Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that on General Patton's 59th birthday, the Fourth Armored Division units of the Third Army had reached Lucy, 17 miles southeast of Metz and two miles from the Sarrebourg railway, moving 5.5 miles beyond captured Delme Ridge during the prior 24 hours. They also captured Louvigny, nine miles south of Metz.

Six miles to the northwest, units of the Sixth Armored Division entered Luppy, three miles from the Sarrebourg railroad, effectively cutting it and in the process splitting German defenses, some of whom fled northwest toward Metz and others eastward.

Other infantry units advanced nearly seven miles north of captured Chateau-Salins to Harbondage, 24 miles southeast of Metz and twenty miles from the Saar.

North of Metz, another Third Army column moved eastward from Mazieres, occupying the woods four miles above Metz. Further north, three bridgeheads were established across the Moselle River near the Luxembourg border. Parts of the curving battle line were within ten miles of the Saar.

Rain, minefields, and heavy German resistance had considerably slowed the advance all along the 75-mile front.

The front extended from Luxembourg to Luneville, with an interruption along a seven-mile enemy bulge west of Metz, which divided Patton's forces north and south.

In the Holland sector, there was no observance by the Americans of Armistice Day. The men simply wanted to win the war, see Berlin, and then return home to see the Statue of Liberty. One corporal from Akron said, "We came over here to finish what was started in the last war, not to observe any of its foolishness."

A piece recounts the last of the fighting before the Armistice in 1918, with General R. L. Bullard's Second Army ready to launch a major offensive on November 14 along the right flank of the First Army, a line extending along much the same path as Patton's lines were now established.

The Eighth Air Force, with 450 heavy bombers and nearly an equal number of fighters, struck synthetic oil facilities and railroads in the Ruhr Valley at Gelsenkirchen and Coblenz. The RAF attacked targets at Castrop-Rauxel in the Ruhr during daylight hours. Simultaneously, bombers and fighters of the Fifteenth Air Force in Italy attacked targets in Southern Germany.

It was reported from London that British agents were busy on the Continent seeking the launching sites of V-2 rockets. Prime Minister Churchill the day before had lifted the censorship ban on news regarding the attacks, which had been hitting England for several weeks, albeit reported thus far to be inflictng relatively few casualties. Some of the first rockets launched against England had been fired from movable platforms positioned in the vicinity of The Hague in Holland.

Russia, the United States, and Great Britain invited the De Gaulle French Provisional Government to join the European Advisory Commission in London, considered an advanced step in restoring France to a position of political and diplomatic power.

Russian forces engaged in seige of Budapest maintained their positions in the southern suburbs as a a wide outflanking movement was accomplished by other parts of the Second Ukrainian Army and Yugoslav Partisans west of the Danube through Southern Hungary aiming for Peca. Another column of Russian forces moved westward from the Tisza River bridgehead northeast of Budapest. Either one of these columns could turn and bypass the capital to move on toward Vienna 140 miles distant. A concerted drive east of Budapest was said to be beginning against the capital.

The Russians captured another 4,100 prisoners during the previous two days.

Snow was falling over Italy, hampering Fifth Army action on that front below Bologna. The Eighth Army now in Forli was slowed by heavy German resistance.

More B-29 raids of General Curtis LeMay's 20th Air Force took place in daylight on the Japanese southernmost home island of Kyushu, striking Omura, as well as hitting Nanking, the seat of Japanese government in occupied China, and Shanghai. One of the undisclosed number of B-29's was reported missing. The raid met only weak fighter opposition. Overcast skies caused a diversion of part of the mission over Omura and Nanking.

The Japanese contended that Saishu, south of Korea and 150 mlies west of Kyushu, was also hit, but this strike was unconfirmed by the American sources.

On Leyte in the Philippines, the Japanese had landed at Ormoc more than 10,000 fresh troops from a nineteen-ship convoy with a loss of three transports and seven destroyers. General Tomoyuki Yamashita, the "Tiger of Malaya", was now in command of these forces. They had landed largely under cover of darkness and thus eluded American PT-boats and aerial patrols in the area. The additional men supplemented the 35,000 already freshly landed on Leyte.

The Chinese High Command confirmed that the Japanese on Thursday night had broken into Kweilin in Kwangsi Province but also stated that Liuchow, site of the last major American air base in Southeastern China, was still held by the Chinese.

A report of silence of Hitler on the November 9 anniversary of the 1923 Munich Beer Hall Putsch of the Nazi Party had fueled further speculation, already afoot since the July 20 failed assassination plot, that Hitler in fact might either be dead or severely ill, physically or mentally.

All the rumors were true. The Fuehrer just did not realize it yet.

Regardless, General Patton was feeling groovy.

Sorry, General. Just a joke.

On the editorial page, "All or None" comments on the attempt by the Methodists in North Carolina to re-establish uniform prohibition throughout the state, there being 25 of 100 counties which were wet by local choice. The choice, says the piece, was in reality between state-controlled access to liquor and bootlegger-controlled access.

