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Posts Tagged ‘1942’

WWII History for June 4 – Battle of Midway

04 Jun

Today in WWII History – The Battle of Midway

World War II History for June 4

Audio: MBS News – The Battle of Midway 06.04.1942

 WWII History - 06.04.1942 - MBS News Broadcast - The Battle of Midway [1:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Jun 04, 1940 “We must be very careful not to assign to this deliverance the attributes of a victory. War’s are not won by evacuations.” – Winston Churchill – To Parliament

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – PBYs attack Occupation Force northwest of Midway; one PBY torpedoes fleet tanker Akebono Maru.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – Japanese carrier fleet – Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, and Hiryu – sends its aircraft against defensive installations on Midway. Although defending USMC F2A’s and F4F’s suffer disastrous losses, damage to facilities on Midway is comparatively slight.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – Japanese carrier fighters and antiaircraft fire annihilates the USMC SBD’s and SB2U’s, Navy’s new TBF’s, and USAAF torpedo-carrying B-26′s sent from Midway Island to attack the Japanese carriers. USAAF B-17′s likewise bomb the Japanese carrier force without success.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – Concentrating on the destruction of Midway air forces, the Japanese carriers were caught unprepared for the U.S. carrier air attack.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – Torpedo bombers (TBD’s) from American carrier striking force Hornet (CV-8), Enterprise (CV-6), and Yorktown (CV-5) attack the enemy carriers. Although mauled by the defending combat air patrol and antiaircraft fire, they draw off the former and leave the skies open for dive bombers (SBD’s) from Enterprise and Yorktown.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – SBD’s from Enterprise sink carrier Kaga and bomb Akagi (flagship) SBD’s; SBD’s from Yorktown bomb and sink carrier Soryu.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – Submarine Nautilus (SS-168) torpedoes carrier Kaga but her “fish” do not explode.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – Hiryu escapes destruction that morning, launches dive bombers that temporarily disable Yorktown. Fletcher transfers flag to Astoria (CA-34) .

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – A second Japanese counter attack 2 hours later, damages Yorktown with bombs and torpedoes so severely that she was abandoned.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – In the late afternoon, SBD’s from Enterprise, including Yorktown planes, hit the Japanese Force again, striking Hiryu, the fourth and last of the Japanese carriers.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – TF-16 (Spruance) released at dusk.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – With control of the air irretrievably lost, the Japanese are compelled to abandon Midway invasion plans and the invasion force retires westward.

Jun 04, 1942 – Jun 05, 1942 Battle of Midway – Overnight – Three Japanese fleets, with ten battleships, including Yamato, the world’s largest battleship, two escort carriers, cruisers, and destroyers race to engage the U.S. carriers.

Jun 04, 1942 – Jun 05, 1942 Battle of Midway – Overnight – The U.S. fleet withdraws till midnight, then returns to the protective air cover of Midway.

Jun 04, 1942 – Jun 05, 1942 Battle of Midway – Overnight – Finding nothing, the Japanese battle fleets also withdraws.

Jun 04, 1942 Battle of Midway – 4:1 win in favor of US

 
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Posted in Europe Theater, Facts, Pacific Theater, Podcast, Today

 

World War II History for January 18

18 Jan

Today in WWII History

World War II History for January 18

Podcast: 01.18.1940 – CBS Today In Europe

 WWII History - 01.18.1940 CBS Today in Europe [12:35m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

1942 - Russian forces under General Timoshenko launched a fresh offensive against the Germans on the central front. The southern front was marked by strong gains by the Red Army in the Ukraine.

1942 - Burma’s Premier U Saw was “detained” by the British for allegedly being in communication with the Japanese.

1942 - Germany, Italy, and Japan sign a military convention in Berlin, laying down “guidelines for common operations against the common enemies.”

1943 - U.S. commercial bakers stopped selling sliced bread. Only whole loaves were sold during the ban until the end of World War II.

1944 - Soviet forces began to arrive at Leningrad, effectively ending the three-year Siege of Leningrad, but fighting would continue for more than another week before German troops withdrew from the area. (from http://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=125)

 
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Posted in Europe Theater, Ground, Media, North America, Pacific Theater, Podcast, Today

 

World War II History for August 24

24 Aug

Today in WWII History

World War II History for August 24

08.24.1942 – U.S. forces sank the Japanese aircraft carrier Ryujo in the Battle of the East Solomon Islands. During this battle the “coastwatchers,” volunteers that reported on Japanese ship and aircraft movement, were a key to American success.

