1940-12-20 — Page 31

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THE CHINA MAIL, DECEMBER 20, 1940

CHINA MAIL

WINDSOR HOUSE

BRITAIN'S INCREASING SUPPORT

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Journey Across Europe

No one will be better pleased thon the German soldiers if Hit ler's plan for invading. Britain is postponed indefinitely. Not from any love of Britain, but just be- cause they would like to stay alive.

I know, because I spent 19 days among them in occupied Brittany and in occupied Touraine.

was trying to escape from Ger- man-cccupied France to Britain in order to carry on our fight. I had

to avoid the Germans.

villages.

I asked our host what it was.

"Oh," he said, "that is the Ger-

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How do the Nazi soldiery face up to the idea of invading Britain?

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They were going around des- troying as best they could the tanks and motorcars and lorries and guns abandoned by the Gormans. A young mechanic led them.

He used to creep right into the villages occupied by the Germans and under the noses of the Ger- man sentries he demolished es-

How do the French people react under sential parts of whatever machines the heel of the Nazi jackboot?

Here the veil is lifted by a Polish officer, Lieutenant Zygmunt Litynski.

Lieut. Litynski was in Vichy in October. He escaped to Spain via Portugal. Thence he travelled to England.

he found there. The soldiers said they were working under orders from the French military authori- ties. But they would not tell us which. That, they said, was a secret.

Another group of French sol-

to surrender: were using an army petrol tanic car as an armoured vehicle, and with this they used to sally forth on raids into villages occupied by, isolated German posts.

Some of the staunchest supporters of the aid-to- Britain movement in the United States are persons I did not seek out the company who formerly were either of the Germans. That would not lukewarm or quite impar-tenant in the Polish army, and have been healthy. I am a lieu- tial in their attitude to with other Polish officers and men

who had been with the French ward the war. This alter- ation in sentiment has been due to recognition of America's position in the world conflict. Recent re- and the peasants and the people But I saw and I heard them. cruits to the anti-Nazi in the chateau who hid us, who Coming from the Battle of Norway, this cause base their new posi-save us food and helped us on our officer, who is also a distinguished Polishdiers who refused

they all tales to tell us tion on moral as well as of the German soldiers in their journalist, fought in the last stages of the political grounds.

Battle of France. He was nearly three weeks Such is the motive ac-

One-night, when we were hid- knowledged by

ing in the burn of a chateau up among the Germans in occupied France. some near the coast, we heard a great threescore of Roman Cat- noise from the village. holics laymen and clergy

-for a recent statement] urging all possible aid

man soldiers. They are celebrat- from the United States loing. They have just received gr- Britain, "lest we be left to think that down in Bordeaux they ders to move to Bordeaux. They

Now Lieut. Litynski is in London. Here face the dictators of will be safe from being used for he tells his astonishing story. Europe and Asia alone." the invasion of England.”

This is a most timely There was a

regiment in St. I have had since I saw the Gor- had seen the German

soldiers, We had plea. The United States Melo who rejoiced openly when mans hold up their hands in sur-throw down their arms.

orders came for them to

render at Narvik. Alas! that seems seen their general flee to the Swe- is speeding up its manu- away from the invasion coast to a century ago!

dish frontier. And now we bar to give in without firing a shot. facture and shipment of the safe South.

The French, defeated, listless. supplies to Britain. It is Not that the Germans in Brit-disorganised and helpless, like a

One section refused to obey machine whose approaching the

mainspring time any were quiet fellows at any

is orders. They fired on the Gar- shattered. The German soldiers, mans Une. By the time my little party

ard then slowly

retired when it may have to con and I had got galely out the Ger- arrogant and swaggering in their through the forest. I don't know

of dewhat became of them. sider placing its ships mans had drunk up all the chain once more in traffic be- page in the country. Champagne,

sauerkraut (chou-dulgence in the gross pleasures of tween American and Bri-Leute garnie) wus and is the fav- victory. The Spaniards, hungry tish

