The Daily Alaska empire Newspaper, January 8, 1944, Page 1

THE DAILY ALASKA EMPIRE “ALL THE NEWS ALL THE TIME” VOL. XLIL, NO. 9544. UNEAU, ALASKA, SATURDAY, JANUARY 8, 1944 MEMBER ASSOCIATED PRESS PRICE TEN CENTS SAN VITTORIO CAPTURED BY U.S. FORCES Allies Bombing Jap Troop, Supply Barges 30 VESSELS SENT DOWN | ORDAMAGED Wldespread Aflacks Being! _ Made in South and Southwest Pacific ALLIED HEADQUARTERS IN NEW GUINEA, Jan. 8—Allied air- men hunting Japanese troop and supply barges in the south and southwest Pacific have sunk or damaged 30 vessels, killing or wounding hundreds of the enemy. Widespread attacks on barges does not indicate this traffic, on which the enemy depends almost exclusively for reinforcing supplies for defense, have increased lately but rather conditions have now be- come favorable for Allied planes to hunt them ‘down instead of concen- trating attacks on barge staging points. Fighting in the Borgen Bay sector | on Cape Gloucester, New Bntmn.‘ invasion area, has fallen into a lull, with American and Japanese mtung' each other only intermittently. &= Marine lines have remained un- changed after a week of savage attacks and counter-attacks on both (Continued on rage Two) ———.———— The Washington Merry - Go-Round By DREW PEARSON | [ (Mafor Robert 8. Allen on sctive duty.) WASHINGTON — Don't be sur- prised if the railroads remain in Black Sea VITAL NARROW S_Close-up map shows details of Istan- bul, Scutari and the Bosporus, strategic waterway nununx Eurone from Asia at the outlet of the Black Sea, ” Nazis Now on Road o Bombing Ruin; Warfare Has Smashed Fadories MRS. HOOVER %5 AP Features LONDON, Jan. 8. — Behind the pxomxae of Air Marshal Sir Arthur | Harris to “emasculate” 90 centers RED TROOPS AREPOURING INTOPOLAND 'Swift Advances Made, All| Sectors—Fierce Fight- ing in Kirovograd BULLETIN — LONDON, Jan. 8. — Korovograd, the industrial and rail center of the Dnieper bend, has been captured. Stalin, according to a Moscow radio broadcast, made this an- noncement tonight in an Order of the Day. ! MOSCOW, Jan. 8—Troops of the First and Second Ukrainian armies poured through great gaps in the | German lines in swift advances. | The units which surrounded Kir- |ovograd have smashed three miles |into the city in one place, in the Dnieper bend country the Red win-| ter offensive continued their up= surge, and advance units of the | force which captured Klesow are! plunging deeper into Rovno Prc-‘ vince of old Poland. i The German High Command said | —lin their Saturday communique that; fierce fighting is raging in Kirovo- |grad, and front line dispatches said i the fate of the German garrison is already decided. | Farther south some Soviet forces! |have lunged forward to within 18 miles of Dolinovka, western rail- |way junction which feeds Krivoi |Rog. Ludwig Sertorious, Nazi military & analyst declared the Soviet offen- - sives are “not to be underrated in their menace.” B ‘ONE LIFE IS LOST ‘When Roosevelt Goes NAVY PARADE ‘DOWN UNDER’—In a Trafalgar celebration in Melbourne, Aus- Iulh, memhers of the Royal Austnllnn Navy parade Mth fixed buvnneu. GAS WORKS AnywhereWhiteHouse CITY GETS Is Taken Along Also\ DEATHBLOW Chemual Center of Lud- wigshafen Complefely Flattened Qut BY JACK STINNETT WASHINGTON, Jan. 8. — When| the President came back from Te-| heran, Cairo, et al, one of the sil-| liest questions asked him was how | he managed “to function as Presi- | dent” that far from the boundaries| L |of the U. S. A. | LONDON, Jan. 8—British wood-| 1 say the question w silly be- en Mosguito bombe! raiding Ger- cause about all it got was a snick- many for the seventh consecutive! ‘er from the s corps in attend- night, hit targets in western Rclch lance and a broad grin from the last night without ioss, in the wake! President and a recocking of his of strong American daylight attacks long cigarette holder to three- quar-| [which, reports from Sweden said, LEG QUEEN AMERICANS AREMOVING ON CASSINO Strong Defen—se 10 Miles from Rome Are Now Being Atfacked ALLIED HEADQUARTERS IN ALGIERS, Jan, 8—The victorious American troops massed around and captured San Vittore, forming a spearhead to- storm ‘outer defenses of Cassino, 70 miles from Rome. The fall of the fiercely defend- ed little mountain village was dis- closed for the first time yesterday as Assoclated Press correspondent Don