TOULON REPORTED FREE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 88, Issue 201, 23 August 1944, Page 5

TOULON REPORTED FREE

FRENCH ENTER THE CITY MARSEILLES SERIOUSLY THREATENED Reed. 11.45 p.m. London, Aug. 22. Algiers radio has announced that French troops of the Allied Seventh Army have liberated Toulon, the great naval base on the French Mediterranean coast. Allied headquarters in the Mediterranean, however, have not yet admitted that the naval base is free. The latest official reports say that Toulon has been strongly invested by Allied troops, but the Germans are resisting fiercely, and it may be some time before the city is liberated. Allied headquarters also announced to-day that Marseilles is seriously threatened. Reports from, the southern region of France say that the Allied campaign is ahead of schedule. Contact is being made with tiie French Maquis, which are aiding in a very practical way, the progress of invasion. French Forces of the Interior have freed Toulouse, the big French city near the Spanish border.

AHEAD OF SCHEDULE Recd. 8.20 p.m. London, Aug. 22. Allied leaders are not concealing the fact that they are far ahead o, schedule in southern France, says the Columbia Broadcasting System's correspondent at Mediterranean headquarters. Allied troops are moving so fast | that forward field commanders are improvising strategy as they proceed. There it a standing order to all Allied troops that captured guns and ammunition are to be left at the disposal ot the Maquis. In nearly eveay town captured in southern France the Maquis have taken control of local government. Vichy officials have been placed in prison to await formal trial. The correspondent added that a new German radio station, replacing the Paris-Vichy networks, has given as its editorial address Charlottenburg, which is the headquarters of the German radio network. The Swiss radio, quoting a report from southern France, says the Allies are only 10 miles from the Italian frontier and the French Forces of the Interior have liberated Lyons. Evidence that the Allied landings in southern France took the Germans by surprise increases as more ground is captured, states Reuter's correspondent with the Seventh Army. The Germans had actually established formidable defences along the whole landing coast, but the Allies found the positions abandoned. Partisans say the Germans withdrew a week before the landing. It seems they expected the landings elsewhere and abandoned most of the coast defences in the beachhead area to reinforce other points. A Rome war correspondent says the entry into Toulon was effected through the suburbs of Les Quatre Chemins, Les Routes and Vai Bourdin after a partial sweep had been made around the nhval port and the citv. The Americans fanning out from Rian are at one point 12 miles north of Aix.

An Exchange Telegraph correspondent says the Americans’ westward advance into the Durance Valley is mostly against disorganised German resistance. Fast-moving columns were on both sides of Perlins on Sunday afternoon and others were pushing on several miles north-east *o( Aix, also into the outskirts of the tow n. TOULOUSE FREED TAKEN BY FRENCH FORCES OF INTERIOR RISE Reed. 6 p.m. London, Aug. 21. Toulouse, commercial and railway centre of south-western France, has been in the hands of French Forces of the Interior since yesterday morning. says a communique from French headquarters in Algiers. Toulouse (population about 200.000) is France’s sixth city and the largest yet liberated in France. The communique adds: “The militia and part of the German garrison at Tarbes haw? surrendered. German garrisons have evacuated Rodez and Aurillac, French Forces of the Interior are holding up a German armoured division attempting to shift northwards.” VICHY MAY BE FREE PETAIN SAID TO BE STILL WAITING THERE London, Aug. 21. A well-known Frenchman who had 'just, left Vicffy by air, told the British J United Press Madrid correspondent that patriots had been in complete control of Vichy for the last 48 hours.' “There is no Government left in France,” he added. “All the Vichy Gardes Mobile, police, gendarmerie, and Petain’s personal guards have joined the F.F.I. Marshal Petain is still in Vichy, but Laval, Deal., Darnand and other members of the Government have disappeared.” The correspondent says that French collaborationists and German deserters are streaming across the French frontier into Spain, and the international bridge at Irun is the scone of the greatest activity since the inrush of French refugees in 1940. A large party of Doriot’s legionnaires have arrived, also some of Darnand’s militia, in addition to groups of uniform German deserters, who appear to be extremely glad to get out.