EYE-WITNESS’ VIEW

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 255, 28 October 1939, Page 3

EYE-WITNESS’ VIEW

\M.ST FRONT < AMEO I VIVID ACCOUNT OF FIERCE FIGHTING LONDON. Sept. 23. I’he iir>i eye-witness story from the .Wc-lern Fi on;, hv Hector Mai’sdcnjSmedlev. an English woman journalist, 'was published this week in lhe London ’ Sundav Express. From Schengen, on the Luxcm- ■ bourg-Gcrman frontier, she writes. • Standing amid the near-ripe vines which make the famous Moselle wine. I have been watching tierce lighting . in this three-cornered country, where Ge; many, Fi ance, and Luxembourg 1 meet. i French tanks left the German village of Perl and clambered up the hih. | The bombardment was two kilometre.-, away from where I was standing, the objective being an observation lower iin a fortified wood. There were great (puffs of black smoke over the wood, lhe sound following seconds latci, echoing and shaking through the vaL 1 Aftcj each ten minutes of heavy tiring their followed quick, fierce, mai chine-gun lire. The ground a few yards beyond lhe river was suddenly rent by shells. A house in the Gcrjman village of Salmdorf blew sky 'high, probably an ammunition stere. 1 The smell of powder was overpower- ’ ing. Old peasant men unconcerned went ‘ion hoeing, save when they .stopped ’for a moment to say “good-bye’’ tc 1 1 tearful women evacuated from tin i Luxembourg village of Schengen. ( whore Germans earlier blew up the .Luxembourg-owned bridge. Lorries ; now rushing extra guards to the neutral frontier are returning laden with j women and children, washing, chick- ' ens, ducks, mattresses. The Luxembourg Customs ollic-ci, . out of a job for the moment, for thesis little frontier tiattic, tells me ihut ’ he watched the French, a few duy- ' before, penetrate along the railvva.y line opposite. There had been hand-to-hand lighting. Tnen the French had I gone back, “not retreated,'' he em■j phasised just gone back, , As he spoke no gripped mv col lai . and pushed me down. 1 swallowed a 1 mouthful of sand as the world burst [ about, my oars. J peeped cautiously I round the sandbags. A mine had ov- . ploded in the middle of the permanent J way across the river. In a few I moments I saw the guard across the t river doubled, and a machine-gun . mounted upon the bridge with iij t squad <>f grey uniformed tin-hatteu i men. n There has been an as yet. unreported violation of Luxembourg neutrality s further along the River Moselle. /. - dozen German pigs swam across from f their shore and scrambled into Lux- - embourg. Their excuse was that when i j the villages opposite had been suo 4 denly evacuated at an hour’s notice - thev’ together with cattle and poultry, had been lett untended. Pigs .swim, so over they came. lh< - Luxermourgers interned them al r right. Being extremely kind-hearted - and well fed folk, they returnei 1 some of lhe pork to their neighbour? r : when a few came back and demanded -|jt. But they did it with outspokei 1 expressions and emphasis OP their lack ’ of welcome for German pigs.