August 26, 1944; FRENCH SEIZE PARIS:

This was reported today, August 26, 1944:

New York, N.Y.—London, England—France Saturday, Aug. 26, 1944

Fall of City

Is Believed

To Be Near,

Nazi Forces Are Battered

In Seine Pocket; Claim

Yanks Near Troyes

French armored! troops of the U.S. Third Army fought the Germans in the heart of starving Paris side by side with French underground forces yesterday, as Berlin reported that American troops in the suburbs were attacking German defenders of the capital from the west, southwest and southeast.

Heavy air support aided strong Allied tank forces, Berlin said, and it appeared from field dispatches that Allied possession of the whole capital was a matter of hours.

Most reports agreed that the Allies controlled a majority of the city and suburban

areas. An American broadcast from Gen. Eisenhower's Headquarters declared that the liberation of Paris was a fact.

Allied HQ

Claims Fall

Of Cannes

But Earlier Announcement

Of Marseilles' Capture

Is Disputed

Allied Headquarters, announced the capture of Cannes, on the Riviera, yesterday, but it was anybody's guess who held Marseilles, in spite of Thursday's flat official communique reporting the city's seizure.

"Marseilles has not yet been" taken, in spite of previous statements to the contrary." a CBS correspondent with the French reported. He said the French held

only a third of the city.

Yesterday's communique said that inside the city "mopping-up of enemy resistance near the port is in progress."

Although official silence hid the whereabouts of a U.S. column reported at the Swiss border Thursday, other Allied forces pushed west within eight miles of Aries. 26 miles up the Rhone from the sea. While French troops cleaning up

Toulon met stiff German resistance around the base's naval arsenal.

French and American warships heavily shelled Toulon's coastal guns, which were

also targets for Thunderbolt divebombers.

 

Fighting Irishman

Doing a Foine Job

Of Leading Maquis

ORLEANS, Aug. 25 (AP)—

A Gallic Robin Hood, leader of 5,000 fighters of the French Maquis who have been giving the Germans hell for two years, goes by

the name of Patrick O'Neill—and he doesn't care if the-Germans know it. He and his band operated for six months before the Allies landed, using deep forest shelters from which they emerged to raid German units.

It has been a long time since this wiry, six-foot colonel or his clan kissed the Blarney Stone, but he still has all the battling skill of his ancestors who forsook Erin for France.