Show GURR ATTENDS BIRTHDAY celebration the following account of adoll adolf hillers Hit lers birthday observance in berlin was written home to mr and mrs P H gurr by their son elder arnold gurr who has spent more than two years in the german mission field the Fuhr ers birthday which came in april was the occasion of a big demonstration of germany germanas Germ anys arm armed e CL forces and is very well described in in the following story which was give given n us by the gurr family camuy berlin april 20 1939 I 1 arrived at this morning lit in berlin after two hours on a Schnell zug in the same train were hundreds fro from Madg eburg and other towns along who were were headed only for one place berlin to see hitler As I 1 left the potsdam depot a very interesting sight was before me the streets were full of marching soldiers artillery horses and crowds headed for the parade street I 1 purchased a map of the city and joined the crowds in the march toward the ost west achee the new street ot of berlin which is the parade street for today I 1 passed the different consulates in the bellevue strasse and arrived some twenty minutes later at my destination already there were thousands and thousands of people lined along the wide street I 1 found a place near the side and began my wait for the 11 parade I 1 had time to take in my surroundings dings so I 1 began by looking up and down the street this new street with two fourteen meter roads and a four meter mete wide center strip made me think of some of the streets in salt lake city on each side of the street were giant seven meter kandel aber light posts or street lamps about in all I 1 was told twenty pillars each 20 meters high with the or golden eagle at the top of each lined the festive street from the brandenburger en tor to the tiergarten Tier garten garter depot along the street with the large lamp posts were one hundred thirty Adler wande six meters high and crowned with either cither a hoheit sadler or hack en kreuz everywhere were german flags hacken kreuz and from I 1 many buildings giant red banners I 1 with the german lag flag were hanging one side of the street was completely filled with soldiers tanks horses motorcycles and SA men by nine the crowd had become so dense that the SA had to take things in hand they locked arms and made an endless barrier along the street As I 1 fondled my condax in anticipation of the wonderful pictures that I 1 was going to take I 1 was suddenly reminded by an official voice that I 1 the photograph icren strong streng verboten ver boten tough luck but I 1 didn dian t give up I 1 waited for a good opportunity port unity and took a shot through an opening between two soldiers the stories of the night before interested te me very much so I 1 gave up trying to take pictures and just listened it seemed that the 1 night had been very short for most of the berliners the different battalions of soldiers had been moving all night and the raar of cf the army equipment had not made continued to page 5 aubr URR ATTENDS BIRTHDAY celebration ak lk continued from first page 4 pause during the entire night h some orne of the soldiers near me comi bained that they had not even iad ad a minutes sleep many of the atiles had camped in the wil elm strasse near the lei ei where hitler lives and where he e affairs of the government are candled andlee land led by daybreak every avail ible ble corner was occupied in the neighborhood of the Kanz KanzI lei ei and nore ore tried to find places finally he e extra police and SA had to top the enthusiastic citizens from 1 l orning or during this time I 1 moan mean during he time I 1 was listening to the ti stories teries of the past night the army I 1 ij yas making final preparation for he e parade from my position afi ion undress and hundreds of horses nd ind riders could be seen and more 4 ere coming every minute far rf ii her er down the street were the 4 corps bicycle corps si il ank corps and other units of the may all in readiness for the 11 clock parade occasionally a band 6 assed by playing some of the t serman erman national anthems by 10 clock the big space between the it a and the charlotten i brucke was j just list one large k military nili tary camp f eleven finally came with commencement of the parade at iche e head of the parade exhibition was as the music corps of the infantry regiment P and following 0 owing came a glistening sea ot ol tt flag lag battalion this end of the ohp parade arade was lined up far down the treet street by the hoch L rhule on the right side of the th wide street the other side was left led free for the fuehrer fuchner to pass as ha came aine from the thi th arade began par far down the street alie he people began to shout madly the fuehrer must be coming isolin soon every soldier horse and smallest lest piece of equipment was made t 7 ready eady an almost perfect line of gol soldiers goldiears diers and horses stood at atten ion as the shouts became louder i soon scion the honored guests of hit i lers ers began to come past in the first auto came Frei herrn v neura I 1 rith th protector of the new I 1 1 chec czecho ho protectorate and dr hacha I 1 a then came i r the auto bearing the Reich saus sen seri minister v with the slovakian lov akian tiso followed by another in which the well known general of spain and his guard were riding other honored guests from all the neighboring countries and nations