Tuesday, September 19, 1944. The Moscow Armistice Signed.

Fighting was ongoing in Italy.

The Moscow Armistice was signed between Finland and the USSR.

Land ceded to the Soviet Union by the Moscow Armistice.  By Jniemenmaa - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=317801

The land ceded by Finland was similar in extent to that which had been ceded to end the Winter War four years earlier.

Land ceded by Finland in Winter War.  By Jniemenmaa - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=317799

Will discuss the history of Finnish wars with the USSR in a separate thread, which is much more complicated than generally recalled, but suffice it to say, Karelia had been a major bone of contention between the two countries, and fought over several times in the 20th Century until the Continuation War seemingly ended the dispute.

Grand Duchy of Finland, 1900.

The Battle of Păuliș ended in Romanian-Soviet victory.

The Soviets took Valga, Estonia.  A mass flight from the advancing Soviets by the Estonian population was underway, with a huge percentage of the population on their feet and in boats to attempt to escape.

British 30 Corps reached the US 82nd Airborne at Grave.

Cpl. Jaap W. Bothe, San Antonio, Texas, formerly of Rotterdam, Holland, gives some advice to a Dutch farmer who is giving Yanks a lift to the front lines near Son. 19 September, 1944. 101st Airborne Division.

The Battle for Brest ended in Allied victory.

Pvt. Garnett N. Early, of Harrisonburg, Va., receives an early morning cup of coffee from Red Cross worker Mary Jane Cook, of Jackson Heights, N.Y. Nancy, France. 19 September, 1944. 35th Infantry Division.

The Battle of Hürtgen Forest began between German and U.S. forces in the Hürtgen Forest began.  The battle would continue until mid December.  The Battle over a 54 square mile of industrial forest on the Belgian German frontier would continue until December 16 and became the longest battle on German ground during World War II and is the second longest single battle the U.S. Army has ever fought after The Battle of Bataan.

US tanker Lafayette G. Pool lost his third Sherman tank in combat in a night engagement when it was ambushed by a German Panther at Münsterbusch, southeast of Aachen, Germany.  Pool lost his leg in the engagement, ending a pre war amature boxing career. 

In 81 days of combat tanks commanded by Pool had destroyed 12 German tanks, 258 total armored vehicles and self propelled busn and killed German soldiers.

Pool reentered the Army in 1949 and retired in 1960.  He thereafter became a Protestant minister.  He passed away in 1991.

The SS declared a state of emergency in Denmark over the ongoing strike.

Heavy fighting occurred on Peleliu and Angaur.

The U-407 and U-867 were sunk by the Allies and the U-565 damaged beyond repair.

Brazilian nurses embarking for Europe at Hampton Roads, September, 1944.

Last edition:

Monday, September 18, 1944. Eindoven taken.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Airborne, Battle of Arracourt, Battle of Peleliu, boats and ships, Disaster, Heroes, Operation Market Garden, Prisoners of War, Royal Navy, United States Marine Corps, Warsaw Uprising, World War Two

Painted Bricks: Jackrabbit, Gillette Wyoming.

Painted Bricks: Jackrabbit, Gillette Wyoming.:  

Jackrabbit, Gillette Wyoming.

Monday, September 18, 1944. Eindoven taken.

Distraught German medic at scene of German surrender, Orléans, September 18, 1944.

The 101st Airborne Division liberated Eindoven.

Lieutenant Colonel Robert George Cole, who would receive the Medal of Honor for his actions during Operation Overlord, was killed by a German sniper during Market Garden.  He was 29 years old.

Another American combatant would be killed in an action that resulted in his posthumously receiving the Medal of Honor.

The President of the United States of America, in the name of Congress, takes pride in presenting the Medal of Honor (Posthumously) to Private First Class Charles Howard Roan (MCSN: 504236), United States Marine Corps Reserve, for the conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving with the Second Battalion, Seventh Marines, First Marine Division, in action against enemy Japanese forces on Peleliu, Palau Islands, 18 September 1944. Shortly after his leader ordered a withdrawal upon discovering that the squad was partly cut off from their company as a result of the rapid advance along an exposed ridge during an aggressive attack on the strongly entrenched enemy, Private First Class Roan and his companions were suddenly engaged in a furious exchange of hand grenades by Japanese forces emplaced in a cave on higher ground and to the rear of the squad. Seeking protection with four other Marines in a depression in the rocky, broken terrain, Private First Class Roan was wounded by an enemy grenade which fell close to their position and, immediately realizing the eminent peril to his comrades when another grenade landed in the midst of the group, unhesitatingly flung himself upon it, covering it with his body and absorbing the full impact of the explosion. By his prompt action and selfless conduct in the face of almost certain death, he saved the lives of four men. His great personal valor reflects the highest credit upon himself and the U. S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his comrades.

