Remembering History by day WW2

[Peter Clare]

LST-422 (January 26, 1944)
Landing Ship Tank-422 was a Lend-Lease vessel operating with an all British crew under the command of Lieutenant Commander Broadhurst, Royal Navy. The ship had left Naples as part of a convoy of 13 other LSTs carrying troops and supplies to the Anzio beachhead. On board the 422 were American personnel of the 83rd Chemical Mortar Battalion. About twelve miles off shore the ships set anchor 'to wait in queue'. A storm blew up with Force-8 gale winds and waves 20ft high. The gale blew the 422 onto a German laid underwater mine the explosion of which blew a 50ft hole in her bottom and starboard side and caused the fuel oil supply to ignite. This in turn ignited the gasoline tanks of the vehicles on the tank deck. With the whole upper deck a sheet of flame the order was given to 'abandon ship'. Rushing to assist in the picking up of survivors, LCI-32 (Landing Craft-Infantry) hit a mine herself and sank with 30 members of her crew.
Casualties on the LST-422 were 454 American soldiers and 29 British sailors killed. The minesweepers USS Pilot and USS Strive, together with other small craft, rescued 171 survivors from the stormy sea. At 2.30pm the 422 broke in two and went under. Dead bodies were recovered from the water, identified, placed in canvas bags, weighed down with 5.40mm shells and returned to the sea.
The names of those dead or missing are engraved on the walls of the US Military Cemetery at Nettuno, Italy.

[Peter Clare]

1943 : Americans bomb Germans for first time


On this day, 8th Air Force bombers, dispatched from their bases in England, fly the first American bombing raid against the Germans, targeting the Wilhelmshaven port. Of 64 planes participating in the raid, 53 reached their target and managed to shoot down 22 German planes-and lost only three planes in return.
The 8th Air Force was activated in February 1942 as a heavy bomber force based in England. Its B-17 Flying Fortresses, capable of sustaining heavy damage while continuing to fly, and its B-24 Liberators, long-range bombers, became famous for precision bombing raids, the premier example being the raid on Wilhelmshaven. Commanded at the time by Brig. Gen. Newton Longfellow, the 8th Air Force was amazingly effective and accurate in bombing warehouses and factories in this first air attack against the Axis power.

[Peter Clare]

1945 : Burma Road is reopened


On this day, part of the 717-mile "Burma Road" from Lashio, Burma to Kunming in southwest China is reopened by the Allies, permitting supplies to flow back into China.
At the outbreak of war between Japan and China in 1937, when Japan began its occupation of China's seacoast, China began building a supply route that would enable vital resources to evade the Japanese blockade and flow into China's interior from outside. It was completed in 1939, and allowed goods to reach China via a supply route that led from the sea to Rangoon, and then by train to Lashio. When, in April 1942, the Japanese occupied most of Burma, the road from Lashio to China was closed, and the supply line was cut off.
The Allies were not able to respond until 1944, when Allied forces in eastern India made their way into northern Burma and were able to begin construction of another supply road that linked Ledo, India, with the part of the original Burma Road still controlled by the Chinese. The Stillwell Road (named for Gen. Joseph Stillwell, American adviser to Chiang Kai-shek, China's leader) was finally opened on this day in 1945, once again allowing the free transport of supplies into China.

[jacobtowne]

[Peter Clare]

29 January 1943

12 Bostons bombed a railway viaduct at Morlaix and 2 of 12 Venturas dispatched bombed a steelworks at Ijmuiden. 1 Boston lost.

Morlaix Viaduct

[Peter Clare]

WILHELM GUSTLOFF (January 30, 1945)
THE GREATEST SEA TRAGEDY OF ALL TIME. The 25,484 ton German luxury cruise liner was built to carry 1,465 passengers and a crew of 400. The Gustloff and her sister ship Robert Ley, were the world's first purpose-built cruise ships. The ship, now converted to a 500 bed hospital ship, set sail from Gotenhafen (former Gdynia) in the Bay of Danzig en-route to the port of Stettin as part of the largest naval rescue operation in history. Overcrowded with 4,658 persons including 918 naval officers and men, 373 German Women Naval Auxiliaries, 162 wounded soldiers of whom 73 were stretcher cases, and 173 crew, all fleeing from the advancing Red Army, the ship plowed her way through the icy waters of the Baltic Sea. Just after 9pm the ship was hit by three torpedoes from the Russian submarine S-13 (a German designed boat) commanded by Alexander Marinesko. The first torpedo hit the bow of the ship, the second, below the empty swimming pool on E-deck where the Women Auxiliaries were accommodated (most were killed) and the third hit amidships. Indescribable panic reigned as the ship listed and sank in about ninety minutes near the Danish island of Bornholm. Rescue boats picked from the stormy seas 964 survivors, many of whom were landed at Sassnitz on the island of Ruegen and taken on board the Danish hospital ship Prince Olaf which was anchored in the harbour. The exact number of drowned will never be known, as many more refugees were picked up from small boats as the Wilhelm Gustloff headed for the open sea and were never counted. (Latest research puts the number of people on board at 10,582) Many of the 964 persons rescued from the sea, died later, and it is likely that well over 8,500 souls perished.