*Edit: The carrier sunk is the Ryujo, not the Ryuho

Ryuho

 
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Posted in Country - Japan, Images, Media, Pacific Theater, Sea, Today

 

World War II History for July 22

22 Jul

Today in WWII History

World War II History for July 22

1942 - Deportations from Warsaw ghetto to Treblinka begin

Deportations to Treblinka
Deportations to Treblinka

On this day in 1942, the systematic deportation of Jews from the Warsaw ghetto begins, as thousands are rounded up daily and transported to a newly constructed concentration/extermination camp at Treblinka, in Poland.

On July 17, Heinrich Himmler, head of the Nazi SS, arrived at Auschwitz, the concentration camp in eastern Poland, in time to watch the arrival of more than 2,000 Dutch Jews and the gassing of almost 500 of them, mostly the elderly, sick, and very young. The next day, Himmler promoted the camp commandant, Rudolph Hoess, to SS major and ordered that the Warsaw ghetto, (the Jewish quarter constructed by the Nazis upon the occupation of Poland, enclosed first by barbed wire and then by brick walls), be depopulated-a “total cleansing,” as he described it and the inhabitants transported to what was to become a second extermination camp constructed at the railway village of Treblinka, 62 miles northeast of Warsaw.

Within the first seven weeks of Himmler’s order, more than 250,000 Jews were taken to Treblinka by rail and gassed to death, marking the largest single act of destruction of any population group, Jewish or non-Jewish, civilian or military, in the war. Upon arrival at “T. II,” as this second camp at Treblinka was called, prisoners were separated by sex, stripped, and marched into what were described as “bathhouses,” but were in fact gas chambers. T.II’s first commandant was Dr. Irmfried Eberl, age 32, the man who had headed up the euthanasia program of 1940 and had much experience with the gassing of victims, especially children. He compelled several hundred Ukrainian and about 1,500 Jewish prisoners to assist him. They removed gold teeth from victims before hauling the bodies to mass graves. Eberl was relieved of his duties for “inefficiency.” It seems that he and his workers could not remove the corpses quickly enough, and panic was occurring within the railway cars of newly arrived prisoners.

By the end of the war, between 700,000 and 900,000 would die at either Treblinka I or II. Hoess was tried and sentenced to death by the Nuremberg Tribunal. He was hanged in 1947. [1]

1943 - American forces led by Gen. George S. Patton captured Palermo, Sicily.

[1] “Deportations from Warsaw ghetto to Treblinka begin,” History.com, http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=Article&id=6527 (accessed Jul 22, 2009).

 
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Posted in Europe Theater, Ground, Today

 

World War II History for July 6

06 Jul

Today in WWII History

World War II History for July 6

1942 - Diarist Anne Frank and her family took refuge from the Nazis in Amsterdam.

1942 - Japanese forces landed on Guadalcanal Island and began constructing an airfield. On February 1, 1943 the Japanese forces began to withdraw.


Japanese Machine Gunners on Guadalcanal

1944 - Hartford Circus Fire

The Hartford Circus Fire was one of the worst fire disasters in US history. While thousands of spectators were enjoying an afternoon performance of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, a fire broke out on the southwest sidewall of the tent. The big top, waterproofed with a coating of paraffin and gasoline, quickly collapsed in flames, trapping hundreds beneath it. Circus Bandleader Merle Evans is said to be the person who first spotted the flames, and immediately directed the band to play Stars and Stripes Forever, the tune that traditionally signaled distress to all circus personnel.

1944 - Georges Mandel, French patriot, is executed

On this day in 1944, Georges Mandel, France’s minister of colonies and vehement opponent of the armistice with Germany, is executed in a wood outside Paris by collaborationist French.

Born into a prosperous Jewish family (his given name was Louis-Georges Rothschild, though no relation to the banking family) in 1885, Mandel’s political career began at age 21 as a member of the personal staff of French Premier Georges Clemenceau. He went on to serve in the National Assembly from 1919 to 1924, and then again from 1928 to 1940. Although a political conservative, he fell into conflict with fellow conservatives over their too-often pro-German sympathies, especially during the two world wars.