The Battle of Arracourt commenced in France.

The US dropped supplies from B-17s to resistance fighters in Warsaw, the only such mission permitted by the Soviets.  The aircraft flew on to Soviet held territory.

It's often been speculated, not without reason, that Stalin allowed the uprising to bleed itself out as it was resulting in the deaths of a present combatant, the Germans, and a feared future one, the Poles.

The Jun'yō Maru was sunk off Sumatra by the British submarine Tradewind resulting in the deaths of 5,620 people, most of whom were Allied POWs or Japanese slave labor.  The event is one of the worst naval disasters of all time, taking into account the lives lost were largely innocent.

Last edition:

Sunday, September 17, 1944. Operation Market Garden commences.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Animals, Battle of Arnhem, Battle of Nijmegen, Cats, Netherlands, Operation Market Garden, Operation Paravane, Palau, Paratroopers, San Marino, Tallinn, World War Two, Wyoming (LaGrange)

Thursday, September 18, 1924. Leaving the Dominican Republic.

The U.S. Marine Corps withdrew from the Dominican Republic and turned police powers over to the Dominican Republic. The US intervention had come in 1916.

Related threads:

The United States commences the occupation of the Dominican Republic: May 16, 1916.

Last edition:

Wednesday, September 17, 1924. Upset with the Six Nations.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1940s, 1944, Calvin Coolidge, Canada, First Nations, Germany, League of Nations, Monarchy, Ontario, Poland, Six Nations, World War Two

Painted Bricks: Family Ties, Cheyenne Wyoming.

Painted Bricks: Family Ties, Cheyenne Wyoming.:  

Family Ties, Cheyenne Wyoming.

Sunday, September 17, 1944. Operation Market Garden commences.

According to the Wyoming State History calendar, a cat saved a LaGrange girl from a coiled rattlesnake.

Cat's reaction time is so incredibly quick they can out react snakes pretty readily, whereas humans cannot.

This is not actually a unique event.  In 2017, for instance, a girl in Florida was saved from a rattlesnake by her grandmother's cat.

Pieced together in a remarkably quick time, the gigantic Montgomery planned airborne invasion of the Netherlands, Operation Market Garden, commenced on this day in 1944.  Planned as a series of airborne drops to secure major bridges followed by anground advance, it put the ground forces on a single, often elevated, road.  A field problem in the Dutch military prior to the war had posed the same strategic problem with this solution being the failing solution.

Airborne forces from the US, UK, Canada, and Poland would participate in the offensive.  Ground troops from the US and UK provided the ground spearhead. The operation was a British one in terms of command.

Dutch railway workers went on strike, heading a call made by Gen. Eisenhower.

The Canadian Army launched Operation Wellhit to take Boulogne, France.

The Battle of San Marino began in the tiny independant Italian enclave, which had declared itself to be neutral.  German forces entered it for refuge anyway, and the battle was on.

The Soviets launched the Tallinn Offensive.

A bomb dropped by the RAF disabled the Tirpitz.

The UK relaxed blackout restrictions in London.

The Battle of Angaur began on Palau.

The carrier Un'yō was torpedoed and sunk in the South China Sea by the American submarine Barb.

Last edition:

Saturday, September 16, 1944. "Wacht am Rhein" approved.

Labels: "Wacht am Rhein", Adolf Hitler, Battle of the Bulge, Belgium, Bulgaria, Clothing, Denmark, German Weimar Republic, Operation Market Garden, Red Army, Second Quebec Conference, World War Two

Wednesday, September 17, 1924. Upset with the Six Nations.

Governor General of Canada Julian Byng ordered the termination of the Six Nations Confederacy Council and ordered that it be replaced by an elected body.

This followed the Council's attempt to bring its existence to the attention of the League of Nations.

The Six Nations are the Mohawk, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, Seneca and Tuscarora.  They have a large reserve in Ontario.

The Polish Border Protection Corps was established by Poland to protect against Soviet invasion and address bandits crossing the border.

Calvin Coolidge gave an electronic signal from the Oval Office to commences electrical generation from the Skagit River Hydroelectric Project.

Prince Wolfgang of Hesse married Princess Marie Alexandra of Baden over the objections of Wolfgang's uncle, the former German Kaiser Wilhelm II.  The couple would have no children.

She died in an American air raid on Frankfurt am Main on January 29-30, 1944.  She had been working as an aid worker there.  He joined the Nazi Party and was appointed a Landrat (district administrator) of Obertaunuskreis, a landkreis in the state of Hesse.  He remarried after the war and died in 1989 at age 92.

Last edition:

Tuesday, September 16, 1924. RBI record.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1940s, 1947, actors and actresses, baseball, Personalities

Saturday, September 17, 1774. Congress adopts the Suffolk Resolves.

The First Continental Congress adopted the Suffolk Resolves.

