Tuesday 29 July 1941

German soldiers with an MG 34 (Maschinengewehr 34) recoil-operated machine gun. They are taking cover on the side of a house in Rahachow, July 1941.

Eastern Front: SS Battalion Kurt "Panzer" Meyer greets the dawn of 29 July 1941 in an unnamed battlefield that has been "hot" all night long. Reflecting an increasingly gloomy outlook by ordinary soldiers, he later recalls:

I wanted to scream, to curse the whole insanity of war, but I tumbled into the next hole and returned the fire of a Russian who was lying behind a bush not fifty meters away on the other side of the road. Glancing at the prostrate, clawing humanity around me, the bloody fields of Verdun appeared before me in my thoughts.

Meyer notes that the Soviets have left, but there are dead bodies from both sides strewn all about.

In the Far North sector, the German 36 Corps (General Hans Feige) once again attempts to break Soviet resistance east of Salla to continue the advance on the vital Murmansk railway. As did the attempt on the 27, this one completely fails. The fruitless attacks have been extremely costly in terms of lives lost on both sides, with the Germans taking 5000 casualties in the last month in this sector alone. After this, General Nikolaus von Falkenhorst in Army Group Norway accepts the inevitable and calls off further attacks until the situation changes.

In the Army Group North sector, the German 16th Army attacks in the direction of Velikiye Luki while the 18th Army continues clearing out Estonia.

In the Army Group Center sector, German forces encircling parts of three trapped armies in the Smolensk area withstand strong Soviet attempts to open the pocket. Soviet 30th Army counterattacks in the northern part of the pocket, but is stopped by General Hoth's 3rd Panzer Group. Soviet 4th Army attacks General Guderian's Panzer Group 2 in the Yelnya area. At 19:00, General Timoshenko at Western Front orders 20th Army (General Kurochkin) to retake Smolensk. Kurochkin dutifully complies, but the attack fails and the Soviet troops withdraw with heavy casualties. A local counterattack by General Rokossovsky's 101st Tank Division using KV tanks does recapture Iartsevo temporarily.

In the Army Group South sector, General Ewald von Kleist sends XVIII Motorized Corps of his Panzer Group I toward Pervomaisk. Meanwhile, the German 6th Army attacks directly toward Kyiv, but, facing heavy resistance, sidestep to the south of the city to envelop the defenders. The Soviets have 1.5 million men in the vicinity of Uman, but they are slowly being compressed into a smaller and smaller area.

"Stirling N3663/MG-H of No 7 Squadron, on display at Newmarket Heath, Suffolk, during a visit by King Peter of Yugoslavia, 29 July 1941. A typical bomb load is on view beneath the aircraft for the King's inspection." © IWM (CH 3175).

European Air Operations: The weather continues to be poor over northwest Europe, with heavy cloud cover. It begins clearing up during the night, but there are no operations today.

RAF No. 81 Squadron reforms as a Hurricane-equipped fighter squadron. It is designated for transfer to the Soviet Union aboard an aircraft carrier in September 1941.

Battle of the Baltic: German 338-ton freighter Leontes hits a mine and sinks near Ventspils (Windau), Latvia.
Soviet auxiliary minelayer Syzran and minesweeper Zaryad are both sunk near the Ristna Lighthouse, Estonia of unknown causes.

U-331.

Battle of the Atlantic: The German U-boat fleet is still shadowing British Convoy OG-69. However, U-331 (Kptlt. Hans-Diedrich von Tiesenhausen), on its first patrol out of Kiel, is spotted by the British escorts and subjected to a depth charge attack, preventing an attack. There are no other attacks today.

Operation EF, the British raid on Kirkenes and Petsamo, continues steaming toward its destination. Since there is daylight 24 hours a day at the higher latitudes, the Royal Navy armada steaming from Iceland is easy to spot, and indeed the Germans do spot it today far from the coast. A Kriegsmarine destroyer force (Richard Beitzen, Friedrich Eckholdt, Karl Galster and Hermann Schoemann) is conducting a sweep near the Kara Straits when it receives word that a massive British fleet including aircraft carriers is nearby. The destroyers quickly hurry back to port. The British plan their raid for the early hours of 30 July and complete their refueling today.

