Showing posts with label Chichijima. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chichijima. Show all posts

Monday, September 2, 2024

Saturday, September 2, 1944. Finland calls it quits.

This was the 5th anniversary of the start of the Second World War in Europe.

This means, fwiw, that a fair number of combatants had been in their early to mid teen years when the war started, and were now fighting in it.

Finnish Prime Minister Antii Hackzell announced that Finland was breaking diplomatic relations with Germany and demanded that all German troops leave the country.  Fighting concluded two days later.

Finland had lost about 63,000 men in what it termed the Continuation War, over twice as many men as it had lost in the much briefer Winter War.  In the war to regain territory lost during the first war it regained what it had lost, but would lose it again.  Fought as a separate war, the Finns had ceased advancing once they took what they'd lost.

On the same day, two Soviet defectors crash landed a Yak 9 inside of Finnish lines.

At this point, Italy had switched sides, as had Romania and Bulgaria was begging the Soviets to honor its neutrality. Hungary was trying to get out of the war. As noted below, the British had entered Belgium.  The Germans should have realized they were doomed.

Lt. Jr. Gr George Bush, later President of the United States, found his aircraft badly damaged after completing a bombing run over Chichijima and ordered the crew of this TBM Avenger to bail out.  Only one other man made it out of the plane, and his parachute didn't open, making Bush the only survivor.


He'd be at sea for four hours before being rescued by he USS Finback, with which he'd remain for the rest of the month.

FWIW, the President at the time, Franklin Roosevelt, had never been in the service, but he had been Assistant Secretary of the Navy.  The next one, Truman, had been an artillery captain during World War One.  Eisenhower of course was in the service in 1944.  Kennedy was in the Navy in 1944.  So was Nixon, and Ford.  Carter did not serve in World War Two, but was an Annapolis graduate.  Reagan served in World War Two, but not in a combat role. Then Bush.  Clinton was the first to break the trend.

Konstantin Muraviev became Prime Ministers of a now desperate Bulgaria.

The First Canadian Army took Saint-Valery-en-Caux and reached the Somme.

The FFI executed six French young men they found guilty of treason in Grenoble.

The British 21st Army Group entered Belgium.

German troops murdered 450 Poles at Lipniak-Majorat, Poland in reprisal for actions by the Home Army.

The U-394 was sunk by the Royal Navy off of Jan Mayen.

Last edition:

Friday, September 1, 1944. Lone Tree Hill

Saturday, August 31, 2024

Thursday, August 31, 1944. Montgomery promoted. The Red Army in Bucharest. The Mad Gasser in Mattoon, Illinois.

The Red Army entered a Bucharest already cleared of German troops by the Romanian Army.  Crowds cheered the arrival of the Red Army.

Romania would be one of the tragic examples of the Red Army not leaving where it appeared following the war. It would take a revolution in the USSR, more or less, and definitely in Romania, to restore Romanian sovereignty and establish Romanian democracy.

Bernard Law Montgomery was promoted to Field Marshal.


Almost slandered by American historians since the war, Montgomery was a great man and a strategic genius who had mastered the ability to fight with an economy of resources.  Born in England, but raised in Australia (his father was an Episcopal Bishop), he was truly one of the greatest Allied commanders of the war.

The 5th Army crossed the Arno.

Slovene partisans rescued 105 Allied POWs in the Raid at Ožbalt.

The US prevailed in the Battle of Sansapor.

Task Force 38.4 attacked Japanese positions on Iwo Jima and Chichi Jima.

The first of the Mad Gasser of Mattoon incidents in Mattoon, Illinois.

Jimmy Akin's Mysterious World has a good episode on this really weird event.

Last edition:

Wednesday, August 30, 1944. End of Operation Overlord.

Sunday, June 16, 2024

Friday, June 16, 1944. Executions.

Heavy fighting continued on Saipan.

Knocked out Japanese tanks, June 16, 1944.

Beachheads on Saipan were linked, with combat featuring heavy artillery duels by both sides.

US battleships hit Guam, but the invasion of the island was postponed due to the approach of a Japanese fleet, which later turned to link up with a second one.

Carrier task forces raided Iwo Jima, Chichi Jima and Haha Jima.

The Treaty of Vis was signed in Yugoslavia in an attempt by the Western Allies to merge the Yugoslavian government in exile and the Communist partisans in the field.  The treaty provided for an interim post-war government.

The British 21st Army Group in Normandy advanced everywhere along its front.  The U.S. 1st Army crossed the Douvre and captured St. Saveur.

King George VI visited British troops in France.

The U.S. 9th Infantry Division liberated Orglandes.

US troops in Normandy reading their mail.

244 V-1 rockets hit London.

The British 8th Army took Foligno and Spoleto, Italy.   The US 5th Army took Grosseto.

French historian Marc Bloch, age 57, was shot by the Gestapo due to his work for the French Resistance.


George Stinney, a 14-year-old African American convicted of murder of two white girls, was executed in the electric chair, the youngest American to suffer that fate.

His conviction has since been vacated, not that it does him any good, on the basis that he did not receive a fair trial.

Another item on this from Uncle Mike:

June 16, 1944: A Southern State Executes a Black 14-Year-Old

Last prior edition:

Thursday, June 15, 1944. Saipan.

Monday, April 15, 2024

Saturday, April 15, 1944. Romania attacked from the air, Teenagers lose at Tarnopol, Politics in Minnesota, Hydro-Québec

PB4Y Photo Reconnaissance Liberators on a photo mission in the South Pacific , April 15, 1944.

PhoM1c E.S. Ujvarosy and PhoM1c R.M. Rhodes check their cameras, magazines, and data sheets before taking off on a mission in a Navy PB4Y photo reconnaissance plane. Cameras, left to right: F56-40”, two K-18’s 24”, K-17-12” and a K-17-06”. Lying on its side is vertical view finder. April 15, 1944.

The US 15th Air Force sent 500 sorties to Bucharest and Ploesti.  The war had reached the point where the Western Allies air attacks were now directly assisting the Soviet offensive in the east.

The Red Army took Tarnopol. German commander Gen. von Neindorff was killed in the fighting and nearly the entire German garrison was lost.

The original German commander at Tarnopal had deemed the defense hopeless and had reported it so.  The garrison of the doomed city was made up of new troops, most of whom were recent German teenage conscripts.  Only 55 of some 4,000 troops escaped the city.

British X class submarine, in this case the X25.

In Operation Guidance a British midget mine laying submarine, the X24 attacked the floating dock at Bergen, but the raid was not successful as the boat's charges were placed on a large German merchant vessel rather than the dock.

Aircraft from the USS Yorktown raided Chichijima and Iwo Jima.

African American troops on Bougainville, April 15, 1944.

The Minnesota Democratic Farm Labor Party was founded by the merger of the Minnesota Democratic Party and the larger, yes larger, Farmer–Labor Party.


The left wing Farm Labor Party had been hugely successful in Minnesota. Founded in 1918, it's run to 1944 is one of the most successful state third party stories in the US.


Montreal Light, Heat & Power was taken over by provincial entity Hydro-Québec.

Last prior edition:

Friday, April 14, 1944. Indian drama.