In 1940, he was transferred to the Ministry of the Interior by then French Premier Paul Reynaud, with whom he shared the conviction that no armistice should be made with the German invaders, and that the battle should continue, even if only from France’s colonies in Africa. After the resignation of Reynaud and the establishment of the Petain/Vichy government, Mandel sailed to Morocco, where he was arrested and sent back to France and imprisoned. He was then handed over to the Germans, and put in concentration camps in Oranienburg and Buchenwald. On July 4, 1944, he was shipped back to Paris, where the French security police, the Milice, took him out to a wood and shot him. As he was being handed over to his countrymen by the German SS, he said: “To die is nothing. What is sad is to die without seeing the liberation of the country and the restoration of the Republic.” [1]

[1] “Georges Mandel, French patriot, is executed,” History.com, http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=6511 (accessed Jul 6, 2009).

 
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Posted in Country - Japan, Europe Theater, Media, North America, Pacific Theater, Today

 

Bittersweet Reunion Pt 1 of 2

25 Jun

Bittersweet Reunion, Part 1 of 2

Wainwright and MacArthur
Wainwright and MacArthur, date unknown

“Drained of the confidence he had always shown”, journalist Clark Lee of the Associated Press noted when he saw Douglas MacArthur in March of 1942. Lee had no idea why, for the reason for MacArthur’s sadness was classified: he had just been ordered to evacuate the Philippine Islands. He was given the impression that a significant Allied force would soon very be gathered in Australia, to be placed under his command for a return to the Philippines. He was evacuated during the night of 11 March 1942, and made an emotional farewell to his right hand man and friend Jonathan Wainwright.

“Goodbye, Jonathan,” the general said, the choice of words reflecting his guilt for leaving his friend behind, for he rarely addresses anyone, especially not comrades in the Army, by the first name. “When I get back, if you’re still on Bataan, I’ll make you a lieutenant general”, he promised, perhaps hoping to lighten up the mood.

“I’ll be Bataan if I’m alive”, responded Wainwright, dutifully, ignoring the promise of promotion.

After MacArthur’s evacuation, the self-titled “battling bastards of Bataan” fought the defensive campaign on their own, completely cut-off from the outside. “No papa, no mama, no Uncle Sam”, they joked bitterly. These “bastards” fought until the first week of May, 1942. They were defeated militarily as well as spiritually. On 6 May, Wainwright formally surrendered to the Japanese.

As the Japanese escorted Wainwright to a prisoners of war camp, he wondered if his defeat was regarded with shame back home.

This two-part guest blog is written by C. Peter Chen. He is the Founder and Managing Editor of the World War II Database, and is also a staff member at the Imperial Japanese Navy Page.

 
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Posted in Asian Theater, Facts, Other, Pacific Theater, Sea

 

World War II History for June 19

19 Jun

Today in WWII History

World War II History for June 19

19 June 1942 - British Prime Minister Winston Churchill arrived in Washington, DC, to discuss the invasion of North Africa with U.S. President Roosevelt.

19 June 1944 - The U.S. won the battle of the Philippine Sea against the Imperial Japanese fleet.

In what would become known as the “Marianas Turkey Shoot,” U.S. carrier-based fighters decimate the Japanese Fleet with only a minimum of losses in the Battle of the Philippine Sea.

USS Lexington during Battle of the Philippine Sea
An F6F-3 “Hellcat” fighter lands aboard USS Lexington (CV-16) during the “Marianas Turkey Shoot” phase of the battle, 19 June 1944. Note manned 40mm guns in the foreground, and 20mm guns along the starboard side of the flight deck.

The security of the Marianas Islands, in the western Pacific, were vital to Japan, which had air bases on Saipan, Tinian, and Guam. U.S. troops were already battling the Japanese on Saipan, having landed there on the 15th. Any further intrusion would leave the Philippine Islands, and Japan itself, vulnerable to U.S. attack. The U.S. Fifth Fleet, commanded by Admiral Raymond Spruance, was on its way west from the Marshall Islands as backup for the invasion of Saipan and the rest of the Marianas.