Last edition:

Sunday, September 11, 1774. Delivering the Suffolk Resolves.

Labels: 1770s, 1774, American Revolution, Colonial North America, Equine Transportation, First Continental Congress, Massachusetts, Paul Revere, Suffolk Resolves

A random act by an unstable person does not impute to an entire class.

You can't label a would be assassin a "Republican" or a "Democratic donor", as if it it categorizes all Democratic donors or Republican party members. 

Going numb in 2024.

I first heard of the attempted assassination attempt on Donald Trump yesterday.  Since that time, up to now, what has surprised me the most is the level of disinterest in it.

Normally, such an event, the attempted assassination of a Presidential candidate, would be so shocking it would seem to dominate the news cycle.  And had the Secret Service not disrupted it before Trump was seemingly in actual danger, it likely would have been.  Indeed, based on first reports, the Secret Service did a really good job in detecting the assassin prior to his firing a shot.

But people are almost taking the "m'eh" approach ot the news.

This isn't a good sign of the state of American politics or culture.  People are, apparently, so worn out, they've  just tuned out entirely.  Indeed, this is one of several such shocking stories recently that have drawn very little attention.

Monday, September 16, 1974. Letting the evaders and deserters off, somewhat.

President Ford issued a conditional amnesty to American draft evaders and military deserters provided that they agree to work for 24 months in alternative service.

In my view, this was a mistake.

President Carter would compound the mistake in 1977 by issuing a general pardon to most evaders, but not deserters.

None of this should have been granted.  People died in the place of those who deserted and evaded. If a person had a genuine objection, and more than a few did, the honorable thing would have been to refuse to serve and to take the consequences.  Muhammed Ali provides an example of this, as does Walt Whitman from an earlier era.

The legacy of the Vietnam War in this regard continues to haunt us.  The same generation that reviled their parents, went on to brand their parents "the Greatest Generation", and never made peace with the largescale evadence of the call of duty.  Examples of course, abound, including Donald Trump, who was excused priority in the draft due to shin splints, and Joe Biden, who had multiple deferments including health related ones.

The first female Royal Canadian Mounted Police began training.

The Provisional IRA assassinated Martin McBirney QC, 56, and Rory Conaghan, 54, both judges in Northern Ireland.

Argentinian terrorist set off fifty bombs, killing four people.

The Bay Area Underwater Rapid Transit Tube, the first tunnel underneath the San Francisco Bay, opened to the public.

Last edition:

Tuesday, September 19, 1974. Recognizing independence.

Labels: 1970s, 1974, Africa, Colonialism, Guinea-Bissau, Portugal, Portugese Guinea, Portuguese Empire

Saturday, September 16, 1944. "Wacht am Rhein" approved.

Adolf Hitler approved the Ardennes Offensive "Wacht am Rhein", known in the west as the Battle of the Bulge.

Market Garden, the semi failed or wholly failed, hastily put together Allied invasion of The Netherlands hadn't even commenced yet and therefore makes for a remarkable contrast.  The Germans were planning a mid winter offensive and it was still summer, showing planning foresight, but also an appreciate at some level of the inevitability of further retreats into the winter.

"Members of an American airborne unit (82nd Airborne Division) flock to an American Red Cross Clubmobile for coffee and donuts on the eve of their takeoff for the airborne invasion of Holland. 16 September, 1944. Cottesmore Airdrome, England."  These troops are equipped with the then new M1943 Field Jacket and M1943 paratrooper field pants.  This uniform was new and replaced the ones that had been used just a few months prior in Operation Overlord.  The M1943 field jacket wa already becoming a universal issue item, although oddly the trousers were not.

The Red Army took Sofia, Bulgaria.  They then turned west to attempt to block the Germans from retreating from Greece.

The fronts were drawing close.

A general strike broke out in Denmark over deportations by the Germans.

The Royal Navy raided Sigli in Northern Sumatra.

The Second Quebec Conference ended.  The course of combat across the globe was ratified, wit there being an additional agreement for a campaign in Burma, and the British joining American forces in the Pacific in its final campaigns against the British, something the US would effectively recant on as the war drew to a close.

Gustav Bauer, German Chancellor in 1919 and 1920, and very briefly a prisoner of the early Third Reich, died.

Last edition:

Friday, September 15, 1944. Landing at Peleliu.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Army, Australian Army, Battle of Morotai, Battle of Peleliu, Finland, German Kriegsmarine, Germany, Italy, Lapland War, Operation Stalemate II, United States Marine Corps, World War Two

Tuesday, September 16, 1924. RBI record.

Jim Bottomley of the St. Louis Jim Cardinals set a major league baseball record for RBIs in a single game with 12, during a 17–3 win over the Brooklyn Robins. In 1993 the record was tied, but it has never been beaten.