Curite order of the German sol- and disunited, living among the ports. But mean-

ruins of their civil war without diers in the cafes when they can while the seas

on which get it. And the sweeter the cham- the energy to rebuild. American supplies must bgne the better. travel, and American ships may soon have to venture, are becoming daily more dangerous be- cause of the U-boat men-

ace.

sausages and

They did not attack the Ger- mars. They just took their food at the point of the machine-gun and their ammunition, and therf returned to their hideouts. The Germans let them go. They did not want any trouble. I was amazed to see how dispersed and isolated many of the German posts were. It would have been easy to organise ឌ movement against

them. move

I have seen quite enough of the Germans in their new role as the

masters of France. For after the 19 days which 1 spent hopping across fields and through woods

Important and heart-in occupied France, watching from ening as is the

triumph, but in danger moralisation from excessive in-

And now the British, the only one of these peoples that I have seen that really seem to know what this wer is about. @ghting with a strength and a cold calm, soldiers and civilians alike.

We saw the Germans enter the village. They drove right past us on their lorries sitting there on their benches row by row, wood- en, cxpressionless, like policemen.

A captain asked the mayor: "Are there any English around here?" And then they all drove on in the direction of Brest. The Germans were always asking for the whereabouts of British troops. The French they just ignored.

Breton

peasants helped us in our get-away. The walls of their hedges and ditches the German When we arrived in Brest on own houses were plastered with tremen-fantry columns roll by in their June 15 on our return from Nar-posters from the German army dous victory in the Medi-lorries never once did I'sce Ger- vik the streets were full of strag authorities often stuck on top of

man troops marching-1 spent an- glers. Soldiers in ragged uniforms the old mobilisation posters terranean, the area of other two months and a half lounged around They had no warning them on pain of death submarine warfare and of raids on merchant ship- ping in the North Atlantic off the Irish coast re- mains a crucial one in the present struggle.

dogging the agents of the Gestapo arms and there was no one to lead not to help soldiers to escape. in unoccupied France before them. They had no interest in' could make my dash for Spain anything. and freedom.

But these simple peasants did

not care.

Once, after we had changed into civilian clothes, I found myself in a little town among a crowd of French soldiers just at the mo- ment when two Germans arrived to take it over.

The Germans gave the Hitler salute. Many of the French mutely raised their hands in reply. No one mode a move against the Ger- mans. There was no one to lead them.

But there was great bitterness The peasants were angry because against the Germans everywhere.. there had looting, mostly of champagne and

been a good deal of. bicycles, but also, as at Saumur, of clothing. A German platoon in Saumur paraded the streets in stolen pyjamas.

One old French peasant told me: how his last pig had been taken by a German soldier, who gave him a chit for it. When he pre- sented the chit to the Komman- ddantur for payment they laughed and threw him out. He showed me the chit. It said: "Eln gutes verkel fuer einen guten Bayern." A good pig for a good Bavarian.

The civilians all insisted the It is only three weeks since I war was over. They did not want They were not like the people of1į

capital of unoc-it to go on. They seemed afrail Brest, They wanted the war toʻgo" was in Vichy, cupied France. It seems a year that we should want to fight on on. They gave us news of where ago.

in their city.

the Germans were. They hid us. The most difficult part of our Thay gave Mr. Churchill has ex-

us food. They guided escape was crossing the rivers The contrast between the dif- We tried to find our French us. They gave us the maps out of We used to wait in the bushes tilk plained that one of the ferent nations I have come in con- commanding officer, General their almanacks,

the only a good moment came to rush foremost reasons for the tact with in the last few weeks is Bethouart, of the 1st Light Divi- maps we had.

across the big motor roads. But the the most encouraging experience sion. No one knew where he was.

