The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-12-18

gan house-to-house mop-up of the Nazi garrison.
 The Germans were reported put ting up stubborn but losing stand for their few remaining positions on the west bank of the Roer.
 A total of 845 Germans were cap tured on that sector and on the Nazis offensive front to the south yesterday, and first army headquar- ters said American bazooka squads and tank destroyers were taking heavy toll of German armor as they fell back.
 The main weight of German Field Marshal Gerd Von Rund- stedt's offensive apparently was centered on the Monschau Forest area south of MonSchau, where the enemy's arnor and shock troops opened the attack at seven 8. m. Sunday behind heavy artillery and aerial barrage.
 Striking through the same corri- dor used by the German hosts in their drive into France and Bel gium in 1940, the Nazis quickly overran the forward American de- lenses and crossed the Belgian bor- der into the Honsfeld area before running into heavy opposition.
 Fresh Divisions
 Simultaneously, fresh German divisions joined the attack all the way down to the southern end of Luxembourg, super-charged by an order of the day from Rundstedt proclaiming that:
 Everything is at stake. Your great hour has struck"
 A copy of the high command or der found on dead German officer indicated strongly that the Nazis were committing themselves to their biggest effort since D-day in an attempt to disrupt the American drive on Cologne to the north.
 United Press War Correspondent John McDermott reported that the entire First Army front was ablaze with gunfire and that swarms of American and German planes were battling overhead.
 At the same time. the Germans looSed a barrage of V-bombs heav- fer than anything yet hurled against London in bid to smash up the First Army'S rear communications
 Nazi paratroopers also joined in the assault, although in relatively small force. Front dispatches said several hundred paratroopers drop ped behind the First Army lines early Sunday morning and tried to set up road blocks throughout the rear areas. Most of them were rounded up quickly. although a few die-hards still were reported hold ing out in the Monschau Forest and at undisclosed points behind the Ninth Army line.
 The great German ground attack was accompanied by the biggest tactical air strike the Luftwaffe has attempted since the Allied landing in Normady.
 Waves of German fighters and figsters- bomberS, flying in groups of as many as 50 planes, shuttled over the front lines to bomb and Strafe the American defenSeS.
 Hundreds of American fighters bounced upon the raiders and shot down at least 103 enemy planes at 8 cost of B American aircraft. A sudden break in the weather, which had favored the enemy throughout the first 30 hours of the offensive, gave the U S. Ninth and British Second tactical air force a clear crack at the Germans late in the day and they made the most of it. Ninth Air Force flyers alone des- troyed 25 German tanks and armor- ed vehicles in a few hours, along with hundreds of railway cars and trucks.
 Driven out of the skies by day. light, the Luftwaffe came back af- ter nightfall with a series of heavy bombing and straf1ng attacks on the First Army's front and rear areas.
 While the enemy's best and strangest divisions fought for a breakthrough in the north, It. Gen. | Alexander M. Patch's American | Seventh Army troops pushed | methodically into the Siegfried | forts on the upper Rhine.
 Opposition Varies
 Paachs divisions slugged their way three miles and more into ! Germany on 21-mile front ex- tending westward from the Rhine | at Berg and Lauterbourg through | WisSembourg to Bobenthal against | varying opposition.
 Field dispatches said only ele- ments of five German divisions, plus some fortress troops, were holding | the 30-mile wide belt of Siegfried | Qualifications menaced by the Sev- enth Army drive. All but two of these divisions were said to be far below combate strength, and 1t was believed the Nazis could not muster more than 10000 men in that sector.
 At least nine Germans towns = Lauterbourg, Scheibenhardt, Boben- thai, Berg, Schweigen, Schweigho- fen Kapsweyer, Rechtenbach, and | Nothweiler were in American | hands and Patch's troops were wedging steadily northward into the | deep fortress belt.
 Farther to the west, other Seventh | Army units ran into stiff opposition | in Bitche, where strong German Forces were dug into the old Magi- not Line defenses. The Americans fought their way into Hottviller, three miles northwest of Bitche. and entered Fort Freudenberg, just southeast of Bitche.
 On the French First Army front to the south, German counter-attacks overran number of villages on the Alsace plain, including Bennwthr and Mittelwihr, five miles north of Colmar, and Diebolsheim, near the Rhine 19 miles below Strasbourg.
 Patton Advances
 It. Gen. George s. Patton's Third Army troops, meanwhile, hammered out small gains north of Saarlautern onI olaar fo tho