Evening star., 1944-12-31
Western Front
Continued From First Page

slightest resistance The enemy was
digging in, and using tanks as i'm
promptu pillboxes.
The sudden appearance of Gen.
Patton's far-ranging forces in
Moircy spelled trouble for the Ger
mans, who had captured Libramont
and dug in there against attacks
from the southwest.
Moircy is astride the best retreat
route out of Libramont. Three and
a half miles west is a second road
which leads miles north from
Libramont to st. Hubert. And un-
restricted use of the latter is i'm
possible with the Americans holed
up in st. Hubert.
The Americans made new gains
IN the Bastogne area, reaching La
vaselle and Chenogne, some 4
miles west of Bastogne and little
to the south. In this sector, the
Yanks captured at least three vii
lagos and drove the Germans into
woods a mile north of Sibret.
South of Bastogne, the Germans
still clung to a mile or so of the
important highway to Arlon and it
may have been in this sector that
the new blows came from the east.
Nazis Flushed From Hills.
One doughboy force had reached
the highway about two miles south
OF Bastogne in push from the
west, and another had driven east
to the edge of Lutrebois, a mile east
of the highway and less than three
miles southeast of Bastogne.
East of Bastogne. Gen. Patton's
divisions were flushing the Germans
from the hills of Northern Luxem-
bourg and had pressed to the
Reich's border along a six-mile
front from Echternach northwest to
Bigelbach.
Resistance here, stiff the previous
day crumpled by early Yesterday.
American patrols entered Echter-
mach, 18 miles northeast of the city
of Luxembourg, which the Germans
nave announced they abandoned.
Artillery fire broke up enemy
tanks massing for an attack 3l2
miles southeast of Echternach.
In new gains of up to a mile,
the Sd Army was closing to within
3 miles Of the key point of Wiltz,
Is miles north of Luxembourg.
Americans Score Gains.
In the four days in which the
Germans had been stalled, the
American counterblows made this
progress:
On 25-mile-wide northern front
from Malmedy west to Hotton, ad-
vances of two to five miles.
On an 18-mile front from Marche
southwest to Beauraing, gains of
II miles from near Celles to Roche
fort, with the steel spearhead
pinched off.
On a 23-mile front from Beau
raing south to Libramont, gains of
one to three miles.
On a 49-mile front from Moircy
eastward to Rosport, gains up to
20 miles-as much as 712 miles west
of Bastogne.
The United States 7th Army front
remained quiet while the Germans
to the south laid down heavy ar
tillery fire in the Colmar- -Mulhouse
sector.
In Eastern Holland, the Germans
still f1shed for information, sending
patrols across the Mas miles
southwest of Roermond, where they
ran into heavy British fire and fed
st. With Held Five Days.
Meanwhile, more pieces of the
story of American valor that tripped
the well-laid German plans to split
the Allied armies were being fitted
together.
1t was disclosed that 7th Armor-
ed Division combat team, COM
manded by Brig. Gen. Bruce C.
Clarke, Syracuse. N. Y. was the
slender band that split the German
drive by holding St. With, in the
center of the breakthrough, for
i've days.
Against overwhelming odds Gen.
Clarke's combat team held out three
days more than it was supposed to
while waves of enemy tanks swept
around and behind it. Then he
was ordered to fight back to the
American lines with his team and
remnants of other divisions which
had been overrun.
Whereupon the former University
OF Tennessee and Cornell University