U.S. Marines at Iwo Jima. National Museum of Military History.

 

Last edition:

US and German, Mid Winter 44/45 Display. National Museum of Military Vehicles.

Labels: 1940s, Armor, Army, Battle of the Bulge, German Wehrmacht, National Museum of Military Vehicles, Tracked vehicles, World War Two, Wyoming (Dubois)

Saturday, November 11, 1944. Ghastly Japanese losses at Ormoc Bay.

The Battle of Ormoc Bay began in the Camotes Sea off of the Philippines.  It would carry on well into December and result in disproportionate Japanese losses as they attempted to reinforce ground elements on Leyte.  On this day, four destroyers, 1 minesweeper and 5 transports carrying nearly 10,000 troops were sunk in heavy Japanese losses.

Iwo Jima was bombarded by the U.S.Navy.

Remaining German troops in Greece withdrew.

The Battle of Batina began in Croatia.

US troops in France.  Note many are wearing L. L. Bean style "Maine Hunting Shoes", which were adopted for cold weather use by the  U.S. Army.

The U-771 and U-1200 were sunk by the Royal Navy.

The 1942-44 musicians strike ended with RCA Victor and Columbia Records agreeing to union demands.

Last edition:

Friday, November 10, 1944. The Explosion of the Mount Hood.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, boats and ships, China, Disaster, Imperial Japanese Army, Netherlands, New Guinea, Operation Ichi-Go, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, World War Two.

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.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, British Army, Italy, Operation Overlord, Petroleum, Philippines, Polesti Romania, Red Army, Romania, World War Two

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.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Army, British Army, Canada, German Wehrmacht, Imperial Japanese Army, Operation Forager, Operation Overlord, Politics, Saipan, Saskatchewan, Socialism, United States Marine Corps, World War Two

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.

1940s, 1944, Bangladesh, Battle of Kohima, China Burma India Theater, Eastern Front, India, Indian Army, Indian National Army, Pakistan, The Law of Unintended Consequences, Ukrainian National Army, World War Two

Wednesday June 24, 1942. Eisenhower takes command.

Dwight D. Eisenhower arrived in London to assume command of the European Theater of Operations United States of America, replacing James E. Chaney.

In fact, Eisenhower had only recently returned to the United States on a fact finding mission, along with Hap Arnold, on the United Kingdom in which he expressed a lack of confidence in Chaney.  He was assigned to replace Chaney and sent right back to the UK.

Eisenhower's star was on the rise at the time, and would be throughout the rest of his life, taking him to the White House.  He was the last U.S. Army general officer to become President.  Notably, an Army career was mostly an educational choice for him, rather than the expression of a military vocation.

Chaney would fade into obscurity.  Having been promoted to Major General in 1940, he was an observer of the Battle of Britain and would return to become commanding general of the First Air Force, and then become a training officer in the United States.  Late in the war he was in command of Army forces for the mostly Navy action at Iwo Jima, and he had a senior role in the Western Base Command at the end of the war.  He retired in 1947.  He, as well as his wife, died in 1967.

The Afrika Korps entered Egypt.

June 26, 1920. Waters.

June 26, 1920, was a Saturday, and on that Saturday the Saturday Evening Post featured a female fly fisherman on its cover.

Women doing other activities associated with water and the outdoors would be busy on that day.

The ship the Colin H. Livingstone was launched June 26, 1920, at Virginia Shipbuilding Corporation, Alexandria, Virginia, where it was christened by daughter Clarice M. Livingstone.

The Canadian born Colin H. Livingstone was living at the time and was a railroad executive.  He was also the first president of the Boy Scouts of America, having occupied that position since 1910.  The Boy Scouts were very much a major institution at the time, as we've discussed here before.

The ship was sunk by a German submarine on August 28, 1940.

Further north, the torpedo destroyer USS Hopkins was launched.

Sarah Babbitt of Providence, Rhode Island, descendant of Esek Hopkins, commodore of the Continental Navy during the Revolution, served at the launching of the torpedo destroyer at New York Shipbuilding Corp., Camden, New Jersey.  The ship served all the way through World War Two during which it sustained a single combat casualty when it was hit by a kamikaze in 1945.  The hit was a glancing blow.  The USS Hopkins was scrapped in 1946.

Somewhat related, on this day in 1920, Charles W. Lindberg, who would serve in the Marine Corps in World War Two, and who was one of the Marines photographed raising the flag on Iwo Jima, was born.  He died in 2007.

Friday, July 11, 1914. Babe Ruth premiers, as does the USS Nevada.

Babe Ruth made his major league debut with the Boston Red Sox.

July 11, 1914: Babe Ruth makes his major-league debut with Red Sox

The German foreign office sent a letter to King Peter of Serbia congratulating him on his birthday.

The USS Nevada was launched.

It was classified as a "super dreadnaught", which would really place it in the brief category of "battleship", in a period of rapid naval evolution. The launch was attended by Governor Oddie, Governor David I. Walsh of Massachusetts, Senator Key Pittman of Nevada, Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels and Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt.

She'd serve in World War One.

She was at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, sunk and refloated in 1942.  She served thereafter in Operation Dragoon, the invasion of southern France, as well  as the landings at Iwo Jima and Okinawa. She was sunk as a target in 1948.

On the same day, 5,000 people attended an Anti Militarist League rally to commemorate the anarchist killed in the July 4, Lexington Avenue Explosion.

Last edition:

Friday, July 10, 1914. Loyalties.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, Austro Hungaria, July Crisis, panoramic, Russia, Serbia, Ulster, United Kingdom, Virginia