s Eve was the gayest night since the war began. Theatres, restaurants and night clubs VYore open till 2 a.m. LONDON, January 1. In the first black-out of the New Year, even Scotland was most subaued. Revellers remained in their homes or the local public houses There were no sirens and no rattles for fear of alarming the public and hindering air raid precaution officials. Church watch services were few owing to black-out difficulties. Journalists, censors and the Ministry of Infbrmtion buried the nat chct while Sir W. Monckton made a speech wishing happiness and "peace after victory” in 1940. Crowds gathered in a gloomy Piccadilly Circus, but there were few sti agglers instead of the traditional throngs. Sir J. Simon (Chancellor of the Exchequer) in a New Year message to his constituents, said: “Everything that has happened since the war was forced upon us, Including the monstrous invasion of Finland, shows that this country’s instinct was right. There is something in the spirit to free men and women which is not dreamed of in the Nazi philosophy, and which is bound to prevail.”