Whitehead sent a dispatch from the front. He said San Vit- toric was seized Thursday after a violent 44 hour house to house battle in the village six miles from Cusslna. The capture was later confirmed |in a communique from Headquar- |ters which said the Fifth Army ad- vanced all along the ten mile front in the. jagged hills. Today the Americans are fight- mg in the streets of Giusto, tiny village. The Eighth Army, half a mile north across the peninsula, is en- gaged in strong patrol activity. Allied bombers have pounded the |airfield at Perugia, central Italy, ‘and blasted an aircraft factory at | Maribor, Northern Yugoslavia, have |struck the rialway yards at Fiume, | northeastern Italy and lashed ship- iping on the Yngnsluv coast. GERMAN ~ RAIDER of German war production there lies | ter mast |gave the chemical city of Ludwig- the hands of the Government for the duration. There is one factor pointing strongly in this direction. Dave Robertson, chief of the rail- yoad firemen and enginemen, to- gether with Tom Cashen of the switchmen and H. W. Fraser of me conductors, held a secret meeting in which they decided to demand better terms than the compromise proposal offered by the Presxdem‘ as Federal, arbiter. Also, there was \ talk of calling another strike when the railroads were returned to i-| vate operation—if the wage wrmsl weren't met. I That is why the railroads may be kept in the hands of the Govern- ment—at least until the three rebel unions definitely agree on a wage settlement. | It didn’t leak out at the time, but two brotherhood leaders staged a terrific row during one phase of the negotiations, and J. J. Pelley, rep- resenting the railroad operators, had to pacify them. | It happened after A. F. Whitney, head of the trainmen, accepted Roosevelt's offer to act as arbiter. In the presence of the other brother- | hood chiefs and the railroad exe utives, Dave Robertson launched; L stream of abuse at Whitney, accus- ing him of trying to curry lavon with the President. Whitney shot back that it would not only hurt the nation, but be suicide *for the brotherhoods to carry their strike threat too far in wartime. LABOR COLONELS The War Department didn’t an- nounce it, but Lt. Gen. B. B. Somer- vell offered colonel’s commissions to both Whitney and Alvanley John- ston, of the locomotive engineers, who accepted the President’s arbi- tration and were appointed labor advisers to the Army. Somervell‘ suggested that they become colonels. They promptly vetoed the idea, however. “I've got a son who has been a colonel in the Army for a good many years,” replied Whitney. “He| got his eagles the: hard way and I wouldn't insult him by accepting a colonelcy on a silver platter.” Locomotive engineer Johnston echoed the same sentiments. They didn't tell General Somervell, how- PASSES AWAY IN NEW YORK a coelly calculated program of de- | much of which already | struction, has been accomplished. Few cities in the history of war- fare have been smashed as thor- | health. aughly as the port of Hamburg or| -mo industrial center of Cologne. Wife of Former President, Highly Respected Form- er First Lady, Is Dead nnd the shattered cities of Dussel- | dorf, Duisburg, Essen, Mannheim ‘irmd Ludwigshafen furnish stark examples of what the air marshal | meant when he spoke of emascula- | tion. NEW YORK, Jan. 8.—Mrs. Hel-‘ Berlin’s turn came last month. Now thousands of anxious eyes are bert Hoover died last night in an| rd apartment hiere. “The/fafmer Prest- ifted f0 the tky i Siher. Genman ! | | bombardraent of Germany has now {reached a point where even the de- istruction of a pot and pan factory will shorten the war. That is not .to say the war can be won by air power alone. It is rather a state- |ment that the war in the air is !achleving all that its advocates claimed for it. Size of Attacks Increases « The RAF’s heavy bombardment “When are we going to get it?” but, “When are we going to get it again —like Berlin?" The highest circles in the Royal IAir Force believe that the aerial | lis done at night and its technique iis saturation. It pours an over- |whelming load of high explosives |and incendiary bombs on one spot in ithe shortest possible time. If the attack is successful, there should be nothing left of the target area when | . the big four-engined Lancasters and Halifaxes and Stirlings go home. | All