23:55GMT
23:55GMT
The day in dispatches
Filed through the day, as it happened
23:10GMT
23:10GMT
Both sides now say they are ready for a long war
LONDON Yesterday this paper argued that Berlin's claim to have entered Warsaw should be treated as a claim and kept out of print as a fact. One army had made it, the other had denied it within hours, and there was no third source.
22:00GMT
22:00GMT
Government tells departments to plan for a war of at least three years
LONDON The Government has told its departments to plan on the basis that the war may last at least three years.
21:10GMT
21:10GMT
Göring tells armaments workers that 1918 will never be repeated
BERLIN Germany is armed and supplied well enough to withstand a long war and an Allied blockade, Hermann Göring told armaments workers today.
21:00GMT
21:00GMT
Canada's Commons resumes its war debate with the vote still to come
OTTAWA The Canadian House of Commons resumed at three o'clock this afternoon, still debating whether Canada goes to war. The time of the vote is still to be announced.
20:10GMT
20:10GMT
Moscow calls up reserve classes, citing the war's “menacing character”
MOSCOW The Soviet Union is calling up members of several reserve classes, TASS, the official Soviet news agency, announced today. It said the German-Polish conflict is acquiring a “wide and menacing character”.
18:20GMT
18:20GMT
Maritime Commission corrects City of Flint list to 113 non-Americans
NEW YORK The U.S. Maritime Commission has issued a corrected list of 113 non-American citizens aboard the rescue ship City of Flint. Most are believed to be Canadian.
17:30GMT
17:30GMT
Berlin says Polish territory that was German before 1914 will be German again
BERLIN Hitler intends to treat the territories of Poland that belonged to Germany before 1914 as German again, a German spokesman said today.
16:40GMT
16:40GMT
RAF aircraft crossed into Belgium in error and fought Belgian fighters
LONDON British aircraft crossed into Belgian territory yesterday and fought Belgian fighters, the Air Ministry has announced. The British Ambassador in Brussels, Sir Robert Clive, has been instructed to apologise.
15:50GMT
15:50GMT
Thirty of the 97 ships held at Gibraltar sail under destroyer escort
LA LÍNEA Thirty British merchant ships left Gibraltar today under the protection of a destroyer squadron.
15:00GMT
15:00GMT
Missing Manaar lifeboat found and 23 men rescued
LISBON One of the missing lifeboats from the British steamer Manaar has been found, and the 23 men aboard it have been rescued.
14:10GMT
14:10GMT
British tanker Kennebec reported torpedoed, with the whole crew rescued
AMSTERDAM The British tanker Kennebec, of 5,548 tons, has been torpedoed, according to a message from the Dutch liner Breedijk reported in Amsterdam today. The whole crew has been taken off.
13:20GMT
13:20GMT
Steamer Helfrid Bismark now placed south of the Sound, with a mine blamed
STOCKHOLM The loss of the German steamer Helfrid Bismark is now being placed south of the Sound, a firmer position than yesterday's reports gave.
12:30GMT
12:30GMT
Lwów radio calls on villagers to build barricades and take up arms
LWÓW The Polish radio station at Lwów has told village populations to build barricades and defend themselves against the invading forces.
11:40GMT
11:40GMT
French High Command says the Warndt Forest is almost entirely in French hands
PARIS The Warndt Forest, west of Forbach, has passed “almost entirely” into French hands, the French High Command has announced.
10:50GMT
10:50GMT
Polish military mission arrives in London by a secret route
LONDON A Polish military mission has arrived in London, travelling by a route described publicly only as secret.
09:40GMT
09:40GMT
Polish Government reported moving farther east from Lublin
BUDAPEST The Polish Government is moving farther east, according to diplomatic dispatches reaching Budapest.
08:10GMT
08:10GMT
Swedish Legation tells Stockholm that Warsaw is still in Polish hands
STOCKHOLM The Swedish Legation in Warsaw has advised that the capital is still under Polish control and has escaped occupation, according to a report reaching Stockholm this morning.
06:20GMT
06:20GMT
German and Polish broadcasts still contradict each other on Warsaw
STOCKHOLM German and Polish broadcasters are still making conflicting claims about who holds Warsaw this morning.
05:20GMT
05:20GMT
Air-raid alarms sound twice over Berlin, with no aircraft seen
BERLIN Air-raid alarms sounded twice over Berlin overnight, the first the German capital has heard since Britain and France entered the war.
05:00GMT
05:00GMT
Canadian Commons adjourns without a vote and sits again on Saturday afternoon
The Canadian House of Commons adjourned at eleven o'clock Ottawa time after an evening sitting on the Address in Reply, the debate that will decide whether Canada enters the war. The vote is still to come.
02:20GMT
02:20GMT
Woodsworth tells Canada's Commons he cannot consent to another war
OTTAWA J. S. Woodsworth told the Canadian House of Commons tonight that he could not consent to anything that would drag the country into another war. He said he was speaking for himself alone, and the House heard him out.
Where things stood at the start of the day
- Poland
- Berlin says its armoured troops entered Warsaw at 5.15 yesterday afternoon, Berlin time, and the Polish Embassy in London calls the report false. No third account exists, the German statement names no unit, and Berlin gives 25,000 Polish prisoners taken against Warsaw's 1,500.
- The Atlantic
- Two ships have been lost in neutral waters, both attributed by survivors to mines: a Dutch minesweeper off the Dutch coast with 29 reported dead, and the German steamer Helfrid Bismark south of the Øresund with seven dead. Neither figure is final.
- Britain at home
- Still not given: any figure for the aircraft lost over Wilhelmshaven on Monday, any new total for merchant ships sunk since the Athenia, or any detail of where the convoys are sailing. Berlin's five bombers remains the only loss figure in circulation.
- Western Front
- Communiqué No. 9 reports new local advances in the Saar sector and strengthened forward positions, giving no distances, place names or casualties. Paris papers put the northern flank seven or eight miles into Germany, a figure the High Command has not confirmed.
- The Empire
- Canada's Commons debate continues without a vote. Mackenzie King said Canada will act with Britain and France if the House supports the government, and that a government unable to carry the House should give way; Canada has not declared war.
- Neutrals
- Roosevelt has proclaimed a limited national emergency, confined to enforcing neutrality and strengthening defence within peace-time powers. Two further proclamations extend the neutrality law and the arms embargo to South Africa, and Canada remains off the list.
Background
Why Ottawa must vote before it can declare
Britain declared war on Germany on 3 September. Canada did not, and nobody expected it to.
Each Dominion decides. Under the Statute of Westminster the Dominions are not bound by a British declaration. Each decides for itself, and the decision belongs to its own parliament. That is why the Canadian House of Commons has been sitting through the night on a question that in London took a morning.
The instrument before the House. The instrument in front of members is not a war vote. It is the Address in Reply to the Speech from the Throne, the ordinary parliamentary response to a government's programme. What makes it consequential is that Mackenzie King has told the House what he will do with it: if the Address is adopted, the Government will treat that as approval to request a formal proclamation of war against Germany.