Saturday, January 20, 1945. FDR Reinaugurated.

The fourth, and modest, inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt took place on the South Portico of the White House.

His address. 

Mr. Chief Justice, Mr. Vice President, my friends: 

You will understand and, I believe, agree with my wish that the form of this inauguration be simple and its words brief. 

We Americans of today, together with our allies, are passing through a period of supreme test. It is a test of our courage—of our resolve—of our wisdom—of our essential democracy. 

If we meet that test—successfully and honorably—we shall perform a service of historic importance which men and women and children will honor throughout all time. 

As I stand here today, having taken the solemn oath of office in the presence of my fellow countrymen—in the presence of our God—I know that it is America's purpose that we shall not fail. 

In the days and the years that are to come, we shall work for ajust and honorable peace, a durable peace, as today we work and fight for total victory in war. 

We can and we will achieve such a peace. 

We shall strive for perfection. We shall not achieve it immediately—but we still shall strive. We may make mistakes—but they must never be mistakes which result from faintness of heart or abandonment of moral principle. 

I remember that my old schoolmaster, Dr. Peabody, said in days that seemed to us then to be secure and untroubled, "Things in life will not always run smoothly. Sometimes we will be rising toward the heights—then all will seem to reverse itself and start downward. The great fact to remember is that the trend of civilization itself is forever upward; that a line drawn through the middle of the peaks and the valleys of the centuries always has an upward trend." 

Our Constitution of 1787 was not a perfect instrument; it is not perfect yet. But it provided a firm base upon which all manner of men, of all races and colors and creeds, could build our solid structure of democracy. 

Today, in this year of war, 1945, we have learned lessons—at a fearful cost—and we shall profit by them. 

We have learned that we cannot live alone, at peace; that our own well-being is dependent on the well-being of other Nations, far away. We have learned that we must live as men and not as ostriches, nor as dogs in the manger. 

We have learned to be citizens of the world, members of the human community. 

We have learned the simple truth, as Emerson said, that, "The only way to have a friend is to be one." 

We can gain no lasting peace if we approach it with suspicion and mistrust or with fear. We can gain it only if we proceed with the understanding and the confidence and the courage which flow from conviction. 

The Almighty God has blessed our land in many ways. He has given our people stout hearts and strong arms with which to strike mighty blows for freedom and truth. He has given to our country a faith which has become the hope of all peoples in an anguished world.

So we pray to Him now for the vision to see our way clearly to see the way that leads to a better life for ourselves and for all our fellow men—and to the achievement of His will to peace on earth.

Roosevelt would be the only US President to be elected to more than two terms, and after him jealous Republicans caused the Constitution to be amended to prevent that reoccurring, which we can now all be grateful for as it will theoretically prevent Donald Trump from trying for a their term, should old age or dementia not remove him from politics before the end of his claimed current term.  While still hated by some conservatives, FDR is the last American President who might be regarded as "great", although that status can be debated.  He certainly was one of the best Presidents in the nation's history, and his long administration fundamentally altered the country and shaped the post war United States up until, it would seem, today.

Outgoing Vice President Wallace administered the oath to his successor Harry S. Truman, which had been the long standing tradition.  It was the last time it would be observed.  Wallace was dumped as insiders, including FDR, knew that FDR was on death's door and that the incoming Vice President would become President.  Wallace was feared by many because of his very far left views.

The Germans started evacuating East Prussia.

The evacuation of East Prussia would be a major human tragedy, although one that receives very little attention as the Germans brought it upon themselves.  The mass migration into the Reich would end centuries of German presence in what is now once again part of Poland.

The Red Army took Prešov, Slovakia.

The Hungarian Provisional Government entered into an armistice with the Allies.

The Allies progressed in the Ardennes and the French 1st Army commenced an offensive in the Vosges region.

The Nationalist Chinese took Muse, Burma.

Last edition:

Friday, January 19, 1945. Martin Bormann and Hitler's mistress Eva Braun arrived at the Führerbunker.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Adolf Hitler, Eastern Front, French Army, French Resistance Movements, Poland, Red Army, Siege of Budapest, War Crimes, World War Two

Sunday, January 14, 1945. Retreat in the Ardennes.

M-25 light tank in operation, probably in Belgium, January 14, 1945.

Hitler granted von Rundstedt permission to carry out a drastic retreat in the Ardennes.

The Americans won the Battle of Foy.

The US 8th Air Force resumed strategic operations after a month-long pause caused by the Battle of the Bulge.  Their missions encounter heavy German fighter resistance in spite of German losses over the past month.

German POWs in the Ardennes, January 14, 1945.

The Red Army engaged in offensive action nearly everywhere on the Eastern Front, save for Hungary where the Germans were still attempting to relieve Budapest.

