BRITISH ATTACK ON VENLO

Southland Times, Issue 25538, 5 December 1944, Page 5

BRITISH ATTACK ON VENLO

ENEMY HOLD ON MAAS ALMOST BROKEN SHARP ACTION FOR CONTROL OF VITAL BRIDGE (United Press Association—Telegraph Copyright) Rec. 11.30 p.m.) LONDON, December 4. The German bridgehead on the west bank of the Maas river at Venlo in north-eastern Holland has been virtually wiped out by Lieutenant-General Sir Miles Demsey’s British 2nd Army. Fighting is in progress towards the centre of Venlo and a sharp action is being fought for the control of the main bridge across the Maas. A correspondent at SHAEF states that Allied guns had to quieten heavy German artillery fire from positions across the river. Flail tanks cleared holes for the British troops through a wide belt of mines. The infantry were carried right into the heart of the German defences on the western side of the town by armoured troop carriers. The action is developing with the object of clearing Venlo entirely and preventing the enemy rearguards from escaping over the Maas. In the Aachen gap, the American Ist and 9th Armies on the Roer river line are slowly edging towards Duren, the big communications centre on the Cologne plain about 30 miles from the city. On the southern end of the western front, troops of the French Ist Army, under General de Lattre de Tassigny, are pushing down through the passes of the southern Vosges and have fought a brisk action with a pocket of Germans about 10 miles from Mulhouse on the edge of the Alsace plain. Lieutenant-General G. S. Patton’s infantrymen are receiving the full benefit of the bridge across the Saar river at Saarlautem which they captured in a daring dawn attack, says a correspondent of Reuter’s with the American 3rd Army. Tanks and tank destroyers have already rolled across the river to aid in the fighting in the streets of Saarlautern. Another smaller bridge across the Saar, north of the first one captured, has been destroyed by artillery fire. The 3rd Army’s front in Germany now extends almost 40 miles.