The German luxury liner Wilhelm Gustloff as a KdF ship, pre-1939

[Peter Clare]

1943 : RAF launches massive daytime raid on Berlin


On this day, the British Royal Air Force begins a bombing campaign on the German capital that coincides with the 10th anniversary of Hitler's accession to power.
The Casablanca Conference, held from January 14 to 23, saw Prime Minister Winston Churchill, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the Combined Chiefs of Staff meet in Morocco to discuss future war strategy following on the success of the North African invasion, which heralded the defeat of Vichy forces. One of the resolutions of the conference was to launch a combined and sustained strategic bombing effort against the Germans. Strategic bombing was the policy of using bombers to destroy an enemy's warmaking capacity, also referred to as "area bombing." Churchill described it as an "absolutely devastating, exterminating attack by very heavy bombers...upon the Nazi homeland."
To celebrate the anniversary of Hitler's 1933 appointment to the office of chancellor by then-President Paul von Hindenburg, both propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels and head of the Luftwaffe Hermann Goering planned to give radio addresses to the German masses. Goebbels intended to bolster morale by hailing an impending victory in Russia: "A thousand years hence, every German will speak with awe of Stalingrad and remember that it was there that Germany put the seal on her victory." As the speeches were broadcast, RAF fighters rained bombs on Berlin, the beginning of devastating attacks on German cities that would last until the very end of the war. To make matters even worse for the Germans, the next day a massive surrender of German troops occured at Stalingrad.
30 January 1943

2 formations, each of 3 Mosquitos, made dramatic at temps to interrupt large rallies being addressed by Nazi leaders in Berlin on this day. These raids would be the first time the German capital was bombed in daylight.
3 aircraft from No 105 Squadron successfully reached Berlin and bombed in mid-morning at the exact time that Goering was due to speak. The speech was postponed or an hour and all 3 Mosquitos returned safely.
In the afternoon, 3 Mosquitos of No 139 Squadron arrived at the time Goebbels was due to speak and again bombed at the correct time but the German defences were alerted and the aircraft of Squadron Leader DF Darling was shot down. Darling and his navigator, Flying Officer W Wright, were both killed and are now buried in Berlin
19 Wellingtons of No 4 Group and 17 Bostons to many places in Germany and Holland but only 5 Wellingtons and 1 Boston found targets to bomb. 4 Wellingtons lost.

[Peter Clare]

1943 : Japanese begin evacuation of Guadalcanal


On this day, Japanese forces on Guadalcanal Island, defeated by Marines, start to withdraw after the Japanese emperor finally gives them permission.
On July 6, 1942, the Japanese landed on Guadalcanal Island, part of the Solomon Islands chain, and began constructing an airfield. In response, the U.S. launched Operation Watchtower, in which American troops landed on five islands within the Solomon chain, including Guadalcanal. The landings on Florida, Tulagi, Gavutu, and Tananbogo met with much initial opposition from the Japanese defenders, despite the fact that the landings took the Japanese by surprise because bad weather had grounded their scouting aircraft. "I have never heard or read of this kind of fighting," wrote one American major general on the scene. "These people refuse to surrender."
The Americans who landed on Guadalcanal had an easier time of it, at least initially. More than 11,000 Marines landed, but 24 hours passed before the Japanese manning the garrison knew what had happened. The U.S. forces quickly met their main objective of taking the airfield, and the outnumbered Japanese troops temporarily retreated. Japanese reinforcements were landed, though, and fierce hand-to-hand jungle fighting ensued. The Americans were at a particular disadvantage because they were assaulted from both sea and air, but when the U.S. Navy supplied reinforcement troops, the Americans gained the advantage. By February 1943, the Japanese retreated on secret orders of their emperor. In fact, the Japanese retreat was so stealthy that the Americans did not even know it had taken place until they stumbled upon abandoned positions, empty boats, and discarded supplies.
In total, the Japanese lost more than 25,000 men compared with a loss of 1,600 by the Americans. Each side lost 24 warships.

[Peter Clare]

USS De HAVEN (February 1, 1943)
While escorting three Landing Craft Transports (LCTs) during the American landings on the beach at Marovo on Guadalcanal, the De Haven was singled out and attacked by six Japanese planes. Shooting down three of the planes the remaining three dropped their bombs on the De Haven. Three bombs hit the ship which destroyed the bridge and killed her captain, Cmdr. Charles Tolman. A fourth bomb split her hull plates and the ship began to settle in the water and shortly after upended and sank about two miles from Savo Island, joining the company of about 50 other fighting ships that now rest in 'Iron Bottom Sound'. Survivors were rescued by the LCTs 63 and 181 but entombed within the steel hull of the De Haven were 10 of her officers and 157 enlisted men out of her crew of 299.

[Peter Clare]

1942 : Quisling becomes prime minister of puppet regime in Norway


On this day, Vidkun Quisling, a collaborator with the German occupiers of Norway, is established as prime minister of a puppet government.
On April 9, 1940, German warships entered major Norwegian ports, from Narvik to Oslo, deployed thousands of German troops, and occupied Norway. German forces were able to slip through the mines Britain had laid around Norwegian ports because local garrisons were ordered to allow the Germans to land unopposed. The order came from a Norwegian commander, Vidkun Quisling, who was loyal to Norway's pro-fascist former foreign minister.
Hours after the invasion, the German minister in Oslo demanded Norway's surrender. The Norwegian government refused, and the Germans responded with a parachute invasion. In September 1940, "commissarial counselors" in the control of the Germans replaced Norway's administrative council. Chief of these "counselors" was Quisling, who was given dictatorial powers and who proceeded to earn the enmity of Norwegians as he sent thousands of people to German concentration camps and executed members of the resistance movement.
On February 1, 1942, the commissarial counselors formed a formal government loyal to Germany, with Quisling as its prime minister. When Germany finally surrendered in May 1945, Quisling was arrested by Norway's Allied liberators, tried for treason, and executed. His name continues to be a synonym for "traitor."