GERMAN BRUTALITY

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXI, Issue 90, 15 March 1941, Page 8

GERMAN BRUTALITY

FEMININE HEROISM. A LONDON SCENE. Written by a naturalised Italian woman who is now working in London, a letter received by. a Palmerston North resident gives a vivid account of the life she is leading in playing her part among the civilian population of the Empires great city. An accompanying letter explains that she is the second-in-command ot a mobile operating theatre and since the evacuation ot Dunkirk has been working in London. Her mother, incidentally, is 88 years of age and is- classed as an enemy alien. "We, in London, can sympathise with other areas which have been bombed because they never seem to leave London alone," the writer says. "I dread and fear the raids, but when other people are hurt one must go out and help—in fact, one forgets when one is doing work. Friday night and last night were particularly heavy. 1 was at the shelter on duty when high explosive - bombs seemed to drop ail round. (We are safe because we are very deep down.) Some of the people in their fright fell off the bunks and, as a result, I seemed to be treating dislocated collar-bones and elbows all night, besides various bumps on the head. Last night, Sunday night (of course I wear my tin hat) they dropped a basket of incendiaries. _ There was a gentleman nearby and eight or nine of these bombs dropped all around. It was a auestio.n of flopping, skipping and jumping in and out or the bombs. However, we decided to race for it to the shelter—and 1 won. "About three weeks ago I had a most horrible experience. 1 had been out to some fires and, on my return to the flat, I stood on the steps and was looking at some flares the dirty dogs had dropped, wondering what they were after. Casually, I turned my head in the opposite direction and there, not 30 yards away and only a yard from the house-top, 1 saw a parachute. 1 knew immediately what it was—a land-mine, the vilest of things ever invented. I rushed in and shouted to the porter, but ill that fraction of a second it exploded and the blast blew me down the stairs. 1 shall never forget that terrible explosion, and the roar. I seemed to hear another one go off, and that was at the 8.8. C. only seven minutes away. 1 came to and found the porter's wife giving me some brandy. I was not actually hurt, only stunned, and 1 realised then that work had to be done. The havoc around us was terrible. What is more, one could : hardly see lor dust and smoke. Great Jumps of conciete blocked our way. ajiu we kept cumbU.ig and tailing over them, xipwever, all we seemed to b 3 doing was pulling people out. 1 : though it would never end. there were over 150 casualties in that one incident, not including tfiose killed. A whole block of flats was demolished. Windows and shops were wrecked over a quarter oi a mile radius. ~rter having done all possible—l was just working mechanically—l went down to a hospital and I'm afraid 1 just gave in. The horror of it all even now keeps coming up before my eyes. It was terrible not to be.able to warn anyone. One can hear bombs coming, but landmines are silent, evil things. My room was all blasted, so 1 had to find somewhere else, for the second time since the 'blitz' began. All 1 can sav is that it was by the grace of God that I turned my iiead at that moment, otherwise I would not be writing to ■ you now. The blast would have killed me, as surely as anything. However,! I'm alive, and 1 guess L'll come j through in the end." The accompanying letter is from an- \ other person who describes experiences in another town. Here, the raiders, "dropped a very large -egg' near us la6t Friday week and ruined about six lovely old houses and damaged a hospital—a lot of good that does them, states the writer. "They also damaged a beautiful- old church and a college. There are not many whole windows around us. We are still in semi-dark-ness, so I expect the electric light bill will be low. It is an ill wind that blows nobody good. We fill the bath directly we finish bathing and keep a big jug filled also, so that when we had no supply of water running last weekend, we still had plenty for use. We have a stirrup pump, going shares with the neighbours in buying it, and we have our baskets of earth and rakes all handy."