Force A of British Operation FB, a raid on Spitsbergen, Norway, departs from Seidlsfjord, Iceland.

The Luftwaffe bombs and damages 2816-ton British freighter Adam's Beck in the Tyne. The Adam's Beck is so badly damaged that it sinks on the 30th. There is one death.

German 1890-ton freighter Bernhard is sunk when it collides with 1535-ton Swedish freighter Frode near Nordeney, northwestern Germany.

German raider Orion (Schiff 36, FKpt. Weyher), operating midway between Africa and South America due east of Puerto Rico, captures 5792-ton British freighter Chaucer. The crew survives and become prisoners of war. The sinking is a miserable affair for the German crew because they have to fire the extraordinary number of ten torpedoes, but five miss (perhaps with internal guidance issues) and five fail to detonate. Frustrated, Weyher finally has the men man the deck gun and sink the Chaucer with gunfire. Faulty torpedoes have plagued the U-boat since the start of the war.

Royal Navy submarine HMS Ultimatum (Lt. Peter R. H. Harrison) is commissioned and anti-submarine warfare trawler Buster is launched.

The Lviv pogroms at the city of Lwów, the occupied Republic of Poland (now Lviv, Ukraine), which took place from 30 June to 2 July and 25–29 July 1941, end today. An estimated 6000 people perish.

Battle of the Mediterranean: There are still small groups of British soldiers on Crete despite the complete success of Operation Mercury. They have been supported by Greek villagers and evade capture by hiding out in caves which were prepared as air raid shelters prior to the invasion. Today, 78 of these troops (67 British and 11 Greek) are picked up by submarine HMS Thrasher and taken to Alexandria, two months after the island fell to the Germans.

British Middle East Commander Claude Auchinleck and his RAF commander, Air Marshal Tedder, arrive in London by air for consultations about future operations.

An Italian bomber spots Royal Navy submarine HMS Olympus a few miles from Cavoli Light, southeastern Sardinia. A near miss damages the Olympus. The submarine is leaking and cannot submerge, but it makes it back to Gibraltar after a harrowing journey of several days.

Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 87 Stukas of I,/STG 1 and accompanying Italian Stukas of No 239 Squadron bomb and sink 372-ton British landing craft LCT-8 and Lighter A-8 east of Bardia. Some sources place this incident on the 28th.

Royal Navy destroyer HMS Hotspur and Australian destroyer HMAS Vendetta load weary Australian troops at Tobruk before dawn and take them to Mersa Matruh for rest and recuperation.

An Axis convoy of three large troopships (Neptunia, Oceania, and Marco Polo) departs from Tripoli bound for Naples. It is escorted by five destroyers and a torpedo boat. Another return of four freighters also departs with a four-destroyer escort. Another, third, convoy of only one freighter, 6343-ton Francesco Barbaro, also departs from Tripoli. Generally, transports can steam faster than ordinary freighters, and not all freighters can proceed at the same speed, thus the desirability of having small convoys of different speeds rather than one large (and slow for all) convoy. Faster convoys are usually considered safer than slower ones, so faster ship masters greatly prefer traveling with other fast ships rather than slowing down for slower freighters.

An Axis supply convoy of three Italian ships and one German freighter departs from Naples bound for Tripoli.

At Malta, the garrison receives a personal note of congratulations from the Chief of the Imperial General Staff in London for frustrating the Italian motorboat attack on the 26th. The War Office asks for further details of the action, perhaps because Italian radio in Rome is touting it as an excellent feat of arms by the Regia Marina despite the absolute failure of its mission.

General der Gebirgstruppe Eduard Dietl (Kommandierender General Gebirgskorps Norwegen) with German and Finnish officers in the northern Russian tundra, July 1941.

Ecuadorian/Peruvian Relations: Although both sides are under intense pressure from the United States and neighbors to end their border war, ceasefire negotiations remain incomplete. Thus, Peru orders its military to continue advancing into Ecuador.

US/Japanese Relations: The US State Department issues a stinging denunciation of the Japanese occupation of southern French Indochina, noting that it obviously is "for the purpose of further and more obvious movements of conquest in adjacent areas." It goes on to note that these actions "jeopardize the procurement by the United States of essential materials ... for the normal economy of this country...." Of course, the Japanese at this point aren not too concerned about what the Americans want, considering that the Roosevelt Administration has slapped extremely tough sanctions on Japan that are virtually forcing it to seek out new sources of supply in the south.

