1941-01-31 — Page 3

BOMBED BRITAIN

(Noted American nowspaper man and radio commentator, who spent the first eight months of the war in Serlin, and is now an ob- server in Britain)

for

result this crystalisation of Brit- missus and I have to show

of thirty years of scraping and sav- ish sentiment, this stiffening British morale, resulting from in- ing," he said. "But it's all part in Lon- of the war-and if our boys give discriminate bombings don and other British cities and it back to them in Berlin, it's all

right with us." To a neutral observer, travelling towns, did not surprise me. through the British Isles nown- My experience has

But the poorer districts weren't bombed. A few days, the sight of homes and people who have never been in the only ones

10 be days later, the Nazis bombed the buildings wrecked by German air raids imagine them

much worse than they are in rea- fashionable residential sections of the West End, and then, Bucking- lity.

ham Palace,

been that

bombs is not nearly so impressive as the spirit of the British people.

the That is, perhaps, only natural. Arrested, now and then, by hideous debris of what once was Newspaper accounts of hundreds

Poor and rich, royalty and com-

a worker's cosy cottage, or the killed by bombs, and whole city moners-all were victims of Nazi gaunt skeleton of a former office blocks in ruins, fire imaginations, bombs; and all were united, as building. one may ponder the destruction wrought by "man's inhumanity to man."

But one can only marvel at the courage of those who,

SUFVIVIER

such destruction, still carry with unflinching cheerfulness and confidence.

For there is no denying that the Nazis have failed in their pries- pal object, which WHEN the ter- rorisation of the civil population. By that. They hoped 101 shatter British morale, by that, they hop- ed to paralyze British industrie and thus bring about prace winch, alone, would enable them to win the present wa

early

This failure has been due, pri mauly, to the ability of the Brit ish civil population to adapt . self to present circumstances; an adaptation all the more remark- able in a nation that is, by nature, comfort-loving, peaceful.

easy-going

ant

Nazi mentalities being what they are, it is easy to understand how they would confuse such qua- lities with "decadence"; how they would conclude that, since mar- tial boastings did not have the same appeal to the British masses as they had to their own, the Brit- ish had “gone soft.”

Swagger and vainglorious

·By- WARREN

IRVIN

Britons, by a common bond of suffering: The rich did what they could to help the poor, to find other quarters for them, to pro- vide food and clothing for them. There were thousands of home- less poor.

The relief problem was gigantic. But they were cared for. Factory workers went to their jobs as usual and industrial output was scarcely affected,

The average newspaper reader

London Takes Cover may not stop to reason that a few

Still, in these early days, there hundred killed in neity of me

some anxiety; there were million souls is tragic--but

not Was necessarily important, nor that d

Some people who couldn't sleep in a because of the noise made by the whole city block destroyed city with an area of 443,455 acres bombs and anti-aircraft guns

quite a few people, women IN even less mportant.

Then London began to

the en- move underground. Qurues peared at dusk before trances to the big public shelters; the doors were drawn open;

Aud, on occasion, when investi- pecially. gating reports of the destruction of whole city blocks, I have been

the dam surprised to find that age was, in fact, confined to three or four buildings in the block.

it

es-

the

was

people flocked in-and slept.

Londoners, A strange life for How They Took It

this, burrowing like moles into Not so com- On September 7, when the Nazis the earth's surface. began their intensive raids, I was fortable as the peacetime life in

But their own homes. in London. The raid, on that particular day, was one of the safe; and, in time, it became rea- worst London has had. Few of sonably comfortable. At least, the the others since compared with it. people got used to it; learned I made it a point to observe the adapt themselves. reactions of the people. The worst damage was in the poorer sections of the East End. I went

destroyed.

many

If anything was needed to prick over there, and talked with this bubble of Nazi imagination of those whose homes had been or lack of it--the manner in which the British masses have endured the most intensive raids bas dong so effectively and unequivo- cally.

Some of them had en work- ing for twenty or thirty years to pay for those homes; and, in a flash, all their possessions had been wiped out.

Go where you will in Britain, and you will hear no grousing; you will hear no whimpering nor complaining. You will hear only indignation at the brutality of Nazi methods; defiance of Nazi "I'm lucky", one man said military power; and everywhere

me. "I've lost my home.

Yet, to my amazement, I found that they were much more con. cerned with their neighbours' los

ses than with their own.

to

It meant a sacrifice of privacy, of course; it meant community living.

well as disadvantages. It brought But it had its advantages, as

the people closer together; it made them realise that war necessitat -

ed sacrifices-by all classes alike.

And life in the shelters wasn't

the Channel coast; towns that are

A bearded Itallan airman seen in London. (Copyright, Fox).

"Italy wins the Boat Race" was British people. It is true, not so bad. Some of the people brought how one newsvendor described the only of London, but of other cit- musical instruments, and enter- retreat of Italian naval forces be- ies and the small provincial towns. tained their fellows. Some of the fore units of the British Medit- It is true of the towns even along women organised knitting or sew- erranean Fleet. conversation; and there was plenty buting their share. ing circles. There was plenty of Shopkeepers, too, are contri- in the very shadow of the threa- In one street, tened German invasion. It is true where the windows of most of of the country districts. Facing It With A Smile the shops were shattered by

With a

calm, with confidence, a reiterated determination that, at I've still got my missus, and my

Indeed, the war seems to have bomb explosion, one shop hung with fortitude, Britons everywhere whatever cost, the war must be

as "Open

Usual. are facing the future, facing it My brother-in-law has lost made a special appeal to the Brit- out a sign: job. both his missus and his home. ish sense of humour. One en- Whereupon the shop next door as a united people, a people fully

no counters it on all sides. One sees hung out

"More He's got three kiddies, and

a sign:

Open aware that worse may yet come; but fully resolved, also, to face, As a war correspondent, I have job."

it scrawled in chalk on the black- Than Usual."

face it with a experienced air raids in Finland, Another man held up a batter- boards being used as posters by That, after weeks of intensive the worst-to

of the smile. air raids, is the spirit

Won

What Raids Are Like

Norway and elsewhere, and as a ed suit case.

"This is all

Lo But

of humour.

my the news vendors.

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