DISTRAUGHT American guests at Cotswold hotels have been trying desperately to contact friends and relatives back home.

Mary Hill, from Bourton's Chester House Hotel, said one guest, who checked out worked at the Pentagon.

She said he and his wife were due to fly back and added: "They were shocked. It was terrible."

Another American party were staying at the village's Old Manse Hotel, but manageress Sue Dootson said they had continued on to Cornwall after phoning home on Tuesday night.

For the Cotswold's vital tourism industry the attacks in America are another hammer blow.

Thousands of Americans visit the area every year and are a mainstay of the hotel and restaurant trade but the damage wrought by the terrorists could have a major effect on the industry, which is only now starting to recover from a series of blows in recent years.

Stow's tourist information centre manager, Veronica Woodford, said: "Having just started to get a few people back from overseas after foot and mouth we were beginning to see signs of a recovery and now we have this."

She added: "It will probably put an awful lot of people off coming and off flying in general."

Many hotels in the Cotswolds were expecting American guests in the coming weeks and are now uncertain whether they will arrive.

Tracey Brown, of Moreton's Manor House Hotel, said: "We are due to have some in a fortnight. Whether this will affect them, I don't know."

With transatlantic flights cancelled, many guests from America and Canada have had to extend their stays in Britain, which could mean problems in finding vacancies this weekend.

Yet the tragedy has brought out the best in some. One Stow resident walked into Stow's information centre offering to put up guests for free if there was a shortage of rooms.