Friday December 19, 1941. Royal Navy Disasters, German Ground Reversals, Japanese Advances, Gardens and Censorship.

Italy achieved what was amounting to a rare naval victory when it attacked two Royal Navy battleships at Alexandria, Egypt, and disabled them, using three manned torpedoes, dispatched from a submarine.  The HMS Valiant and HMS Queen Elizabeth were badly damaged in the bold attack, and the HMS Jervis, a destroyer, was as well.

The HMS Queen Elizabeth.

Because of the way the HMS Queen Elizabeth settled, it had the illusion of remaining afloat, something that was maintained until she could be dry docked and repaired.

HMS Valiant.

The Valiant was a sister ship, both being of the Queen Elizabeth Class.  She'd be reassigned to the Pacific later in the war.   Both British battleships would return to action, but it would take more or less a year to accomplish.

All the Italian frogmen survived and were made Prisoners of War.

On the same day, the British HMS Neptune was sunk by mines off of Tripoli.  The HMS Aurora and HMS Penelope were damaged.  The following day, the HMS Kandahar was hit and had to be scuttled.

The bold and unconventional Italian attack, and the successful minefield laying, reversed the naval balance of power in the Eastern Mediterranean in favor of the Axis.

It also somewhat cuts into the myth that there were no naval surface actions during the war.  In fact, there were a lot of them, and at this stage of the war the naval battle in the Mediterranean remained a heavily surface campaign.

Walter von Brauchitsch was relieved as Commander in Chief of the Germany Army.  Hitler replaced him with Hitler, a tipping point in the war for a variety of reasons.  With this, the German Army's bargain in which it supported the rise of the Nazis in exchange for Nazi support for the Army was essentially betrayed and shown to be worthless, as the Nazi co-opting of the Army was effectively complete.

Moreover, it showed an increasing strain in the German war effort as the dawn of realization that not only had Operation Barbarossa failed started, but it was obvious that the Soviets were not only not defeated, but they were beginning to reverse German fortunes for the first time in the war.  The obvious fear that Germany had overstretched herself and now the decline would become general was developing.

Von Brauchitsch was effectively retired by the act and never received another command.  He was imprisoned after the war on war crimes but died in a British military prison before he could be tried.

Hitler, who was already Commander in Chief of the Wehrmacht, would remain CiC of the Heer for the rest of the war.

The Indian 4th Division took Derna, Libya, where the Germans were also experiencing setbacks.  It was a victory, but the Germans had pulled out before they could be trapped and defeated there.

The Japanese invaded Davoa, in the Philippines.

Sgt Maj. John Osborn of the Winnipeg Grenadiers won a posthumous Victory Cross for falling on a Japanese hand grenade at the battle for Hong Kong, making him the first Canadian soldier to receive that award during World War Two.

His citation read:

At Hong Kong on the morning of 19th December 1941 a Company of the Winnipeg Grenadiers to which Company Sergeant-Major Osborn belonged became divided during an attack on Mount Butler, a hill rising steeply above sea level. A part of the Company led by Company Sergeant-Major Osborn captured the hill at the point of the bayonet and held it for three hours when, owing to the superior numbers of the enemy and to fire from an unprotected flank, the position became untenable. Company Sergeant-Major Osborn and a small group covered the withdrawal and when their turn came to fall back, Osborn single-handed engaged the enemy while the remainder successfully rejoined the Company. Company Sergeant-Major Osborn had to run the gauntlet of heavy rifle and machine gun fire. With no consideration for his own safety he assisted and directed stragglers to the new Company position exposing himself to heavy enemy fire to cover their retirement. Whenever danger threatened he was there to encourage his men. 

During the afternoon the Company was cut off from the Battalion and completely surrounded by the enemy who were able to approach to within grenade throwing distance of the slight depression which the Company was holding. Several enemy grenades were thrown which Company Sergeant-Major Osborn picked up and threw back. The enemy threw a grenade which landed in a position where it was impossible to pick it up and return it in time. Shouting a warning to his comrades this gallant Warrant Officer threw himself on the grenade which exploded killing him instantly. His self-sacrifice undoubtedly saved the lives of many others. 

Company Sergeant-Major Osborn was an inspiring example to all throughout the defence which he assisted so magnificently in maintaining against an overwhelming enemy force for over eight and a half hours and in his death he displayed the highest quality of heroism and self-sacrifice.

Osborn was born in England, reflecting a Canada in which the English speaking population still had strong connections to the United Kingdom and in fact a fair number were English born.  He'd served in the Royal Navy during World War One.

US War Cabinet meeting, December 19, 1941.

The United States started the Office of Censorship.

It censored communications during the war coming into and out of the country.

The National Defense Garden Conference commenced to encourage growing your own.

Both of these last two items are from here:

Today in World War II History—December 19, 1941

Also on that site, you can read about Victory Gardens as well, here:

Victory Gardens in World War II

The endless series of nearly meaningless declarations of war continued, with Nicaragua declaring war on Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania.

Saturday December 13, 1941. The Niihau Incident.

The Niihau Incident, in which a Japanese pilot on Niihau secured the assistance of Japanese residents of that island to secure his release from captivity, and which saw a conflict develop between native Hawaiians and resident Japanese, came to an end when the pilot Shigenori Nishikaichi (西開地 重徳) was killed and the man aiding him killed himself.