The Battle of Ramree Island began off Burma.

The British Second Army began Operation Blackcock with the goal of clearing the Germans from the Dutch towns of Roermond and Sittard and the German town of Heinsberg.

The Twin Star Rocket entered service with the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad.  It was the only new streamlined train permitted to enter service in the US during World War Two.

African American actress Vonettta McGee was born in San Francisco.  She had beat Hodgkins Lymphoma at age 17 and went on to university to seek a career in the law, before switching to acting, in which she had a wide variety of roles, including appearing in The Eiger Sanction.  She died in 2010 of cancer at age 65.

Last edition:

Saturday, January 13, 1945. Stiff German resistance.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Belgium, boats and ships, Kamikaze, Philippines, Proskurov–Chernovtsy Offensive, Prussia, World War Two

Friday, January 5, 1945. They gave all.

British forces prevailed in the Battle of Bure.

The Navy shelled Iwo Jima, Haha Jima and Chichi Jima. The USAAF also hit them with B-29s.

Suribachi Wan in the Kurils was bombarded by surface vessels.

Shwebo was taken by the British 2nd Division of British 33rd Corps (Stopford).  Indian paratroopers were dropped south of Rangoon.

The opening mission of Operation Cornflakes, an attempt to distribute propoganda via the German mail system, opened with a mail train being bombed followed by an air drop of fake mail to German homes.

Ala Gertner, age 32, was executed at Auschwitz for her role in the Sonderkommando revolt of October, 1944.

Julies Leber, age 53, was also executed by the Germans for his role in being an opposition politician and German resistance member.  An Alsatian who had originally chosen a career in the German Army, he was wounded in World War One and resigned from the army after the Kapp Putsch, which he opposed.  He was a member of the July 20 plot and was anticipated to have a future role in the replacement German government.

The Soviet government recognized the Communist Provisional Government, which the UK and US did not.

Pepe Le Pew debuted in "Odor-able Kitty".

Last edition:

Thursday, January 4, 1945. Fighting in snowy Belgium.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Army, Battle of the Bulge, Belgium, British Army, Burma, German Wehrmacht, Indian Army, Luzon, U.S. Air Force, World War Two

Friday, December 15, 1944. Glenn Miller Lost.

The airplane carrying definitive band leader of the 1940s, Glen Miller, disappeared over a fog bound English Channel.  Miller, age 40, was serving as the leader of the US Army Air Forces Orchestra.

Miller's influence on US military music would be profound.

The U.S. Seventh Army captured Riedseltz, Salmbach and Lauterbourg in France.

The RAF made a largescale daylight raid on the submarine pens at Ijmuiden.

The Sixth Army landed on Mindoro and faced very little ground resistance, but heavy air resistance.  The US forces included a regiment of paratroopers.

Admiral William D. Leahy was promoted to five star rank, the first officer to be so promoted and the senior most officer in the Armed Forces.

The Chinese Army captured Bhamo, Burma.

Hollywood Canteen including the Andrews Sisters, Jack Benny, Eddie Cantor, Joan Crawford, Jimmy Dorsey and Roy Rogers was released.

Last edition:

Thursday, December 14, 1944. The tragedy of Lupe Vélez.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, actors and actresses, Mexico, Military, Netherlands, Palawan Massacre, Philippines, Prisoners of War, U.S. Navy, War Crimes, World War Two

Tuesday, October 24, 1944. Leyte Gulf, day two.

It was a major day of naval maneuvering off of Leyte Gulf.

The USS Princeton was hit by kamikazes and so badly damaged that it had to be scuttled.  The Japanese destroyer Wakaba was sunk by aircraft from the USS Franklin.  The Musashi was sunk in the Sibuyan Sea by U.S. aircraft.  T he USS Shark was sunk by Japanese warships.  The USS Darter ran aground in the Palawan Strait and was scuttled.

The Japanese prison ship Arisan Maru was sunk in the South China Sea by an American submarine. Only nine of the 1,781 Allied and civilian prisoners of war survived the sinking.

The 1st Cavalry Division landed on Samar.

Martial law was lifted in Hawaii.

The Soviets prevailed in the Riga Offensive.

The British entered Lamia, Greece.

The China Burma India Theatre was divided into the India-Burma Theater and the China Theater.

Hitler announces his intent to launch an offensive in the Ardennes.

Blood plasma refrigeration unit above was mounted on wheeled machine gun mount by enlisted men serving in France with the 1st Army since D-Day. S/Sgt. Homer N. Shrimplin, of Jelloway, Ohio, and Pvt. Frank Bozoyak, of Bordentown, N.J., are hitching the unit to their truck. 24 October, 1944.

Japanese-American infantrymen attend church services outside their billet in France. 24 October, 1944. 442nd Regimental Combat Team.

