SEVENTY-FIVE WARSHIPS

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXII, Issue 256, 28 September 1942, Page 5

SEVENTY-FIVE WARSHIPS

ESCORT FOR CONVOY. (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright.) RUGBY, Sept. 26. Disclosure that no fewer than 75 warships of the Royal Navy of varying sizes had escorted a recent Anglo-American convoy to Russia was made by Mr Eden in a speech at Leamington. The convoy, he said, had safely delivered in . Russia the largest total of munitions yet transported in a, single voyage from the United Kingdom and the United States. Tho shipment included aircraft, tanks, guns, ammunition and valuable stores of all kinds.

"It is good to know that these supplies reached our Russian allies at a critical time," ho said. "The Battle of Stalingrad is an heroic struggle and no ■ praise can fairly describe what the Russian armies have achieved." Reuter's correspondent on one of the escort ships says that the convoy's losses must remain a secret, but it is safe to say that Stalin will be pleased and astounded at what has arrived at a northern port.

An eye-witness on the cruiser Scylla, describing the fighting off of the German attacks, said: "Excitement on the flag deck is intense. The men watch a Junkers streaking up through the cloud with smoke pouring from it. Lieutenant-Comman-der McKane, megaphone _ in hand, wanders from side to side of the bridge watching everything. He is calmness personified. A Scots cameraman suspends his shooting for a moment to mutter: 'I didna' ask to come on this party.' But nothing seems to worry Him. "A warning voice shouts: 'Bombers overhead!' and tho Scylla gives the Luftwaffe everything she's got. Four bombs fall towards the deck, but the captain sweeps the ship round and the bombs fall harmlessly into the sea. Tho attack fails. The principal medical officer announces that when every alarm is sounded patients in the sick bay go to their action stations at the guns. When on the next day the aircraft-carrier is singled out she comes unscathed through a shower of bombs and 17 torpedoes."—Official Wireless.