The incident became significant in bringing the US Government to internment of Japanese and Japanese Americans.  

Niihau was inhabited primarily by native Hawaiians who spoke the language, and owned by a white family that generally precluded access to it to outsiders.  It had three Japanese residents, however, and all three helped 西開地 重徳 in his efforts after he crashed landed on the island.  

The incident had seen Hawila Kalehano, a native Hawaiian, disarm the Japanese pilot as he was concerned about the surprising event, but he otherwise treated him well.  The Hawaiians sent for Ishimatsu Shintani who was marred to a Hawaiian so he could translate.  Shintani didn't want to perform the task and only briefly spoke to the pilot. Thereafter, the Hawaiians sent for Yoshio Harada who had been born in Hawaii.  Harada was informed by Nishikaichi of the attack on Pearl Harbor.  The Harada's, husband and wife, decided to aid the pilot in recovering his papers and escaping.

That night the Hawaiians learned of the attack on a battery power radio.  They then confronted the pilot, and it was decided to hold the pilot and turn him over to the islands' owner, who was due to arrive the next day from Kaua'i.  The owner, Aylmer Robinson, did not arrive, however, as the military had stopped boat traffic after the attack.  The pilot was therefore put under guard in the Harada's house.  

On December 12 Shintani attempted to buy the pilot's papers but failed.  On the same day the Harada's and Nishikaichi attacked their guards and armed themselves, taking a hostage.  They confronted Kaleohano who ran and was shot at.  During the night, the escaped pilot and confederates torched the Japanese airplane.

During the night they took additional hostages but became aware that they were being deceived by the Hawaiians and that it was likely that they were going for help.  Ultimately a struggle developed in which the pilot shot one of the Hawaiians three times, but was nonetheless overpowered and had his throat slit.  Harada killed himself after the pilot was killed.  

Shintani returned to the island after the war, after spending the rest of it in an Internment Camp, and lived there the rest of his life.  Irene Harada was held as a prisoner until 1944.  She moved to Kaua'i and lived the rest of the war there, stating in a 1992 interview that she felt sorry for the pilot and wanted to help him.  In an interesting twist, the Japanese government thanked her in later years for her efforts on behalf of the pilot, in spite of her resistance to their doing so.

Authorities, already distrustful of those of Japanese ancestry in the US, were shocked by how quickly all of the Japanese residents of the small island went over to aid the Japanese pilot which had a role in helping to convince the authority to intern the Japanese and Japanese Americans on the continental United States.  They were not interred on the Hawaiian islands where they made up 1/3d of the population, but it was felt that it was not economically possible to do so nor that they constituted a danger because of the islands isolation.

Pacific Aviation Museum: The Ni'ihau Zero Incident

Indeed, the incident remains problematic to the social history of World War Two as it does demonstrate that in at least some instances some Japanese and Japanese Americans retained sufficiently strong loyalties to Japan that it could in fact override loyalty to the United States.  That does not excuse internment, but it makes it less irrational that it is sometimes portrayed to be.  The US and Canada had a long problematic relationship with their Japanese residents as it was in which they both unfairly constantly suspected them of being hostile aliens and had often thought of them as a potential fifth column.  The incident gave a real world example of this actually occurring.

The desperate quality of the pilots actions remain curious.  The Japanese Navy had designated the island as one to land on in an emergency, as they believed it to be uninhabited.  But how anyone who landed there was to be rescued is a mystery.  It would have required either a fellow pilot to land there at the time, which was a possibility, and take the others on, or it would have required rescue by a plane designated to that task, which would have been unlikely to have been dispatched.  In this case, the pilot attempted to use the plan3's radio to radio for help, but was unsuccessful.

The Royal Navy sank three Italian cruisers off of Tunisia in the Battle of Cape Bon.

Hungary declared war on the United States.

The United Kingdom, New Zealand and South Africa declared war on Bulgaria.

Honduras declared war on Germany and Italy.

The Today In World War Two blog has some interesting items, including the destruction of American airpower in the Philippines.

Today in World War II History—December 13, 1941

A glacier collapse caused 4,000 to 6,000 deaths in Peru when it fell into a lake and caused a morraine landslide.

Friday November 14, 1941. The Ark Royal Sinks, the Marines Leave, and Suspicion.

Suspicion, the film, not the feeling, premiered on this day in 1941. 

The Ark Royal, hit yesterday by a torpedo, sank.

Remarkably, only one life was lost due to the sinking.

The movie is also mentioned on Sarah Sundin's excellent blog, along with the item that the United States ordered the withdrawal of Marines from China to the Philippines along with the river gunboats of the U.S. Navy.

Today in World War II History—November 14, 1941

The Marine Corps had a presence in China that dated back to the 19th Century, as indeed did the U.S. Army (the 6th Cavalry had once patrolled in northern China).  In context however, the Marines in China in 1941 were there, as were the Navy's gunboats, as part of a military mission in the country to protect American lives and property in the context of the Chinese Civil War. They'd been placed there with that mission in 1927.

Their withdrawal came at this point as it war with Japan was regarded as nearly inevitable and the Navy and Marine Corps mission in the country placed those assigned to it at the mercy of the Japanese, given their location.  The Marine Corps returned to China following the war's end, but were withdrawn again in 1948 as the Nationalist began to slide towards defeat.