German/Norwegian Relations: The first 300 Norwegian volunteers for the "Legion Norwegen" arrive in Kiel, Germany and are sent to Fallingbostel Training Camp.

German Luftpost propaganda leaflet, 29 July 1941 (psywar.org).

German Military: General der Flakartillerie Ludwig Karl Hermann von Schröder perishes in an air crash near Hohenlychen (north of Berlin). At the time of his death, he is the military commander of Serbia and section commander of the Schutzstaffel (SS). Previously, Schröder served in the German navy as a Vice-Admiral, then transferred to the Luftwaffe in 1937 when it was rapidly expanding and drawing officers from the other branches of the Wehrmacht. General von Schröder is perhaps most notorious for instituting the practice of forcing Jews and Gypsies in Serbia to identify themselves by wearing a yellow armband, along with various other repressive measures against them such as the registration of Jewish assets. These practices rapidly spread throughout the Reich and lead to the infamous Yellow Star of David badge.

Soviet Military: General Georgy Zhukov abruptly is removed from his post of Chief of the General Staff. Stalin apparently (even Zhukov isn't completely certain as to the reason, as indicated in his memoirs) is upset that Zhukov suggested a retreat by the 1.5 million Soviet troops defending Kiev. Zhukov rightly sees a danger of encirclement at Kiev, but Stalin is determined to make a stand there. On the 30th, Stalin, after cooling down, finds a new job for Zhukov as head of the newly formed Reserve Front which is tasked with counteroffensive operations in the direction of Yelnya. As Zhukov later comments, the difference in power between Stalin and any general is similar to that between a Field Marshal and the lowliest private.

The new Soviet Chief of the General Staff is Marshal Boris Shaposhnikov.

German Luftpost propaganda leaflet, 29 July 1941 (psywar.org).

US Military: Heretofore, US aircraft carriers have defended themselves by maintaining standing air patrols. Today, US Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox orders the installation of radar plots to serve as "the brains of the organization." The navy plans the first installation aboard USS Wasp (CV-7).

USAF General Lewis H. Brereton takes command of the Third Air Force at MacDill Field, Florida.

Admiral Husband Kimmel, CINCPAC, is informed by Joseph Rochefort that the danger of immediate war with Japan due to the imposition of sanctions has passed. This is because there are signs that the Japanese Fleet is heading in the direction of Japan, not the United States. In fact, the Japanese Fleet is not even at sea.

Steel, four-masted barque "Pamir" approaches Wellington, New Zealand, 29 July 1941. A Finnish ship, the government seizes Pamir soon after its arrival due to the outbreak of hostilities between Finland and (now) British ally the USSR.

British Government: British Prime Minister Winston Churchill makes a speech before the House of Commons. The majority of his speech concerns munitions production, which he assures the House is in good order despite rumors to the contrary. He emphasizes that war production has been dispersed, noting, "I can give instances of dispersion of twenty, thirty or forty sub-centers." He winds up with a reassuring summary of the war situation, noting that "German air superiority has been broken" and that the Battle of the Atlantic is "moving progressively in our favor."

US Government: The State Department issues a list of blocked foreign nationals. They are barred from entry to the United States for engaging in activities deemed subversive and anti-American.

French Indochina: Japanese troops pour into southern French Indochina with the permission of the Vichy French regime. The French have given the Japanese permission to defend the colony in the event of foreign attack. The parties are operating under a "Common Defense" agreement signed by Deputy-Premier Admiral Darlan and Japanese Ambassador Kato in Paris. The vast majority of Japanese troops at this time are in Saigon, but they soon fan out to other strategic sites in Indochina and neighboring Cambodia.

The Common Defense agreement states, in typical Japanese diplomatic language:

Recognizing in consequence that should the security of French Indochina be menaced, Japan would have reason to consider the general tranquility in East Asia and its own security endangered.

Of course, Japan at this point is the one threatening the "general tranquility" of the region.

Saint Maximilian Maria Kolbe.

Holocaust: Axis occupation troops in the Belgrade vicinity execute 122 men purportedly for being in the Resistance - they just so happen also to be Communists and Jews.

