Evening star., 1943-05-27

by fr1e d
Donald Grant,
Henry McLemors. Look Maga-
zines war correspondent, who sud-
denly dropped down from the skies
in a Liberator.
He was with the Allied African
Army as it swept to complete con-
quest. He started with it from
GafSa, was with it when the Stars
and Stripes, Union Jack and the
Tricolor of the Free French were
| holsted on the shores of the Med
iterranean. He was with the Amer
leans when they rallied from the
| early setbacks and broke through
at Hill 609. He scrambled up Long
stop Hill behind the British. He
went into Bizerte in Gen. Grant
tank.
AS I write this, Don is sitting on
my bed. talking about his expert
enceS. We came over together and
instead Of trying to put his words
into a pattern. I'll just jot down
noes as he talks. The arrival of
the Allied Armies in Tunis made
| the Mardi Gras seem like an egg
| rolling contest at church social.
The population completely aban-
boned itself to the occasion. ANY
one with an Allied uniform on
could have anything he wanted.
The wine, the silver, the money
that had been buried since the
Germans and Italians took over
were unearthed and literally given
away.
Begged to Surrender.
Down from the hills poured the
German and Italian soldiers begging
to surrender. Truckload after
truckload of them sought out the
vlctors. Any Allied soldier could
commander car from the Axis
soldiers. At the same time, iso-
lated Axis units, not knowing their
army had been vanquished, fired
INTO the streets of the town. So
there was laughter and happiness
| on one hand and death on the
other.
The Germans had many Amer
lcan automobiles. Grant captured
half dozen Germans riding in a
. Chrysler sedan. Il just told the
| no-good buns to get out and walk
and they obliged as If l had been
three-star general"
Grant said the unity of the Allied
forces was unbelievable Politicians
might argue about differences be-
tween our country, England and
France, but the soldiers didn't. They
fought side by side as though thev
were of the same race.
Gen. Eisenhower showed magnif-
cent understanding by letting the
desert trained Alexander and Mont
gomery run the show. In the field.
he played a tremendous part bv
welding the various units into a
fighting whole. No Britisher or
Frenchman ever criticized his ap-
polntment as commander of the
African theater of war.
Too much publicity has been
given the air force and too little
publicity given the artillery in the
devastating barrage that paved the
way for the final assault on Tunis.
For every bomb that was dropped,
hundreds Of cannon shells pulverized
the earth.
Propaganda Effective.
One Of the vital factors in the
| debacle was the propaganda shells,
When the shells exploded, they
scattered leaflets telling the Axis
soldiers that they were doomed
unless they quit and that IS minutes
after reading the leaflets they would
be subjected to a merciless barrage.
This promise was always kept by
the Allied artillerymen. Axis
prisoners were almost psychopathic
cases. They were like dead men
walking and in no way resembled
the superior Nordics that their
Nordic housepainter leader had
told them they were.
The 9th Army men are superb.
Hard as whalebone from manv
years of fighting in the desert, they
fear nothing, They don't look like
fighters. Most of them are short.
wizened, bandy-legged little fellows,
but they know how to handle
bayonet which is another thing that
the supreme Nordic German fears.
Mr.. Grant was scared all the time
he was moving forward in the at
tack
But I wasn't alone" he said. "I
have yet to meet soldier. no
matter what his rank, who didn't
feel exactly as I did When Jerry is
shooting at you, the main thing Is
to keep alive. When you have &C
complished that, nothing else seems
tosmatter for the moment. But it
Is very hard to kill good soldier
and our American boys who fought
through the campaign In Tunisia
are the best soldiers in the world
today, and they will stay alive long
after the Nazi nightmare Is for.
gotten in history"
distributed by McNaught Syndicate. Inc)