this year the size of the at- dent was at the bedside at his wife’s | tacks has been increasing, not only passing. because the RAF has more planes Death came unexpectedly and as ‘but because authoritatively it has the result of a sudden attack of the discovesed the bigger the force it heart, and took place in the Wal- can put into the air the less its dorf Towers apartment. The Hoov- percentage of loss becomes. Great ers had just returned from a con- forces of bombers can overwhelm the cert and she appeared in good present German anti-aircraft de- fense. The RAF has not announced Her sons, Allan, a California percentage losses, but they are re- rancher, and Herbert, Jr.. radio en- | ported unofficially to be phenomen- gineer, have been notified and nrelally small. flying here. i As German cities crumble, the Nazi transportation system breaks From childhood days of mcycling‘up with them. Bombings not only after school along Iowa roads, Lou destroy war plants, but level work- Henry Hoover carried through lnelers homes and send tens of thous- a bent for balancing work and play. jands of Germans wandering through It was perhaps this as much as|the country seeking shelter. © BACHRA MRS. HERBERT HOOVER cities as the population wonders not, IN FIRE ABOARD PRINCE OF WALES { Others of Cre_w- of 17 and { Passengers Saved by i Help of Juneau Craft | KETCHIKAN, Alaska, Jan. 8.— The Coast Guard reports that Sea- man First Class, Kenneth A. Kraft, of Ketchikan Headquarters, is mis- sing following the burning and Isinking last Wednesday at the north end of Chatham Straits, of the Coast Guard freighter Prince of Wales. Others of the crew of 17 and pas- sengers were saved largely through the able help of the motor vessel Stormy Petrel of Juneau. Survivors were landed at Excursion Inlet and Juneau, several coming back here to Ketchikan. | An explosion presumably caus di the fire aboard the 65-foot craft.| | On Thursday, January 6, the Em- | ipire published the story of the “dis- aster to a small Coact Guard cargo vessel in Icy Strait, causing com- plete loss of the vessel.” Thursday ! morning the Empire had the com- plete story of the fire and sinking of the vessel, with the loss of one life, but in deference to the wishes of Lieut. (j.g.) Lance Hendrickson, temporarily in charge of the Coast| Guard Headquarters in Juneau dur- ing the absence of Lt. Caro, did not print the name of the vessel lost as the Coast Guard did not desire that information to become | public then, neither was it men- tioned that one life was lost. Lieut. Hendrickson however di secure authority from the Coa Guard Headquarters in Ketchikan, to publish an article, released and sent to Juneau from the Ketchikan Headquarters, stating fire broke ou’ about 9 am. below decks and quick- ly enveloped the boat, overcoming all efforts of the crew to bring it under control. The commanding of- ficer ordered abandonment of the| boat shortly after and all hands; (Continued on Page Four) (Continued on Page Five) (Continued on Page Two) (Continued on Page Five) From a historical standpoint, the shafen its death blow. question wasn't silly at all. As re-| The Stockholm paper declared cently as when President Wilson that a force of hundreds of Fort- ed off for the Versallles con- resses and Liberators bombed the a former attorney general German poison gas works city, IS SUNK xted that as soon as he got * ‘which now looks completely flat- ACTRESS IS DENIED District Court Judge George Mar- what the White House tells me. 4 shall has denied t ast: of Madge Bellamy, |silent movie days, !Stanwood Murphy, whom she said| Command | married -her, by consent, in 1941. the couple the actress making |to claim to such marriage relation- ship. : | outside the three-mile limit, he was tened out.” | no longer President of the United| Other reports said the twin cl(y States. |of Mannheim was struck in a joint Perhaps he was right. A guy British and American raid. named Lindbergh hadn't flown the| Atlantic then and more than a fy the targets for yesterday and| couple of weeks was record time for last night, but said that during the round-tripping between here and|large scale American operation 42 | the coast of France, without con-| | German fighters were shot down sidering such things as ~lr;pu‘v(-x‘slund 12 bombers and seven fighters| while the President debated