CALAIS UNSAFE

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVI, Issue 23013, 3 October 1944, Page 5

CALAIS UNSAFE

Streets Heavily Mined

(8.15 p.m.) LONDON, Oct. 2. Calais is heavily mined, and it is unsafe to walk on pavements or drive jeeps in the streets, reports the correspondent of the British United Press after a .tour of the town. Tire heaviest damage is concentrated around the German headquarters, which were in a block of flats in which Colonel Schoerner had a luxurious suite. There was a large reinforced concrete shelter behind the flats containing 50 bunks and office equipment. The remains of uneaten meals and empty champagne and cognac bottles were also found. The German staff was transferred there during the siege. The Calais correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph” says that several hundred German prisoners were lined up in the main square awaiting > noval. They, were all freshly shaved, and showed no signs of hunger. Calais was strongly fortified with many concrete forts and blockhouses in which a stouter garrison might have put up a sterner defence than the Canadians met.

Canadians who captured Brecht also liberated Baer-le-Duc, six miles northwest of Turnhout. Allied forces in the area have advanced two miles west. A heavy enemy counter-attack in the Huisen area is being held, the enemy having made no ground. The corresp'ndent of Reuter’s says that forward units of the United States Third Army advanced several miles and occupied high ground six miles north-west of Chateau Salins. Activity elsewhere on „iie Moselle front is confined to artillery duels and patrol activity. Many fires still raging in the centre of Calais are spreading for lack of water and firefighters, says the correspondent of the British United Press. Canadian casualties in the battle of Calais were comparatively light. The Tactical Air Force on Sunday closely supported the Canadians in the Dunkirk area with attacks on strongpoints, gun emplacements and ammunition dumps, says a communique from Tactical Air Force Headquarters in Belgium.

The “Daily Express” expresses the opinion that this is the beginning of an all-out assault on Dunkirk.