Bottomly would retire from baseball in 1938 and go on to raise Hereford cattle in Missouri as well as being a radio announcer.  HE scouted for the Cubs starting in 1957 and managed their Class D minor league Appalachian League club.  He died in 1959 at age 59.

Betty Joan Perske, known on the screen as Lauren Bacall, was born in the Bronx.

Both of her parents were of Eastern European Jewish ancestry, with her mother having been born in Romania.  Her mother had adopted the maiden name of Bacall, that she later adopted as a screen name.  Her parents divorced when she was five, and she no longer saw her father.  She uniformly came across as a highly intelligent, graceful, figure on the screen.

She married Humphrey Bogart in 1947 when she was 20 and he was 45.  It was his fourth, and last, marriage. She'd marry Jason Robards after Bogart's death, but her second marriage would end in divorce.

Last edition:

Sunday, September 14, 1924. Most Valuable Player.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1924 at the Movies, Alaska, baseball, Crime, Movies, Personalities, police

Thursday, September 16, 1824. Death of King Louis XVIII.

 

Louis XVIII, King of France, died.

He reigned from 3 May 1814 until 20 March 1815, and then again from 8 July 1815 – 16 September 1824, following the defeat of Napoleon.  He was succeeded by Charles X.

He introduced a parliamentary form of government, payed off French indemnity imposed by the Napoleonic Wars, modernized the French Army.

Last edition:

Sunday, August 29, 1824. Battle of Gerontas (Ναυμαχία του Γέροντα).

Labels: 1820s, 1824, Battle of Gerontas (Ναυμαχία του Γέροντα), Greece, Greek Navy, Greek War of Independence, Ottoman Empire, Ottoman Navy

Does a "Freedom" Caucus victory in the primaries mean the Democrats have a chance in the general?

Some quarters of the press are hinting it does, and Rep. Yin took advantageof the news:

The effective head of the Democratic Party issued an immediate statement:

cont:

But what of it?

This has been in the news, in Wyoming politico circles, quite a bit.

Well, frankly, let me note that I doubt this will be the case. At the same time, I predict some Democrats will in fact do better than expected, and the Democrats would have to be fools not to attempt to take advantage of the Populist pushing out real Republican candidates.

The scary thing is the Wyoming Freedom Caucus may very well control the next legislature, which will take us clean off the Wyoming political map into something we've never experienced before.  My perditions are that Wyoming won't like it much.

Miracle Mile.

 

Wyoming Catholic Cowboys - raw and real: Rosary

Wyoming Catholic Cowboys - raw and real: Rosary: I like to carry a Rosary on my hip. It is intimidating to the devil and it is also a source of consolation to know our Lord and Lady are clo...

The City of God.

 

964: The City of God

Friday, September 15, 1944. Landing at Peleliu.

 

US forces invaded Peleliu.  Initial troops were from the 1st Marine Division, which would later be joined by the Army's 81st Infantry Division for the hard fought battle.  The landing on the island was in order to seize its airfields for the invasion of the Philippines.

The landings were bizarrely named Operation Stalemate II.

 Corporal William R. Scott, and Prince Doberman. Peleliu. 15 September, 1944.

American and Australian forces landed at Morotai near New Guinea.  The Battle of Morotai would go on until the end of the war.

The Battle of Gemmano in Italy ended in an Allied victory.

The Lapland War between Germany and Finland commenced when the Kriegsmarine attempted to take the island of Suursaari in order to secure the shipping routes in the Gulf of Finland.  Up until that time the German withdrawal from Finland had been going peacefully, although it was deteriorating as the Germans destroyed things on their way out.  The attempted German landing was resisted and the Finns withdrew their shipping from German evacuation efforts, although evacuation from Lapland to Norway, guaranteed by a secret agreement between the countries, continued peacefully at first.

The failed landings at Suursaari were an attempt to secure the island out of a fear the Soviets would.

Pvt. Stanley J. Zielonka fires an automatic rifle at a hidden sniper in Harze, Belgium. 15 September, 1944. 9th Infantry Division.  Like almost all BAR gunners, Pvt. Zielonka has removed the bipod and flash hinder from his BAR.  The unnamed soldier with a Thompson submachinegun has a short belt of machinegun ammunition around his neck.  The other two soldiers are armed with M1 carbines.  The one in front has a combat knife strapped to his lower leg.

The French Provisional Government issued arrest warrants for Philippe Pétain and his cabinet.

The Great Atlantic Hurricane made landfall on Long Island and Rhode Island.

Last edition:

Thursday, September 14, 1944. Dragoon concludes. More SOE agents executed. The toll of the 1944 Great Atlantic Hurricane increases.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, 1944 Great Atlantic Hurricane, Baltic Offensive, boats and ships, Buchenwald, Canadian Army, France, Hungarian Army, Operation Dragoon, Red Army, Romanian Army, SOE, Weather, World War Two