The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-11-06
Allies Drive
 Forward
(Continued from Page D

Extensive minefields covered by artillery and small arms fire was slowing the American advance all along the sector southeast of Aachen. Fighter -bombers of the 9th air force operating north and south of Schmidt knocked out 27 enemy tanks to help ground forces break up an enemy counter-attack.
 British Commandos brought the campaign to liberate flooded Walch- eren Island into it's final phase by breaking into the outskirts of Mid- delburg, capital of zeeland Province and last enemy stronghold on the island.
 Nieuwland, two miles southeast ot Middelburg, was captured and pro- greSs was being made northeast of Domburg on the north. coast of the island.
 Severe Losses
 Supreme headquarters announced last night that naval casualties and losses in landing craft were "sdvere' during the amphibious assault and landing on Wstkapelle at the west ern tip of Walcheren last week.
 At least 20 out of 25 landing SUD- port craft were lost. Casualties 1n the surf and on the beaches exceed ed in proportion anything encoun- tered at Dieppe or on the Normandy Beaches and probbaly equaled the bloodiest American landings in the Pacific.
 Nearly 2,00O prisoners were cap tured at Walcheren yesterday Northeast of Walcheren, Allied troops pushed onto the island oi Tholen and also drove into the Philipsburg Isthmus, gateway tc Duiveland and Schouwen bordering on the southern mouth of the Hol land deep.
 The Allied sweep to the Maas and the Holland Deep hemmed the Ger mans into two pockets each eight square miles in area, one at Willem- stad northeast of Steenbergen and the other south of Moerdijk. where the Maas emptieS into the Holland Deep.
 Attempt Evacuation
 Field reports said the Germans were atempting to evacuate mer and material from the two pockets by barge. RAF Mosquitoes swooped down on a cluster of barges last night and sank 10 of them. Allied artillery was sending ceaseless round of shells into the doomed pockets.
 Swept up in the, Allied advance were Geertruidenberg, 10 miles east om Moerdijk; Heusden, 12 miles farther east and seven and a hali miles northwest of $ Hertogenbosh and Klundert, five miles southwest of Moerdijk. The Germans blew up the Maas bridge at Heusden be- fore fleeing to the north bank.
 German resistance had continued savage up to the immediate ap- breaches to the Maas and the Hol- land deep, then suddenly collapsed front dispatches said.
 No Attempt
 There apparently has been nc Allied attempt to force the MaaS west of $ Hertogenbosch to the sea and the waterlogged terrain to the north made such crossing most impracticable.
 Canadian forces yesterday att tackled Dunkerque, isolated French channel port still in German hands, following a heavy aerial lombard ment, but it appeared to be limited effort rather than a grand scale assault to end the siege.
 Tactical bombers and fighter bombers were lending strong SUD- port to American troops southeast of Aachen. They cut railway lines at several places in the Rhineland, bombed railway yards near Dussel- dorf, blew up an ammunition train south of KasSel and attacked an ordnance depot at Hamburg.
 Four enemy aircraft were shot down and 34 destroyed on the ground during the series of attacks, which snarled enemy communica- tions behind the 1st Army front.
 In eastern France, other Ameri- can forces seized Berg on the Moselle river eight miles north- east of Thionville and farther south captured St, Barbe in the Baccarat sector.