Thursday, October 19, 1944. Airbase disaster.

Today In Wyoming's History: October 19: 1944  1944  A bomber from the Casper Air Base crashed killing three crewmembers.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

Last edition:

Wednesday, October 18, 1944. Levée en masse.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Auschwitz, Conscription, Erwin Rommel, Greece, Italy, Nazi Germany, The Holocaust, Volkssturm, World War Two

Saturday, June 17, 1944. A stateside tragedy.

B-24J 42-100023 piloted by 2nd. Lt. Richard Zorn of Connecticut crashed on top of Casper Mountain, south of Casper, Wyoming, at about midnight, killing all on board.

The US 7th Corps advanced markedly on this day.  The British, however, were having trouble near Caen.

The 41 Commando, Royal Marines, took the German surrender at Douvres-la-Délivrande.

Royal Marines in Douvres-la-Délivrande.

Iceland declared independence from Denmark.  Large celebrations broke out in the country.

South Dakota suffered a horrific tornado outbreak, killing 13 people and injuring 550.

Last prior edition:

Friday, June 16, 1944. Executions.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Aircraft, Army, British Army, Chichijima, Crime, French Resistance Movements, Gestapo, Guam, Haha Jima, Italy, Iwo Jima, Operation Overlord, Saipan, World War Two, Yugoslav Partisans, Yugoslavia

Tuesday, September 1, 1942. Miscarriages of Justice.

On this 1st day of September 1942, the United States District Court in Sacramento, California ruled wartime detention of Japanese Americans to be legal.

Japanese Foreign Minister Shigenori Tōgō (東郷 茂徳) who had opposed war with the United States on the basis that it was unwinnable, resigned and went into retirement.  The cause of his resignation was his opposition to the creation of a special ministry for occupied territories.  He was appointed thereafter to the upper house of the Japanese Diet, but did not take an active role in it.

He returned to his former position in April 1945 and worked towards acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration.  He advocated Japanese surrender after the atomic strikes of August of that year.  

In spite of his opposition to the war, he was tried as a war criminal in 1948 and sentenced to twenty years imprisonment.  He died as a prisoner two years later at age 67.

He was an unusual man in multiple ways.  He'd studied in Germany when young and then entered the foreign ministry.  He served as ambassador to Germany in 1937 and then later was assigned to the Soviet Union, where he'd negotiated a peace settlement between the USSR and Japan following Khalkhin Gol.  He married German Carla Victoria Editha Albertina Anna de Lalande, who was a wide of was well known German architect, with Japanese marriages to Westerners being uncommon then, which remains the case today.  She survived him and died in 1967.

Tōgō's family, including his wife's daughter by her first marriage and the couple's daughter.  His descendants have continued to have diplomatic careers.

Both of the examples above provide interesting examples of the miscarriage of official justice.  Internment should have been deemed illegal, particularly as to U.S. citizens who were truly being deprived of their liberty without due process.  And while there were Japanese war criminals, Tōgō''s conviction seems to have been for simply being on the losing side of the war.

Royal Air Force Wellingtons bombed Afrika Korps supply lines at night, destroying fuel supplies, which halted Panzerarmee Afrika for most of the day.  

Wellingtons over Europe.

We don't think of Wellington bombers much in the story of the war, but they did in fact see combat service.

The Germans took the Black Sea port of Anapa.

According to the Wyoming State Historical Association, on this day in 1942 official approval was given to commence use of the Casper Air Base, which had been constructed in an incredibly small amount of time.  The existing county airport was Wardwell Field, the Casper area's second airport (the first was in what is now Evansville).  Today, what was Casper Air Base is the Natrona County International Airport, which actually uses at least one fewer runway than was constructed by the Army in 1942.  Wardwell Field's runways, in contrast, are city streets in the Town of Bar Nunn.