Germans at a mental hospital at Lodz, Poland take 40 patients out to a forest and execute them.

At Auschwitz, ten prisoners disappear from the camp. SS-Hauptsturmführer Karl Fritzsch, the deputy camp commander, decides to pick 10 men to be starved to death in an underground bunker to discourage further escape attempts. Fellow inmate Catholic priest Maximilian Maria Kolbe, is not selected. However, noticing that one of the men so selected is in despair, Kolbe steps forward to take the man's place and ultimately perishes on 14 August 1941. Kolbe will be canonized for this act by Pope John Paul II on 10 October 1982.

Einsatzcommando 3 executes 257 men, 254 of them Jewish, in Raseiniai (according to the Jäger Report).

The second wave of massacres of Jews in Lwow (Lviv), Ukraine ends. An estimated 6,000 Jews are thought to have perished in June/July 1941 from these pogroms.

A "Baby Parade" held in Scranton, Pennsylvania on 29 July 1941. This event is part of the Scranton Diamond Jubilee and Centennial Celebration. Awards are given in several categories, including Prettiest Girl and Handsomest Boy. (Times-Tribune Archives).

Canadian Homefront: The controversial Arvida strike ends when Munitions and Supply Minister C.D. Howe is permitted by a change in the Defence of Canada Regulations to call out the troops. The strike is later found to have been illegal and caused by routine worker concerns about pay and working conditions.

Italian Homefront: Retired opera singer Erminia Borghi-Mamo passes away in Bologna, Italy.

American Homefront: British actor James Stephenson passes away from a heart attack in Pacific Palisades, California. His career began in 1937 at age 48, an unusual age at which to become a film star, and especially so because he had little previous acting experience. Stephenson's roles included parts in "Beau Geste" (1939), "The Sea Hawk" (1940), and "Shining Victory" (1940). Stephenson earns one Academy Award nomination for "The Letter" (1940). He is interred in Glendale's Forest Lawn Memorial Park.

Silent film actor Charles Murray, who appeared in 283 films between 1912 and 1938, passes away in Los Angeles at the age of 69. Murray appeared in the first 'The Wizard of Oz" in 1925. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1725 Vine Street.

Future History: David Hattersley Warner is born in Manchester, Lancashire, England. He becomes a leading stage actor beginning in January 1962 and makes his feature film debut in "Tom Jones" (1963). He goes on to a distinguished acting career and is perhaps best known for his appearances in several films concerning RMS Titanic (including "Titanic" (1997) and the "Star Trek" franchise, but his credits are numerous and stellar. David Warner remains a working actor as of this writing in 2018.

A German-Ukrainian parade in Ivano-Frankivsk in July 1941. Many Ukrainians at this time see the Germans as liberators from Russian domination.

July 1941

July 1, 1941: US TV Broadcasting Starts
July 2, 1941: MAUD Report
July 3, 1941: Stalin Speaks
July 4, 1941: Pogroms in Eastern Europe
July 5, 1941: Germans on Schedule
July 6, 1941: Australians Attack Damour
July 7, 1941: US Marines in Iceland
July 8, 1941: Flying Fortresses In Action
July 9, 1941: British Take Damour
July 10, 1941: Sword and Scabbard Order
July 11, 1941: Cease-fire in Syria and Lebanon
July 12, 1941: Anglo/Russian Assistance Pact
July 13, 1941: Uprising in Montenegro
July 14, 1941: Katyusha Rocket Launchers in Action
July 15, 1941: Smolensk Falls
July 16, 1941: Stalin's Son Captured
July 17, 1941: Heydrich Orders Mass Executions
July 18, 1941: Twin Pimples Raid
July 19, 1941: V for Victory
July 20, 1941: The Man Who Wouldn't Shoot
July 21, 1941: Moscow in Flames
July 22, 1941: Soviet Generals Executed
July 23, 1941: Secret Plan JB 355
July 24, 1941: Operation Sunrise
July 25, 1941: US Naval Alert
July 26, 1941: Italian E-Boat Attack on Malta
July 27, 1941: MacArthur Returns
July 28, 1941: Auschwitz Exterminations
July 29, 1941: Rescue From Crete
July 30, 1941: Raid on Petsamo and Kirkenes
July 31, 1941: Final Solution Order

2020

Tuesday 11 February 1941

German Panzers arriving in Tripoli, 1941.