Last edition:

Monday, October 23, 1944. The Largest Naval Battle In History.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Australian Navy, Battle of Leyte Gulf, boats and ships, France, German Kriegsmarine, Imperial Japanese Navy, U.S. Navy, Volkssturm, World War Two

Sunday, October 1, 1944. Battle of Tornio starts.

Miss Betty Brittian, Pasadena, Calif., hands Cpl. Wm. B. Brooks, Clayton, Ga., inside the tank, a cup of coffee and doughnuts. 1 October, 1944. Company B, 609th Tank Destroyer Battalion.

The Battle of Tornio began with a Finnish attack on German positions in Lapland.

The U.S. Army took Monte Battaglia.  II and IV Corps launch an offensive towards Bologna.

The Germans commenced the Putten Raid in the Netherlands, removing 660 men in reprisals for a failed assassination attempt on a German official.

British commandos landed at Poros, Greece.  Greek troops landed at Mitilini, Lemnos, and Levita.

British General General Richard McCreery assumed command of the 8th Army, in Italy. General Oliver Leese, was assigned to command Allied Land Forces, Southeast Asia.

Gen. Rudolf Schmundt, age 48, died of wounds sustained in the July 20 plot.  He had been an adjutant to Hitler.

Sally Reed, Durham, Mass., a Red Cross worker somewhere in France, does a bit of KP on the large containers about her--and she doesn't believe in signs for they're all coffee urns. 1 October, 1944.

Last edition: 

Saturday, September 30, 1944. Counteroffensive at Nijmegen.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Battle of Peleliu, boats and ships, British Army, Canadian Army, Defence of the Nijmegen bridgehead, German Wehrmacht, Operation Market Garden, Palau, Pas-de-Calais France, World War Two

Friday, April 14, 1944. Indian drama.

The Bombay Explosion occured at Mumbai, India) when the British SS Fort Stikine caught fire and exploded, creating mass destruction and killing around 800 to 1,300 people.

Kohima was relieved with a British breakthrough.

Col. Shaukat Ali Malik of the Indian National Army entered Moirang with his troops and raised the flag of the Azri Hukumat e-Azad Hind for the first time on Indian soil.

The stories above illustrate the complicated nature of India and the Indian people in World War Two. Col/ Sjailat Ali Malik was a Muslim Indian who had previously served in a British Indian police force, the latter being quite militarized.  The INA was a collaborationist army in combat against the Allies, while of course the British Indian Army was an Allied Army, but subject to the British Empire and therefore not really a "free" army.  

Following the war, the INA would be regarded with sympathy by many Indians.  I don't know what happened to Col. Malik, but the Muslin portions of Indian broke off from it immediately with independence, forming Pakistan. Today, what had been East and West Pakistan are Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The Red Army reached the Carpathian foothills.

Gen. Nikolai F. Vatutin died of wounds received in an ambush by Ukrainian partisans on February 29, 1944.

The U-448 was sunk off of the Azores.

Last prior edition:

Thursday, April 13, 1944. Soviet advances in Crimea.

1940s, 1944, Australian Army, Clothing, Crimea, Eastern Front, Hawaii, New Guinea, Normandy, Operation Overlord, Royal Air Force, U.S. Air Force, Women

Monday, April 10, 1944. Odessa taken by the Red Army.

The Red Army took Odessa. 24,000 German and Romanian troops were evacuated, although many of them were wounded, along with 55,000 tons of supplies.

The RAF dropped 3,600 tons of bombs in a single raid that included Germany, France and Belgium.  It was a record.

Gen. William Slim ordered an offensive to relieve Kohima and into Japanese territory.

The U-68 and U-515 were sunk in the Atlantic by U.S. aircraft flying from the USS Guadalcanal.

108th Gun Bn., camouflage and concealment of 90mm AA gun battery height finder, dug in. Anzio area, Italy. 10 April, 1944.

Last prior edition:

Easter Sunday, April 9, 1944. A wartime Easter, de Gaulle becomes Commander of the Free French, fighting in Romania, a Ukrainian heroine, Belgrade bombed.

1940s, 1944, Catholic, Charles de Gaulle, Christianity, Crimea, Easter, Eastern Front, First Battle of Târgu Frumos, Free French, Personalities, Radio, religion, Romania, Soviet Air Forces, World War Two, Yugoslavia

Tuesday, March 28, 1944. Another day in the war.

Jewish Welfare Board Seder at Muskogee, Oklahoma, March 28, 1944.

Mexican National Mercy Martinez harvesting carrots in the field in El Centro, Imperial County, California on March 28, 1944.

The British Parliament voted to give female teachers the same pay as men.

The Italian Communist Party declared cooperation with "bourgeois" parties.