passed by and then a motorcycle with a yellow police flag dashed by indicating that the fuehrer was coming now however we were attracted by something else every eye ye was raised to the sky to locate the he source of roaring airplane moors tors soon a chain of observation planes lanes came in in view view over the famous brandenburger tor one could see clearly the glass observe tion ion cabins between the two mo tors A few seconds later followed a group of some thirty pursuit Purs tiit planes and then a squadron of fighting planes at last came the powerful I 1 group of machines of the with about 50 machines all in dil all I 1 counted something over the thunder of the motors could not however drown the heil hei ll 11 hitler cheers that suddenly arose the shouts began in the distance and gradually reached a high pitch as the fuehrer and his group near ed cd our position close by a large band began to play the german national song deutsche D c u t s c h 1 a n nd d deutschland Deutsch land uber ales everyone sprang up irom from their places as the fuehrer came in sight within ten feet of me his auto passed with upraised arm in the customary heil hitler salute he exhibited himself to his volk occasionally I 1 he dropped the arm only to raise raise it again to salute his soldiers soldier 3 nd flags following him were goring coring goebbels and others of the 1 and last followed the last of the airplanes a group of about 60 that was the of the parade but only a beginning for four hours the war machines passed four abreast and in perfect order and time I 1 heard from many s sources that this is the first time that the equipment has been so openly exhibited during these four hours of waiting I 1 changed positions with much difficulty for there were about 20 rows packed like sardines along the parade street and found it interesting to listen to the many different dialects and languages I 1 happened along at the right time to hear a native of bavaria talk in his south german language at other places were numerous italians japanese and other foreigners my wandering finally took me to the brandenburger en tor by way of a few weiner weiner stands aleine gute but that was a sight every man woman and child in berlin must have been there and they were mere beginning to crowd as far as possible to the edge of the street to see sec hitler on his return luckily I 1 found a place near the curb and again saw the fuehrer and his guests as they returned to the again deafening shouts of H heil e i I 1 hitler arose shouts so loud that the earth fairly vibrated the military equipment continued to pass as ever four pieces of war machinery abreast toward three the heavier guns began to pass hundreds of them with giant trucks pulling them or hauling them I 1 soon decided to try to go to unter den linden the entrance at the brandenburger Eran denburger tor was however blocked by the police and SA I 1 finally succeeded in crossing the street and by making a detour of about a half hour arrived on unter den linden Wilm helms strasse which leads to the was ane one solid mass of banners and hacken kreuz flags I 1 soon noticed others taking pictures so I 1 als also 0 sea of people who were trying to took advantage of the opportunity I 1 luckily I 1 found a fire alarm box and was able to get a view of the move along the streets traffic was dc toured to other streets from this elevated position I 1 was afforded an excellent view of this colorful street to the east as fir far as I 1 could see the street was just filled with people and the buildings were covered with the red flags with the in the middle over the brandenburger tor the sun was shining through april clouds what a sight toward evening willicia strasse was blocked 0 off ff by and SA the people lined up again to see the fueher but he evidently had other plans the diplomats from the european countries finally came by but no hitler at last the crowd loosened up enough that one could move around As it turned dark another feature awaited the curious mob special lighting features had been arranged for the streets and were suddenly turned on the tor which by the way is crowned b by a which in 1806 waz wa carried by napoleon as a trophy to paris but which was recovered by the prussians in 1814 wa was very effectively lighted in the background shined the lights from the new street ost west achee until ten I 1 watched the sights and finally decided that it was time to go home my route led me along 0 the new street in the direction from which I 1 had come and through the thickest traffic that I 1 have seen since I 1 left new york As I 1 stopped to take some night shots some of the germans asked me to ob ich auf den d e n fuehrer bartete war tete As I 1 arrived in the platz another interesting sight awaited me nothing had been spared to make an impression on the fuehrer on the side of the big building das Va terland was a giant photograph of hi hitler aler so lighted that one could see it from a long distance I 1 purchased a in the depot and read all about the parade and looked at the pictures of the parade as 1 I rode an 1115 p in train back to magdeburg some of the articles interested me very much and others were very amusing pairs of hose from his subjects were a part of the presents to hitler the greatest parade in the history of the world and so on I 1 arrived in magdeburg about and plenty tired well anyway I 1 had seen the birthday party |