Italian/Greek Campaign: The front remains stable on 11 February 1941, which effectively is of benefit to the Italians. The wrangling about what to do in Greece continues in London. Prime Minister Winston Churchill feels that the British should insert "at least 4 Divisions, rising to 6 or 10 in the summer." He wishes to "make an offer of assistance to the Greeks" and proposes sending guns and a squadron of American Curtis Tomahawk P-40 fighters there. Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and General Sir John Dill both set agree to visit Cairo and Athens to coordinate the expected troop movements.

The Greeks are looking at the Bulgarian border and considering their own defensive military options. The Italians, meanwhile, are determined to defend the key port of Valona (Vlorë and are planning another counteroffensive in the next few days. To date, Italian counteroffensives in Greece have been unmitigated disasters, making no progress and winding up costing the Italians territory. However, the contest for the Trebeshina Heights near the Klisura Pass has produced some minor defensive successes for the Italians, who are fighting much better now than earlier in the campaign.

East African Campaign: The battle at Keren, Eritrea continues. British Indian troops are faced with the tactical problem of forcing their way through the narrow Dongolaas Gorge in order to enter the Keren Plateau. The 3/1st Punjab Regiment takes the top of Sanchil, a low peak overlooking the gorge and have men on the sides of Brig's Peak next to it. However, the Indians are faced with murderous crossfire from both sides of the gorge, as the Italians occupy the heights all around them. While they might be able to hold their ground despite this, the approaches to the peaks are flat ground which exposes anyone crossing it to machine gunfire. Thus, no matter how much they bring with them, the Indians eventually run low on supplies. The Italians rain mortar and artillery fire on the Indian troops throughout the day. Finally, the Italian Savoia Grenadiers advances on the Indian troops and forces them off of both Brig's Peak and Sanchil.

By day's end, the Indian troops wind up back where they started at Cameron Ridge. This reversal, identical to the first attempt to take the peaks several days before, does not interfere with plans to attack the other (right) side of the gorge on the 12th.

In Italian Somaliland, South African and Gold Coast troops (East African 22nd Infantry Brigade) complete the capture of Afmadu at the north end of the Juba River. The South African Air Force heavily supports these attacks.

European Air Operations: RAF Bomber Command sends 79 bombers against Bremen and 29 against Hanover during the night. There are other RAF operations as well during the day, including a Coastal Command attack on the seaplane base at Thisted, Jutland. There also are some Circus offensive RAF operations over northern France.

The day is notable for the first RAF attack by four-engine bombers. Three Short Stirlings bomb the docks at Rotterdam.

The Luftwaffe mainly stays on the ground today, as has been the practice for much of 1941 so far. A few bombs are dropped in the east and southeast of England, while the Luftwaffe attacks shipping off the Scottish coast.

An American, James Alton Jepson of Decatur, Georgia, has been serving with the Royal Canadian Air Force as an observer. Sergeant Jepson enlisted on 15 April 1940 in Ottawa, then was shipped to England with his unit. He goes missing today on a mission and is never found.

USS Long Island (AVG-1), 11 November 1941. Identifiable on her flight deck are 7 Curtiss SOC-3A scout planes and 1 Brewster F2A fighter. This was the US Navy's first escort carrier, commissioned 2 June 1941. Planes flown off the Long Island were the first US planes on Henderson Field, Guadalcanal (US Navy photo.)

Battle of the Atlantic: British monitor HMS Erebus parks off Ostend between 01:00 and 01:40 and bombards the port along with escorting destroyers HMS Quorn and Eglinton. This is Operation PX.

Royal Navy submarine HMS Snapper (Lt. G.V. Prowse) fires at German minesweepers M.2, M.13 and M.25 southwest of Ouessant, Finistère, France in the Bay of Biscay. The attack fails, and the German ships attack and sink Snapper. At least, this is believed to have been her fate, as none of the 41 men aboard survived to tell the tale. Another theory is that she hit a mine.

Operating between Portugal and the Azores, German battlecruiser Admiral Hipper encounters 1236-ton British freighter Iceland. Iceland is from Convoy HX 53, which already has been savaged by U-boat and Luftwaffe attacks and dispersed. Hipper makes short work of Iceland with its guns. In the evening, Hipper spots Convoy SLS 64 (19 ships) out of Freetown and stalks it through the night.

