Crossing Of Danube By Sheer, Grit

Northern Advocate, 1 December 1944, Page 5

Crossing Of Danube By Sheer, Grit

(Rec. noon) LONDON, Nov. 30. Combined bridgeheads over the Danube at Apatin, Batina and Mohacs, now have a firm holding on the river 90 miles long and 25 miles deep, which gives General. Tolbukhin sufficient elbow room for his next stroke west of the Danube, says the Moscow correspondent of the British United Press. The Russian Command has split the Red Army into two groups for crossing the Danube. They crossed at separate points then linked up on the west bank.

Sheer grit enabled the Russians to cross the Danube. The Germans planned to hold the river and had considerable time to build up their defences The Russians, under a blizzard of fire from German guns, crossed the river in small flat boats and weaved their way in and out of dense everglades. Anti-tank guns were ferried across to the Russians as they crouched behind the flimsy camouflage of everglades. Field guns later were sent over and then two bridgeheads, from Mohacs and Batina, struck out and linked up.

Germans Disturbed

A correspondent of the Associated Fress reports that the German High Command is so disturbed about the hole that Marshal Tolbukhin has blown in the Danube River line, that the enemy is reported to be drawing reinforcements from as far as the Italian front. •The German commentator (von Hammer) tonight said: “Twenty Russian infantry divisions and five or six tank brigades are now attacking the German lines west of the Danube.” Marshal Stalin’s Order of the Day revealing the capture of Eger and Skizszo means that the Russians have cut the railway from Miskolcz to Zosice which leaves the Germans only one route from Miskolcz —the highway north-westward—because the Russians already contain Miskolck on three sides.

Reuter’s Moscow correspondentjsays that the Russians, with the capture of Eger, have eliminated one of the two last remaining enemy bastions in north-east Hungary (Miskolcz is the last) and, added that Marshal Malinovsky is continuing his object of disrupting enemy communication system between Hungary and Czechoslovakia preparatory to a grand assault against Budapest. The Hungarian town of Eger has been taken by Soviet forces, announces Marshal Stalin in an Order of the Day. Eger is an important communications and defence centre, 65 miles east-north-east of Budapest.

Likely New Defence Line According to Moscow correspondents. General Tclbukhin’s offensive in Southern Hungary, west of the Danube, is givingfresh indications ■ that - the German Command will be forced into a new defence line along the-south-eastern front. This line may run from an area of Trieste through Vienna, across the Bohemian plateau to Warsaw and East Prussia. More and more Russians arc crossing the Danube where semi-permanent bridgeheads, strongly protected from the air, are now established. “Battles arc continuing,” was the terse flash from General Tolbukhin’s Danube bridgehead toda:> r . Reports on the course of the battle so far make it plain that the Germans are sparing no effort to hold up the Russians fanning-out across Western Hungary, . • Many Places Captured

The Russians in Czechoclovakia captured 30 places today, says a Soviet communique. The Russians in Hungary north-east, and south cf Pecs captured 50 places including Ocseny, 22 miles north of Mohacs and Pecsvarad' eight miles north-east of Pecs besides’ eight railway stations. The Russians and' Yugoslavs in Yugoslavia captured Ihe railway junction of Kraljevo.