Omaha daily bee., 1915-09-19
DESCRIBES LONDON
ATTACK FROM SKY
Observer Tells of Losses Of Life
and Injuries Caused by
Bombs
SOME ARE KILLED OUTRIGHT


LONDON, Sept. 1s.-An official
description Of some Of the effects of
the last Zeppelin raid upon the Lon
don district, written by an observer
st the request OF the home secretary.
Sir John Simon. and issued tonight
fer publication follows;
Here are q few pictures of the
effects accomplished by the officers
and crew of the last air ship which
visited the London district. Some
where in London there is little
street with . public house at the
seFner.
"Outside Il wednesday evening,
after the place was closed, man
and a woman stood talking. While
the woman went away to buy supper,
the man waited for her and there
fell at his feet the first explosive
bombs,
KILLED Man Outright.
'-They killed the man outright and blew
pieces OF the paving stones onto sur
rounding roofs They blew In the front
Of the public house, reducing the stock
to a mass Of broken glass. On the floor
above they twisted an iron bedstead,
Injurlng a woman who was sleeping there
and reduced what had been the carefully
kept living rooms Of a small family to a
mass Of SCOT, dust, plaster and broken
glass.
I'm another part Of the area over which
the airshlp passed there ls big block
Of workmen's dwellings which are
crowded day and night with children. A
bomb dropped on the roof.
directly Under the roof was a little
fiat In which four children had their
sleeping quarters. After being put to bed
two OF them got up secretly to make tea
in an adjoining room.
THE bed they left now is a mass OF
charred and blackened sheets. with the
mattress torn to pieces. They escaped by
q miracle. but In a small bedroom ad-
Joining the other two children were in
stantly killed.
Turn Horses Loose.
UAt another place an incendiary bomb
dropped through the roof OF a stable and
fired a motor car into which It fell. The
stableman and his wife, in spite Of the
fire which Immediately became serious
turned loose eleven horses which were
IN the stable. A watch dog also was
rescued, as was a Gagged bird kept on the
first floor above the fire, although while
bringing IL down stairs the stableaan's q
wife was blown off her feet by the ex-
piesioR Of q bomb In q aelghberiag eeurs
yard,
"Ths only casualty In this case was a
bantam rooster,
Somewhere In Londen'a subuTes there
IL q little block Of houses almost by It.
self. divided into small fats. On the
Z ground floor there were sleeping a widew,
gher ts-yesr-old daughter and yeuna
man lodgeH
ION the first floef there was a family
OF three children. two of them girls, and
on the second floor workinKman, HIS
wife. four girls and one boy, A bemh
dropped squarely on the reo1,
Wall Gives Away,
"AS the lsboreF and hts wife, wha WeFe
On the second floor. described Il, the
whole partition wall beside their bed
gave way and disappeared, The man
showed his wife into the center Of the
room and went to find the children,
Tive of them, who slept In a reem
under the spet where the bomb fell, van
ished with the rOem and everything In it.
Their bodies were found tive days later
under the debris OF the othera, a hoy
OF ran for safety to q staircase, which
had been blown away, and in the dark
fell into the hole where his sisters bodies
were buried In the ruins.
''The bodies OF two OF the occupants
Of the first floor later were recovered,
but the worst effects of the bomb were
felt on the ground floer Part Of the
body of the man who occupied It was
found 16o yards away
Nine Are Killed.
"a bomb, which was dropped In a
street, blew in the front of a shop, but
spent its main force on a passing meter
bus, ON which twenty persons were rid
ing, including the driver and ceRduetor,
Nine of them were killed and eleven In
jured. The drivers legs were bleWR eff
and he died in a hospital,
These incidents alone, which account
for nearly half the deaths, will suffice
to show what was the nature OF tho sue
cess attending the attack upon London.
The net results OF the weeks raids upon
the London district were thirty-eight
killed or died of wounds. and 124 injured.
Two policemen and one army service
corps man were among the victims, but
40 other person In uniform was killed