Paris-Bordeaux road we couldn seriousness of the U-boat]

We had no equipment, only rifles

It was the same whether we cross at all. There was continual warfare against Britain land would be exposed to and a few light autornatics. No went into the cottages of the sim-German traffic on it. In the end

cars or lorries, no anti-tank guns, ple folk or the chateaux of the we found a culvert which ran un lies in the fact that bases bomb attacks should no ammunition for our rifles, no aristocrats.

derneath it, and through this we from which the British Irishmen decide to dedi- telephone or wireless, no medical

crept to the other side. And they were always full of Navy could operate in the cate their naval bases to a

news of the British; "The Eng--

The Loire, too, was closely World War are now de- fight for freedom. There They sent us off by train as welsh are at Amiens," the peasants guarded on both sides.

were on June 17 to take the sector told us with delight and enthus- But just as we were giving up are old and understand-trom St. Malo to Combourg, Arms jasm. "The English are at Dun- hope we came across a little but

would be sent These bases lie in that able grudges. But as com-and equipment

Through a window, we could hear, from Rannes, which, so we were

the B.B.C. news in French being portion of Ireland which pared with the threat to informed, was full of everything, The lord of one of the chateaux broadcast. A forest guard was in is predominantly Roman Eire's sovereignty that is tanks, guns and vast quantities we called at told us full of pride side listening to it with his wife

of how the British had bombed aand three little girls. Catholic. Up to now Mr. implicit in the spread of of munitions and transport.

cross roads on the Paris-Bordeaux de Valera has refused to Naziism, thoughts of any We took up our position and road and had annihilated: a Ger- He took us across the river in

man column.

his rowboat and led us across grant to Britain the right danger of British en

flelds and woods for another seven

nied it.

kit

fortified it. But the supplies did not arrive. The Germans. had taken Rennes in the meantime.

kirk."

It was in a Breton farmhouse (hours. on June 23. in a room with those

1

༔་

to use bases in Southern croachments in the South Ireland. Nor has he pu- must seem romantic to-

The mayors of the villages high peasant beds like cupboards On the fringe of another wood, blicly recognised what is day.

where we had established our in it; that we heard the news of just before nightfall we met an strong points ordered the inhabit the Franco-German becoming clear to many

agreement old peasant woman. "Come in In urging all possible ants to pull down our fortifications: from the portable wireless which boys, she criedi Irishmen elsewhere, that aid to Britain the Irish They, too, did not want us to fight I had bought in Glasgow. Our and have something the interests of an inde- element of Roman Catho-

in their district. ·

General Bohusz covered his head and drink, Only an with his hands, the women sobbed more to go from here and pendent Eire, like those oflicism in America may the German motorised advance

And then at 11 a.m. on June 18 and prayed.

you'll be shut of the Germans." an independent United well do more than urge column was reported

to be ap-

That night we were surrounded | That night there was a wildh States, are bound up with this upon citizens of the proaching. We made ready to by the Germans in a wood. But storm. And under cover of the rais victory over the Nazis If United States. Their stand mobile guards came out ahead of one of the tanks that was search through the forest past, the Go

fight. But they stopped. French we got out by following behind and thunder and wind we crep this means at the moment should help free people the Germans,

ing for us. It made such a clatter man sentries, who were huddling) Britain's victory over the everywhere to clear up They held up their hands above

that no-one heard us.

in their dugouts, across the border ling into unoccupied France. · Nazis, that is not Britain's foggy concepts of Bri-their heads and came towards our fault

advance post. shouting: "DON'T given up the fight

At Chatillon we saw the first tain's present role, and of SHOOT, THE ARMISTICE HAS

French-soldiers with rifles we hadi Ireland's potential place, BEEN SIGNED."

Inaywood where they were seen, for three weeks. We had in a struggle crucial to the As far as fighting in

· [hiding from the Germans like ours | marched 450 miles on foot and we Franceselves. It came acrosa: a› troops of | felt it. future of small States and was concerned that was the und French soldiers in civilian clothes to religious freedom.

Foff our brigade. We hand. – taken with machinesging and full arme Cleuti · Litynukį continues him,

part in the victory of Narvik, woment,

story to-morrow.

Many factors operate to keep Mr. de Valera's posi tion fixed in a static re- fusal to face facts. Ire

"

Not all the French soldiers. had