NAZI BARBARITY

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21219, 16 September 1940, Page 7

NAZI BARBARITY

ATTACK ON PALACE ESCAPE OF ROYALTY DELAYED=ACTION BOMB (United Press Asn.—Elec. Tel. copyright) LONDON, Sept. 15 Representatives of the press who were invited to Buckingham Palace yesterday saw the evidence of Friday morning's deliberate attack on Their Majesties and their home. A German pilot who dived from the clouds through the balloon barrage, released six bombs from a height of 1000 ft., and again disappeared in the clouds, failed by a miracle to bring murder and devastation to the Palace. Apart from a bomb which hit and completely wrecked the Royal Chapel, the damage resulting from this cold-blodcd assault was less than that which a time-bomb caused earlier in the week, but three bombs which landed in the inner quadrangle barely missed the Palace proper. If they had landed a few feet either to the right or the left, Buckingham Palace would be mostly in ruins today. The explosion caused craters in the quadrangle and a water main burst, throwing up a cascade of water.

Police and soldiers piled a mountain of sandbags around a delayedaction bomb which fell on Friday between Buckingham Palace gates and the Queen Victoria memorial. It exploded at 3.40 a.m. on Saturday, and wrecked a massive stone pillar and a section of the Palace railings. The Queen Victoria memorial was not damaged. Pressman’s Story of Outrage The representative of the Australian Associated Press who visited Buckingham Palace today saw torn metal railings fronting the Mall and an ugly crater in the quadrangle, 10ft deep and 18ft across. At least 100 windows had been shattered around the court. “ One bomb had made a large hole in the south-west corner, through which I found it a simple matter to enter the Palace vaults,” says the correspondent. “ The Diplomats’ Corridor, through which countless debutantes have filed, received the full blast of a bomb. It looked more like a cloister than a corridor, but among the priceless paintings covering almost every inch of the walls I found only one badly torn, namely, a portrait of the Duchess of Cambridge by an early Victorian artist. A strangly ugly portrait of the Tsar of Russia, which. King Edward VII described as ‘ a portrait thrown on a landscape,’ was directly in the path of one explosion, but was unharmed. Some other canvases were spattered with dirt and rubble from the quadrangle. Ghastly Heap of Masonry “ There were three casualties among the workmen sheltering under the chapel, which is considered beyond * repair. A bomb dropped neatly mrough the roof. It left the walls standing, but completely wrecked the floor, and the altar, together with all the priceless sacred emplems and furnishings on it, crashed in a ghastly heap of masonry. “ A Bible, in which intimate details of the lives of all the members of the Royal Family were entered, was found not even torn under the heap of debris, but the lectern on which the Bible had rested could not be found.”

The priceless Gobelins tapestry depicting the baptism of John the Baptist still hangs unharmed on the wall over where the altar stood, says a British official message. Hidden away in the debris was the famous mother-of-pearl cross which stood on the altar. Buried in Pile of Rubble The King’s Colour of the Third Scots Guards on its standard attached to a cream and gold pillar also stands undamaged among the ruins, but a regimental colour which stood beside it was buried in the pile of rubble. In the gallery the King’s pew is undamaged. Only a jagged hole roughly two feet square in the beautiful coffered gilt ceiling shows where the 1001 b bomb tore through it to burst just before the altar rail. Attempted Murders “The bombing of Buckingham Palace was obviously carried out under orders,” says the Daily Mail. “The Germans planned the capture of Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands and tried to murder King Haakon of Norway from the air. Such attempts to assassinate the heads of States are part of the calculated policy of the Berlin barbarians. “The first stage of this spiritual offensive against the British people is to drive the King from his capital. Such a victory has been denied them. The bombing, in the King’s own words, ‘ only strengthens the resolution of all of us to fight through to Anal victory.’ ” New Zealand House Re-occupied New Zealand House, which was evacuated earlier in the week owing to the presence of unexploded timebombs near by, has been reoccupied.