IJN Zuikaku 1944
IJN Zuikaku in the Battle of the Philippine Sea 1944

Mobilized to repel the Allied invasions the Japanese launched Operation ‘A’ sending two task forces into the Marianas area. But Japanese Admiral Ozawa Jisaburo decided to challenge the American fleet, ordering 430 of his planes, launched from aircraft carriers, to attack. In what became the greatest carrier battle of the war, the United States, having already picked up the Japanese craft on radar, proceeded to shoot down more than 300 aircraft and sink two Japanese aircraft carriers, losing only 29 of their own planes in the process. It was a described in the aftermath as a “turkey shoot.”

Admiral Ozawa, believing his missing planes had landed at their Guam air base, maintained his position in the Philippine Sea, allowing for a second attack of U.S. carrier-based fighter planes, this time commanded by Admiral Mitscher, to shoot down an additional 65 Japanese planes and sink another carrier. In total, the Japanese lost 480 aircraft, three-quarters of its total, not to mention most of its crews. American domination of the Marianas was now a foregone conclusion.

Not long after this battle at sea, U.S. Marine divisions penetrated farther into the island of Saipan. Two Japanese commanders on the island, Admiral Nagumo and General Saito, both committed suicide in an attempt to rally the remaining Japanese forces. It succeeded: Those forces also committed a virtual suicide as they attacked the Americans’ lines, losing 26,000 men compared with 3,500 lost by the United States. Within another month, the islands of Tinian and Guam were also captured by the United States.

The Japanese government of Premier Hideki Tojo resigned in disgrace at this stunning defeat, in what many have described as the turning point of the war in the Pacific.[1]

[1] “United States scores major victory against Japanese in Battle of the Philippine Sea,” The History Channel website, http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=6491 (accessed Jun 19, 2009).

 
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Posted in Country - USA, Media, News, Pacific Theater, Sea

 

World War II History for June 15

15 Jun

Today in WWII History

World War II History for June 15

15 June 1940 - The French fortress of Verdun was captured by Germans.

15 June 1942- On the carrier IJN Zuikaku Captain Yokokawa was relieved by Captain Tameteru Notomo.

IJN Zuikaku 1941
IJN Zuikaku 1941

IJN Zuikaku 1944
IJN Zuikaku in the Battle of the Philippine Sea 1944

15 June 1943 - Paul Blobel, an SS colonel, was given the assignment of destroying the evidence of the systematic extermination of European Jews.

15 June 1944 - American forces began their successful invasion of Saipan during World War II. U.S. 2nd and 4th Marine land on Saipan against heavy resistance.

 
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Posted in Europe Theater, Media, Pacific Theater

 

Operation A B

09 Jun

Operation A.B.

A.B. – Designation (together with a numeral) of Allied convoys plying the route across the Indian Ocean from Aden to Bombay; the start date of the A.B. convoys was November 1942.

HMS Warspite in Indian Ocean 1942
HMS Warspite in Indian Ocean 1942

 
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Posted in Facts, Media, Sea

 

Searching for Soviet WWII Subs

09 Jun

Explorers Search Bulgarian Waters for Soviet WW II Submarine
June 9, 2009, Tuesday | novinite.com

Divers with a Soviet WWII Submarine

A Russia-Bulgaria submarine expedition begins in July, in Bulgarian Black Sea territorial waters, a search for a Soviet World War II Submarine. Photo by BGNES

Russian explorers are going to ask Russia’s government to assist them in their search for a Soviet submarine near the Bulgarian Black Sea coast.

The search will be conducted in July 2009 as part of the Russia-Bulgaria submarine expedition “In Honor of the Great Victory’s Ships” dedicated to the 65th anniversary of the Soviet victory in World War II.

[...]

The C-34, destroyed in 1942, is the fifth and last Soviet submarine to be found along Bulgaria’s shoreline.

The explorers already identified the L-24 submarine they discovered earlier near the Bulgarian cape Shabla, in the area of the northern Black Sea town of Balchik. The submarine was destroyed by a torpedo in 1942 and the entire crew of 57 was killed.

A special memorial plaque has been mounted on the L-24 declaring the submarine a “common grave”.

 
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Posted in News

 
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