The Stars and Stripes
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TO HAVE AND TO HOLD MAN SPRICHT DEUTSCH SEATTLE—Louis Coleman sought a refund on his marriage license, explain- THE Ich nehme das Zimmer oben . ing that he and his girl were still in mures Ish nayme das Tsimmer oben. love, but still in jail, too. Daily Newspaper of 0.5. Armed Forces in the European Theatern>f Operation I take the room upstairs. ONE FRANC TEN PFENNIG Volume 1, Number 3 New York — STRASBOURG — Paris Wednesday, December 6, 1944 3rd Cuts Into Siegfried Defenses Selestat Taken A Tank Destroyer Battery 750,000 Nazis Captuied Saarlautern Falls Since D-Day Landings Behind as Push in Houseto House; SHAEF, Dec. 6 — The six Allied armies- now fighting on the western front—four of them inside Germany— Basin Makes Gain have taken more than 750,000 prison- 7th Batters on ers since D-Day, June 6, it was an- nounced here yesterday. This is an The U. S. 3rd Army completed the capture of Saarlautern yesterday and, By ED CLARK average of 4,000 a day. fanning out a mile and a half north Stars and Stripes Staff Writer Meanwhile, an AP correspondent of the Saar Basin's second most im- ADVANCED 6TH ARMY GROUP reported that six divisions had been portant city, was knifing deeper into HEADQUARTERS, Dec. 6 — The U. S. eliminated since Nov. 16 in the fight- the outer defenses of the Siegfried 7th Army won the three-day bitter ing east of the Aachen gap in Ger- Line. Smashing farther into Ger- battle for Selestat today, squeezing Al- many. Four of them no longer exist as many's rich Saar region, other unita military entities, while the remaining lied pincers still tighter on partially of Lt. Gen. George S. Patton's left encircled German positions west of the two are so badly decimated that they flank hammered another bridgehead no longer count as divisions. He aiso Rhine on the central Alsatian Plain. across the Saar River midway between Forced to fight for Selestat from said no German division on the whole Saarlautern and Saarbrucken, 12 miles western front, with a few exceptions house to house against well-entrenched southeast. By this morning his troops tank-supported infantry, American as SS outfits, had »anything like full held a firm mile-long bridgehead on doughfeet, tanks and TD's cleared the strength« in personnel or equipment. the east bank. old walled city of Germans early in With 3rd Army forces less than six the morning and pushed on. and a half miles from the region's The Selestat success came just a day capital city of Saarbrucken, it was_ after other doughfeet had beaten their Americans Smash announced that Patton's artillery had way out of the central Vosges to cap- been shelling the rich industrial prize ture the town of Ribeauville and puts for a week, tossing in over 6,000 shells the Americans in strength fewer than at a rate of 36 an hour. 10 miles north of Colmar, the only **.,5 Berlin in Daylight; Saarlautern was the first important remaining large Alsatian city still German city to fall to the 3rd Army heldij^y the Germans. A massed line of American tank destroyers here lets loose a hammering broadside against German positions on the 5th Army front in Italy. On that in the mounting intensity of the fight- Allied pressure was also applied Down 91 Fighters ing along a 50-mile front from the in- from the south and west on the stead- southern front, 90 mm. ack-ack battalions, as well as tank destroyer units, have frequently been employed for long periods to batter away at mountain- dustrial German city of Merzig south- ily shrinking German pocket between east to Sarre-Union, in Lorraine. It the Selestat and Mulhouse areas as side emplacements where the Kraut had dug himself into solid rock. American heavy bombers returned ; 1 a yesterday to Berlin for the first day- was the 95th Division which captured French 1st Army troops made more Saarlautern after seizing the Saar substantial gains in the southern Vos- light raid in two months, dumping 2,000 tons of explosives and incen- River bridge which connects the east- ges southeast of Gerardmer. ern . and western halves of the city. Gen. Jean de Lattre de Tassigny's Big Noise, Also Horsemeat, diaries into a tank factory and muni- tions plant in the outskirts of the city North of Saarlautern, other troops of forces have seized 4,461-meter high Mt. the 95th widened a previous bridge- Hohneck, second highest peak in the and on other targets ins'ide the Nazi Finally Routs Mutzig Nazis capital. head across the Saar to a mile and a Vosges, and dominate the region east of half. Lac Blanche, from where they add The 500 Fying Fortresses and Lib- By WADE JONES erators, escorted by 800 hard-hitting To the right