The Luftwaffe attacks 227-ton British trawler Eamont off the coast of northern Scotland. All ten men aboard take to the boats and survive, but the abandoned ship is run ashore by the winds and current and wrecked.

The Luftwaffe also bombs and sinks 215-ton British trawler John Dunkin 13 miles northeast of Buckie, Aberdeenshire. There is one death.

In a related attack nearby, the Luftwaffe attacks 488-ton British freighter Cantick Head and damages it.

Minelayer HMS Plover lays minefield ZME 16 in the Irish Sea.

Convoy OB 285 departs from Liverpool.

Royal Navy submarine HMS Ultimatum is launched.

US destroyers USS Aaron Ward and Buchanan are laid down.

U-68 (Kapitänleutnant Karl-Friedrich Merten) is commissioned, U-80 is launched.

A burning Italian CR 42 biplane fighter. The original caption said that it was hit during aerial combat over Tobruk. El Adem, 11 February 1941.

Battle of the Mediterranean: British Middle East Commander General Archibald Wavell requests permission from the Chief of the Imperial General Staff to continue Operation Compass into Tripolitania in western Libya. Whitehall denies this request, as Prime Minister Winston Churchill is more interested in sending troops to Greece.

The British decision to halt their offensive is made just in time - for the Wehrmacht. Today, the German convoy which departed from Naples with a stopover in Palermo arrives in Tripolitania as part of Operation Sunflower (Unternehmen Sonnenblume). The transports carry troops of the 5th Light Division, the vanguard of General Erwin Rommel's Deutsches Afrikakorps (DAK). This is the first time that German troops have been on North African soil. These troops would still be quite vulnerable before they are reinforced - if the British were to attack. Royal Navy submarine HMS Unique spots the troop convoy and attacks one of the ships, German transport Ankara, but misses. Allied attacks on troop convoys from Naples will be a prime cause of the DAK's issues in North Africa.

General Rommel, en route to Tripoli, arrives in Rome. German Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels has given him a camera and some color film, which Rommel intends to make use of.

The Italians never wanted the Germans involved in their "empire" of North Africa, but the situation has changed drastically over the past few months due to Italian reversals there and in Albania. Mussolini accepts the resignation of Libyan commander Rodolfo Graziani, who flies out of Tripoli today. He is replaced by the Italian 5th Army (Tripolitania) Commander General Italo Gariboldi.

Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies resumes his extended journey from Melbourne to London. He arrives today in Benghazi, where he meets with General Iven Mackay, commander of the Australian 6th Infantry Division. This division captured Bardia, Tobruk, and Benghazi, and Menzies somewhat cattily comments in his diary that the General's "tactics are highly praised, but [he] looks as gently ineffectual as ever." He dines with General O'Connor, commander of XIII Corps, of whom he notes:

He did this job [conquer Cyrenaica], but Wavell has received all the credit.... Wavell will probably get a peerage while this man gets a CB but that is the way of the world.

Menzies notes that life has changed little in Benghazi for the residents there, with "good Australians slapping down their money on the bar of a hotel conducted by a 'conquered' Italian."

The Royal Navy begins Operation Shelford, the clearing of Benghazi Harbor by minesweepers. A similar operation at Tobruk was a disaster, with several ships hitting mines after the port was declared free of mines. In fact, today 344-ton naval whaler HMSAS Southern Floe hits a mine off Tobruk and sinks, killing everybody on board (mostly South Africans) but one rating.

At Malta, there are some minor Luftwaffe attacks on St. Paul's Bay that cause minor damage to a seaplane base and petrol lighter. Antiaircraft fire downs a Junkers Ju 88.

Two Malta-based RAF reconnaissance pilots, Flying Officer Adrian Warburton of 431 Flight (now 69 Squadron) and his observer/navigator, Sergeant Frank Bastard, are decorated. Warburton receives the DFC, while Bastard receives the Distinguished Flying Medal. Bastard is the navigator who took over as pilot (without any training) and successfully landed the plane after the pilot (apparently Warburton) was rendered unconscious. As usual in the British military, the senior officer in such a situation invariably receives a plum award when a subordinate is decorated - as Menzies noted (see above), "that is the way of the world."

