IN THE AIR Raid on Sylt
Niels Schmidt, an innkeeper on the tiny Danish island of Romb, mile and a half north of the long German sandspit called Sylt which Adolf Hitler set apart in 1933 as a "bird sanctuary," knew something remarkable was going to happen one night last week when, at 8:15 p.m., two big airplanes came diving down over him through the low-lying clouds "with crazy speed." They were headed for List, the settlement in Sylt's northern tip, whence (as all Danes know) most birds and all fishermen long since moved out to make way for a Nazi seaplane base.
Within a minute, Landlord Schmidt heard eight loud explosions near List. He saw spouting pillars of fire. Then he heard the Sylt sirens start wailing, and searchlights shot up to finger the sky. Anti-aircraft guns started barking like a kennel of mastiffs aroused in the night. As the two bombers roared south, away from him down the length of Sylt, Herr Schmidt could hear other long-muzzled watchdogs take up the furious chorus.
Five minutes after the first two, another lone bomber power-dived in over List from due west. The German batteries set up such a fierce yammering that the newcomer released only two bombs before whirling back over the North Sea. But the whole length of Sylt—the seaplane base down at Westernland, the anti-aircraft towers on the Hindenburg Damm (causeway) connecting the island umbilically with the mainland, and the seaplane base at Hörnum on the southeast tip 20 miles away—began thudding and crackling with bomb and gun explosions. For ten minutes more Herr Schmidt watched the show—biggest British air raid of the war—until, at 8:30 p.m., he "witnessed a spectacle such as I have never seen in my life. First I heard the explosion of a single bomb. A few seconds later another explosion literally illuminated the entire sky over Sylt, and now explosion followed explosion. The bomb evidently had hit a munitions depot."
British bombing attacks continued at intervals of from five to 20 minutes all through that night until 2:40 a.m. Other Danes estimated they heard 82 heavy explosions, exclusive of incendiary bombs which fizzed and flared beyond count. They saw fires all over Sylt. They believed the whole place must be pretty badly smashed. They saw only one attacking plane shot down, in flames.
That evening Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, with radio reports from his fliers in hand, was on his feet in the House of Commons, defending his Government. The Germans' dashing raid on the Fleet in Scapa Flow (TIME, March 25) rankled bitterly in Members' minds. Not long after 9 p. m. Mr. Chamberlain was able to announce dramatically: "Tonight the Royal Air Force attacked and severely damaged the German air base at Hornum on the island of Sylt."
At 10:20 p.m. Mr. Chamberlain arose and added: "I understand that the attack is continuing."
Next day a squadron of Heinkels swooped on a British convoy near the Orkney Islands. They let go several tons of their "problem children." The British said three neutral merchant ships were hit and two had to be abandoned. The Germans said they dispersed the convoy, sank nine warships and merchantmen, totaling some 42,000 tons, damaged two merchantmen totaling 11,000 tons.