of the 95th, at least another and perhaps a final threat five other American divisions were to the German bulge west of the Stars and Stripes Staff Writer P-47 Thunderbolts, ran into some Train Leaves as GI Sees rough opposition from hitherto shy picking up speed again after a week Rhine. MUTZIG, Dec. 6—A horsemeat diet, of ferocious counterattacks. Resistance At the northern end of the 7th Army Allied firebombs and 7,000 pounds of Luftwaffe fighters. The escorting Wife 1st Time in 3 Yeais fighters and bomber gunners shot was still strong, but they were steadily front, limited gains have been made TNT today had proved too much -for gaining ground toward /the Siegfried in the last 24 hours in the American 85 German soldiers who for some 10 down 91 of them against a loss of 12 NOWATA, Okla., Dec .8—En rwtrtr! American Jighter» and 22 bombers. Line and the German side of the fron- drive along "both eastern'and western days held"-out hr-'a -toflrop-•fertTess- tier from Lorraine. Their wheuitng slopes of the Lower Vosges. to a camp in Texas after three years here, 16 miles behind the Allied Rhine Eleven of the fighter pilots, however, in the Pacific, Sgt. Floyd W. Roberts got back to friendly terrjtory. movement from the right was even Harried by the standard enemy River front. more menacing than any previous at- bookful of delaying tactics, including looked out the window as his train The last of the hungry, explosive- Other American bombers attacked stopped in Nowata, his home town. tacks toward the river. liberal use of Schu mines, detailed deafened Boche came out with their the big railway center at Munster, in The 80th, resuming the offensive road demolitions and just-around-the- He saw his wife descend from the hands behind their heads yesterday northwestern Germany. train unknowing that for three hours after a wfeek of counterattacks, was corner fire from SP guns, doughfeet after part of their isolated garrison The U. S. attacks were part of an six and a half miles from Saarbrucken have fought into and cleared the little they had been in different cars. There had made a break for it night before intensified campaign to disrupt Ger^ was time only for a quickly kissed yesterday. On its right, the 6th Ar- town of Wingen, which controls the last. man industries and communications mored was two miles short of Forh- Moder River pass and the main road hello-goodbye before the train pro- The attempt to fight through encir- supplying Nazi troops fighting on the ceeded. bach, on the French side of the fron- over the Vosges, between Sarre-Union cling Yank infantrymen was made at Cologne plain. Munster is 90 miles (Continued on Page 4) and Hagenau. Mrs. Roberts had been returning 2100 hours Tuesday by part of the northeast of the center of the Cologne Meanwhile, the tiny but dramatic from a visit in Bangor, Maine. There trapped forces, operating in groups of plain battleground. battle of Mutzig, which had been go- was a ray of hope, though—Roberts six or seven. RAF Lancasters Monday night re- ing on for days deep in the Allied rear was due for a furlough. The resultirig battle on the wind, Russians 50 Miles just west of Strasbourg, came to a newed their battering attacks oft the storon-ripped plateau accounted for still greater communications center of close as the German garrison :ashed two Germans killed, seven wounded in their chips. Hamm, 22 miles southeast of Munster. Tac Planes Hit Traffic and a score or so captured. One of Hamm is the best equipped rail center By-passed in the rapid U. S. break- our men was killed and six were From Austria Line through over the Vosges, the high in Germany, and it serves the rich, in- wounded. dustrial Ruhj Valley. Three German ground at.Mutzig had been turned into On Rhine Ahead of 7th A captured captain was sent back MOSCOW, Dec. 6 — Russian troops a miniature Metz by the Germans. fighters were shot down there, and driving through west-central Hungary into the sunken, moat-encircled fort one British bomber was lost. Never a threat to Allied communica- TWELFTH TACTICAL AIR COM- to bring out the rest. They came, have taken two towns on the eastern tions or even to troops in the adjoin- MAND, pec. 6 — Thunderbolt fighter- hands high and behind, s o m J nine Yesterday's double-barreled attacks shore of Lake Baloton, the 50-mile- ing area, the hilltop fortress had nev- bombers buzzed through low-hanging hours later. followed a day in which 4,000 Ameri- long lake which guards the approach ertheless managed to make itself a clouds and rain squalls today ahead The enemy decision to fight their can and British planes slugged Ger- to the Austrian border, last night's nuisance by its determined holdout.