"Next Fight" tells of University of North Carolina president Frank Porter Graham having spoken to the local chapter of the PTA, outlining a new program of hospital and medical care in the state. The Governor's Commission had recommended expansion of the two-year medical school at Chapel Hill to a four-year school, including a 600-bed hospital, and that the program should have as its purpose that no one in North Carolina would be without adequate hospital or medical care by reason of poverty or income.

"The Doctor" finds significant Josef Stalin's speech commemorating the anniversary of the Russian Revolution of 1917, even if it had been overshadowed by the American election. He condemned both Germany and Japan for the war as aggressor nations, indicated Russian support for a post-war international organization which could thwart aggression through use of force.

"A Second" praises Governor-elect Gregg Cherry for his speech before textile manufacturers supporting the North Carolina tax structure, though higher at the state level than in neighboring states. He pointed out, as had The News recently, that when combined with lower local tax rates, the overall rate was lower than neighboring states, hence attractive to industry. The Governor-elect did not decry the efforts of those who wanted lower state taxes to better attract industries but cautioned that, with greater post-war demand for services, lowering of taxes could produce deficits and hard times. The revenue surplus ought be used to retire the debt resulting ultimately in tax savings.

Drew Pearson tells of Vice-President Henry Wallace, on one of the last days of the campaign, having walked fifty blocks through Harlem with Congressional candidate Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Thousands of blacks had crowded the streets and cheered both men. Mr. Powell, ultimately successful in the campaign, remarked that the walk was picking up 50,000 votes for Roosevelt. Mr. Wallace responded that if he thought that were true, he would walk all the way to the Canadian border.

Mr. Wallace had given a rousing speech at Madison Square Garden in the closing days before the election, standing beside Harry Truman, predicting a win by a hundred electoral votes. FDR had sent him a telegram saying that if his prediction came true, the President would deliver the promised 60 million jobs, and an important one of them would go to Mr. Wallace.

The President would be true to his word, appointing Mr. Wallace to be Secretary of Commerce, replacing controversial and aging Jesse Jones.

Mr. Pearson speculates that the outgoing Vice-President might be made Secretary of State in the event of Cordell Hull's resignation. Undersecretary Edward Stettinius would get the call by the end of the month on that position at the resignation of Secretary Hull after twelve years of service, the longest serving Secretary of State in the history of the country.

The column next relates of the pilots of the Air Transport Command reporting of the varied attitudes of important Nazi prisoners flown from Europe to the United States to be placed in prisoner of war camps. They ranged from sullen to happy and relieved.

Most commented on the evidence of sound engineering in America when they first cast eyes upon New York City. They were astounded at how quickly the city had been rebuilt after its destruction by German bombs. Herr Doktor Goebbels had so instructed them. Not only New York, but most American cities lay in rubble. As the Germans passed over Philadelphia and Baltimore on their way to Washington, they became increasingly speechless in their amazement at American ingenuity.

Mr. Pearson finally recognizes several men who had been either booted out or kicked around by President Roosevelt who nevertheless had contributed remarkably to his victory. They included former Price Administrator Leon Henderson, former War Production Board chair Donald Nelson, former WPB member Bob Nathan, and former Office of Production Management member Sidney Hillman of CIO. It was Mr. Hillman especially who was most responsible for insuring that displaced war workers registered to vote, and, comments Mr. Pearson, without his efforts, the President might not have achieved re-election.

Marquis Childs looks back at the election, finds that the Republican chant that it was time for a change more appropriately could now be assessed as a time for a change in the Republican Party. It would need be so should there be again a viable two-party system at work.

Samuel Grafton likewise observes the election and finds that there were lessons to be learned from the campaign. First, organized labor had vastly changed the political landscape of the country, was now a permanent fixture of political force in the land. It would no longer work to ignore labor intervening elections and then court them only during the months prior to election day. Instead of working to foster class warfare, this new alignment would work to obliterate class lines, forcing the vast working class to be recognized as a viable force in American life.

Dorothy Thompson also observes the election and campaign, finds that claims by each party of vitality in their respective party structures to be flawed. There was energy on the part of the Republicans, but no vitality; there was vitality exhibited by the Democrats, but not as a party, only centered around President Roosevelt.

Dick Young writes of the war surplus goods and how they might be distributed. Many of the GI's looked longingly on the jeeps along the roads and byways of the front and wanted to have one when they returned home after the war. He expressed the idea that they should not have to pay a premium through a middle-man expecting a profit in order to get one. There was also a plan to distribute surplus war equipment on a need basis to state and local governments free of charge.

A news piece on the page reports that a GI who had led a patrol of three jeeps and a half-track on Leyte told of the bad aim of the Japanese. They opened up on the patrol with machinegun fire and grenades from a range of fifteen yards. Of fifteen men of the patrol who then quickly scattered and began returning fire, the Japanese hit only one man in the leg. He walked away.

Well, it reminds us of the crisp fall day back in 1911, six months before the fateful maiden voyage of the Titanic, when the Spartans took on the U.S.S. Franklin and won 12-0, in football.