Churned and Battered

Manawatu Times, Volume LV, Issue 6776, 6 February 1932, Page 5

Churned and Battered

Jap Big Guns Fail To Dislodge Chinese MILE-WIDE CONFLAGRATION, New York Times Broadcast. SHANGHAI, Feb. 5. The devastated Chapei section of Shanghai was churned and battered by another heavy Japanese bombardment to-day, but its Chinese ’defenders still clung to the barricaded strongholds they had set up amidst the ruins. Judging from the thunder of the guns, the Japanese were using six-inch projectiles in their effort to blast the Chinese out of their positions in the northern section of the city. This new artillery assault followed two major bombardments yesterday which left the Chinese holding fast to their holes in the ground. The heavy shelling started forty minutes after midnight. Shells exploded at the rate of one a minute, rattling the doors and window's of houses three miles away. After an hour the heavy guns ceased firing, but three-inch pieces and machineguns were kept in action. At three-fifteen a.m. quiet descended on the battlefield. With the breaking of dawn three hours later, the guns got busy again. Shells screamed through the air and burst in the Chapei battleground where ma-chine-guns again had taken up their rat-tat-tat. A trail of tiro a mile long lighted the sky over Chapei. Smoke and fumes from the conflagration were swept down on the International Settlement by a cold north wind. The Chinese looked for a final desperate push on the part of the Japanese to clear out the last stronghold in Chapei before many more hours. Tse Chili College, a wellknown Chinese school in the Japanese occupied district of Hong Kew, was destroyed by flames early to-day. Chinese said the Japanese entered the four-storey dormitory of the school and set fire to the furniture and then put the tore?* to the institution’s other two buildings. ~ Fresh detachments of the United States marines, brought in on the cruiser Houston, took their places in the International Settlement guard line. The United States transport Chaumont was expected from Manila to-day with 1200 members oI the Thirty-first Infantry and about one hundred additional marines. These new forces will bring the total United States strength here to almost 6000 men.

When all the United States naval vessels en route from Shanghai arrive, there will he a total of seventeen American warships in the Whangpoo. The marines had a hard time keeping off thousands of Chinese refugees who stormed the gates to bridges over Sooehow creek in a vain attempt to get into the International Settlement. Only persons holding passes were admitted, for the Settlement already was swarm-

ing with refugees estimated to total one million. During one of the two engagements yesterday an artillery shell crossed the International Settlement border and exploded in a group of Chinese buildings only a block from the main post office. The shell injured half a dozen Chinese and several houses were burned. The Chinese claimed they were still holding the Woosung forts, sixteen miles down the river, despite a two-day bombardment by Japanese ships of war. Shells blew out the commercial cable head at Woosung, leaving the Great Northern cable and the radio as the only means of communication with' the outside jyorld.