Germans Retreat Under Heavy Bombardment

Southland Times, Issue 23921, 13 September 1939, Page 7

Germans Retreat Under Heavy Bombardment

NAZI DRIVE TO SURROUND POLISH CAPITAL (United Press Association —Telegraph Copyright) (Received September 12,10,15 p.m.) WARSAW, September 11. The Warsaw radio station announced that the defenders had beaten off strong German attacks to the south-west and north. Aeroplanes had machine-gunned men, women and children in the streets. German radio bulletins support the Polish claims. The Germans retreated in the suburbs under a heavy bombardment.

A Polish communique says that German attempts to break the defences along the Narew and Bug were frustrated, the Polish second line liquidating raids designed to destroy communications. The communique added that the Pomorze army was withdrawing to the south-east and had engaged the enemy in an attempt to join the main army between the Vistula and Bug rivers. The Poznan army was fighting the Germans between Kutno and Warsaw. The Berlin correspondent of The New York Times outlines the principal German advances on the Polish front today as follows:—

North and west of Warsaw, where it is reported that between eight and 12 Polish divisions are fighting desperately to break through the Kutno and Radom sectors, The biggest battle of the war is being fought. The Polish fortress at Modlin, on the banks of the Vistula, north of Warsaw, is holding out against a German push directed south from Ciechanow. The most important German drives are coming from the Narew and Bug rivers sector north-east of Warsaw and the Lodz and Radom sectors south-west of Warsaw. Thus from the north and south two German armies are driving towards each other. When they meet the bottleneck will be tightly closed and Warsaw surrounded. The Germans now firmly established on the southern bank of the Bug river are driving south. North of them East Prussian troops captured Lomza and reached Nowgorod and Wizna. Rain is reported in Poland, according to a message from Paris.