The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-03-13
Hundreds Of Bombers
 Pound Germany Hard
Continued from Page l0

eoass again just before noon today, through c mist over the sea, in token that the Royal Air Force had re- erned the offensive by day.
 Many Fires Started
 The air ministry asserted that the British planes had started many large fires in Berlin, had set the great industrial area of Bremen ~weil alight," had hit the dock area cf Hamburg with many heavy bombs, and had shot down one Mes serschmitt-l10 night fighter plane which attempted to interfere.
 One British pilot, diving in the bright moonlight over Hamburg, put out c German searchlight battery with machine gun fire and gunned Q military barracks from an altitude of 50 feet.
 It was indicated that Britain's air defense organization had used new devices and technique in smashing great German raids on Britain dur ing the night, in addition to using a fleet of new secret Beau fighter planes.
 It was estimated that 200 German planes had taken part in the Liver pool raid.
 Nine Nasi Planes Downed
 Nine German bombing planes, the greatest number ever bagged in a single night, were shot down over Britain and the adjacent sea and it was indicated that the toll might be more.
 In addition, two Messerschmitt- 10o fighter planes were shot down over the English channel at dawn by British fighter planes which turned back a formation of six on the southeast coast.
 Taking of from their bases few hours after Prime Minister Winston Churchill had called the aid bill "a new magma carta," British planes opened a merciless attack on three of Germany's most im- portant cities.
 At the same time great fleets of German planes made concentrated attack on the Liverpool area of northwest England. The air minis- try, usually most conservative, im- piled in a communique that the raid was almost Q complete failure.
 The simultaneous offensives of the British and German air forces were believed here to mean that a merciless spring aerial offensive had opened and was as yet only In its formative phase.
 No Briton doubted that Britain had the best of the first round.
 The news of the raid on Germany came in a brief preliminary corn- xnunique of the air ministry:
 "Last night the Royal Air Force carried out the heaviest raid yet launched on Germany, bombing Bremen, Harmurg and Berlin"
 The story of the smashing of the German mass raid was told by the cotnmunique issued jointly by the air and home security ministries:
 "Last night, the moon being full and the weather very clear, the en- emy attempted It's first large scale raid ln some months, attacking the Merseyside (the Liverpool area) in force.
 '"On this occasion, however, dam age and casualties bore no relation Co the scale of attack. Very little damage was achieved beyond seri- ous damage to number of private houses.
 "There were isolated incidents in other parts of the country.
 "Our defenses, including fighters, anti aircraft guns and other devices were very active and harassed the enemy by land and sea.
 "Nine enemy bombers are known to have been destroyed"
 On two previous occasions seven planes had been shot down in a single night; this was Britain's big geSt triumph of the war against the Nazi raiders who have ranged by darkness over It's territory, bombing and machine gunning from great attitudes.
 London escaped the Nazi fury de- spite three air raid alarms during the night. One German bomber was shot down on the Surrey Sussex border a few miles away. Home guards captured the only member of the crew to escape the flaming wreckage.
 Of the five remaining bombers known to have been shot down, two were bagged off the south coast, on their way to Britain or returning to invasion coast bases, and four were shot down over northwest England.
 Tn such instances the air ministry claims only planes definitely known to have crashed; later 1t usually de- yelops that more have been hit, and Q proportion of damaged planes would be expected to crash before they could reach home.
 There was no immediate hint of the "their devices" used against the German planes during the night, which apparently had been held in readiness for their first mass of- fensive of the spring.
 It had been widely reported that the British air defense had devel- oped, if not one of the Nazis' peril odically advertised secret weapons, ct least some surprises on which re- search experts were known to have been working.