The Red Army took Nikolaev.

Fighting carried on in the CBI.

"Infantrymen of the 66th Regt, 2nd Bn, 22nd Chinese Division advancing upon a group of tanks upon which a Jap Magnetic anti tank mine has been set off by remote control ordnance Intelligence purposes.

These tanks had burnt out. They belong to the First Provisional Tank Group and maintenance men of that outfit will salvage the salvageable parts left on these tanks. They met action against the Japs in the area a few miles north of the village of Shadeazup, Northern Burma. This photo demonstrated though, how the Chinese troops had actually fought with the tank group. This tank group is an American trained Chinese outfit, they having received their training at Ramgarh, India from U.S. Army Armoured Corps instructors. These infantrymen are also American trained. 28 March, 1944."

Ships were inspected:

USS Cleveland (CL-55) during a Captain's inspection, March 28, 1944.

Combat runs were made.

Corsairs on a mission over the Solomons.

Stricken B-17 "Whodat/The Dingbat" of the 381st Bomb Group in flight over Reims, France, 28 March 1944. Just hit, she was dropping out of formation with three dead on board.

B-17 going down over France, March 28, 1944.

Training was ongoing.

M4 Shermans at Camp San Luis Obispo, California, March 28, 1944.

Field Mess, Camp Cooke, California, March 28, 1944.

Tank crews with M4 Shermans, Camp Cooke, California, March 28, 1944.

The final game of the 1944 NCAA Men's Division Tournament saw Utah beat Dartmouth.

Commander Richard Wainwright, Jr., winner of the Medal of Honor for action at Vera Cruz in 1914, and recalled to service after having been medically retired in 1921, died in service at Annapolis at age 61.  His Medal of Honor citation reads:

For distinguished conduct in battle, engagements of Vera Cruz, 21 and 22 April 1914. Lt. Wainwright was eminent and conspicuous in command of his battalion; was in the fighting of both days, and exhibited courage and skill in leading his men through action. In seizing the customhouse, he encountered for many hours the heaviest and most pernicious concealed fire of the entire day, but his courage and coolness under trying conditions were marked.

Last prior edition:

Monday, March 27, 1944. Knock Out Dropper.

Tuesday, March 7, 1944. U-Go and women at war.

The Japanese launched Operation U-Go on the Indian Burmese border.

It was a major Japanese offensive, and would be one of their last.

Today In Wyoming's History: March 7: 1944  It is announced that the Wyoming State Hospital at Rock Springs will be training nurses for the Army.

In Germany, the National Socialist Women's League (Nationalsozialistische Frauenschaft, abbreviated NS-Frauenschaft) started making house calls to recruit women between the ages of 17 and 45 to work in "the service of the community" as part of an effort to address the German labor shortage.

Navajo woman with carrots, near Phoenix, Arizona, March 7, 1944.

On Bougainville, the Japanese were preparing for an assault, which is the same day these men of the 37th Infantry Division were photographed.

Last prior:

Monday, March 6, 1944. "Black Monday"

Monday, March 6, 1944. "Black Monday"

The first large scale daylight bombing raid on Berlin occured.  The raid, remembered as Black Monday, involved 814 bombers and 944 fighters from bases in southern England.  69 bombers were lost.

Miss Donna Mae II sustaining damage after the B-17 drifted under another B-17 dropping its bomb load. The plane would go down with all eleven crewmen.

P-51 pilot Donald Blakeslee would fly the first such aircraft over the city.  An early American fighter pilot, he first joined the RCAF in 1941, he served in the USAF until 1965 and passed away in 2008 at age 80.

For those watching Masters of the Air, it is depicted in Episode 7.

The Red Army took Volochysk.

Finland rejected a Soviet peace proposal that included interning German troops that were inside of Finland and restoring the 1940 borders.  The proposal was very similar to what the Finns would accept the following September and represented, effectively, a defeat, which is likely why it was not accepted, in part, at this time, although it was also surprisingly generous on Moscow's part.

Company B, 2nd Chemical Bn. Cassino area, Italy. 6 March, 1944.

The U-744 was sunk in the Atlantic, and the U-973 was sunk in the Arctic.

Orderlies from 25th Field Hospital loading wounded Chinese soldiers into airplane.

Albanian partisan Ramize Gjebrea age 20, was executed by a partisan firing squad for "immoral behavior", that being having intercourse with a male partisan.  She was engaged to another person.  The charge was denied by both parties, but she was convicted and, on this day, shot.

This is interesting partially as Albanian partisans were Communist dominated, but as was often the case with Communist partisan groups, and even Communist societies, traditional morality was strictly observed even though Marx had expressly rejected it and Communist revolutionaries most definitely did not observe them.

Baker City, Oregon, weather station.