wheth-|were lost. The bag raised the total er to sizn or veto bills |of fighters destroyed in the three But times have changed in the major raids of the month to 149.; arter of century since Woodrow| More than 750 other Allied war Wilson took precedent by the Im(-\pluncs delivered daylong attacks’ lock and went abroad. Now, wher- on the invasion coast, and continued ever the President goes the White today for the seventh time In 19 House goes also. |days of such raids. U ! .. ——— | President Roosevelt has traveled !fimething like 290,000 miles in ma;FURlOUGH plA" years as chief executive. And| ADVO(AIED fOR MEN OVERSEAS never once has there been any ser-| Jlous contention that he didn’t have | the White House, so to speak, in| his hip pocket. At Teheran, as a matter of fact, I WASHINGTON, Jan, 8 — Amid |reports the Army is moving relief | troops to isolated outposts, the Sen- ate Democrats and Republicans {have joihed in urging establishment AP Features Blonde movie actress Leslie Brooks has the most beautiful legs in America, say the Hosiery Designers of America: ankle, 8¢ inches; calf, 13'; inches; knee, 14 inches; lower thigh, 17 inches; upper thigh, 20'% inches. HERDIVORCE PLEA; NEVER MARRIED 'he was closer to 1,600 Pennsylvuma} Iavenue than he has been on sever- al fishing junkets in less turbu- ¢ days. Sometimes, then, it took| {a week or ten days to find um President and get an answer from | {him. At Teheran, Cairo, Malta PR LAl s 3 for battle |DOh](h en ‘route, the President Wasl o cion-(0NE OVErschs, | Senator Robert Taft told a r never more than three days uw&y;pmw, Ko Canabid tha trasiBanst !from a hand to hand message from| v Yaiould s P! ; " | Washington and he actually signe il e P p'"‘"“:"*] or | bills four days after they were pass-( 0" ‘{l"; BF {JOsh R0, aye LAS VEGAS, . Nevada, Jan. B—led by Congress. At least, that's sew‘“: east two years in forelgn| 1 he divorce sult| Somewhere in the history of avia- | , COngress has heard informally the film star of the tion, there should be a little foot. | ATy has already acted to replace against Albert note about how the Air Tramport]zn"ym"‘"”wm in-Alaska and the kept the President in ,ntn bean Islands and other out- iclose contact with Washington "% The decision handed down holds while he was almost half way was never married. around the world. Every few hours| ;’f"”“‘ let ong man out of four re is no community property in-lof those days when the President|’® desisnated froi d unit to come volved. The decision also restrained was hobnobbing with Chiang Kai- :mme for a month or more and cn| any reference shek, President Inonu of T urkey’ | na' return, another soldier would be Vand Premier Joset Stalin, a port-|5\VeD leave |folio was laid at his right elbow. It .- The highest clouds are 50 miles above the earth. - e BUY WAR BONDS (Continued on Page Two) The communique failed to identi-| Senator Taft suggested a rotation | {Combmed U S.-Brazilian t Units on South Atlanfic Blast Su&ly Carrier , RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan. 8.—The | Brazilian Government News Service announced that combined units of |the United States and Brazilian Ifleets sank a German surface raid- jer in the South Atlantic. The announcement quotes Capt. . E. Blaine, Chief of Staff of the Unn.ed States South Atlantic fleet 'at Revipe saying patrols located the raider which was carrying war sup- plies to Germany from Japan. After an intensive search, the units of both the Brazilian and U. 8. fleets sent . their Aviation Arm against the raider and it was sent down. M S S B JET PROPELLED | AIRCRAFT PROVES ITS EFFICIENCY NEW YORK, Jan. 8—The jet propelled aircraft, with terrific {spced, has proven its efficiency at great altitudes and will be a “high- \ly important tactical weapon” against the Axis and it may even be used in the expected inyasion |of Europe from the West, Majoy Alexander Deseversky predicted to- day. ! The noted aeronautical engineer- designer and air warfare strategist, |explaind in an interview, the prin- ciples of its use and estimated that it might double the speed of ordin- |ary planes but believed for the pre- {sent it will not be used to any great extent, Its long sustained flying ability might help in “flash performance” enabling heavy bombers to take off easier with heavier loads or in cata- pulting from carriers.