Free French forces under Leclerc take the Italian outpost Gadamis in southwestern Libya.

The body of an Italian soldier lies where he fell during battle, in a stone-walled fort in the West Libyan desert, on February 11, 1941.

Battle of the Indian Ocean: German raider Atlantis rendezvouses with supply vessel Tannenfels east of Madagascar. Atlantis has captured Norwegian tanker Ketty Brøvig and 5159-ton freighter Speybank with it. The tanker, in particular, is prized because it has a load of fuel which is quite useful for all of the German ships. The Speybank is no slouch either, being used by the Germans as a minelayer off Cape Town.

Battle of the Pacific: In the Dutch East Indies, the military authorities for some reason go on a high military alert. They suddenly close all ports to Japanese shipping, order Dutch vessels to safe waters, put the military on alert and take other actions. The Japanese are not planning anything, however.

Royal Navy destroyer HMS Thracian and minelayer HMS Man Yeung lay mines outside Hong Kong Harbor.

A 1941 Lincoln Continental. The Lincoln Continental was the idea of Henry Ford's son Edsel, who wanted something sporty to use on vacation. It originally was built as a one-off for him but was such a fine car that it went into limited production. This particular Lincoln, immaculately restored, was No. 290 of 400, built on 11 February 1941. This was the original model year, with only two dozen manufactured in 1939. All Continentals built 1939-41 are a single model year.

US/Japanese Relations: New Japanese Ambassador Kichisaburō Nomura arrives in Washington. Nomura is a moderate who genuinely wants to broker some kind of deal to avoid conflict with US Secretary of State Cordell Hull. However, the hardliners in Tokyo want concessions (primarily economic), while the Americans are not interested, demanding major concessions of their own (entirely military and political ones). Major issues between the two powers are the US oil embargo of Japan, Japanese military action in China, and the Japanese occupation of Indochina.

Vichy French/German Relations: Rudolf Hilferding dies in a Gestapo dungeon in Paris. Hilferding is a prominent Jewish socialist from Austria who upon the accession of Hitler to power fled to Denmark, then Switzerland, then Paris. He would have been safe in Zurich, but he left there for Paris in 1939 (many expected Hitler to invade Switzerland in 1939). The Vichy French arrested him, and the Vichy government turned him over to the Gestapo on 9 February despite Hilferding securing an emergency visa to emigrate to the United States. The Gestapo tortured him at La Santé for two days, leading to his death. Hilferding's wife, Margarete, is sent to Theresienstadt concentration camp and perishes there in 1942.

Anglo/Italian Relations: Rumors are flying in Vichy France that Generalissimo Francisco Franco of Spain and Marshal Petain are trying to negotiate an Armistice between Great Britain and Italy. If this is the case, though, nothing seems to come of it.

"A sailor and his girlfriend are amongst the crowds listening to a speech by a member of the Socialist Party at Speakers' Corner, Hyde Park." While Winston Churchill attempts to suppress prominent socialists from speaking on the BBC, he is unconcerned about agitators in Hyde Park. February 1941. © IWM (D 2095).

British Government: Churchill sends General Ismay a note suggesting that "an Anti-Mussolini or Free-Italian" force be organized in Cyrenaica using Italian POWs. He views this as "world propaganda." It is unclear where he came up with this idea, but he might not be flattered to be told that this is an old Soviet and Imperial Japanese tactic.

Churchill also complains to Minister of Shipping Ronald Cross about an incident involving a ship that refused to sail around from Liverpool to London. Agreeing with the captain's reasoning, Churchill points out the immense value of the ship's cargo to the war effort (19,677 sub-machine guns and about 2.5 million cartridges). Churchill notes that "I always follow the movements of these important cargoes."

US Government: President Roosevelt meets with U.S. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, U.S. Secretary of the Navy William "Frank" Knox, U.S. Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Harold R. Stark, and U.S. General of the Army George C. Marshall. Roosevelt suggests that the navy risk half a dozen cruisers and two aircraft carriers at Manila as bait to gt the Japanese to enter the war. Navy Chief of Operations replies:

I have previously opposed this and you have concurred as to its unwisdom. Particularly do I recall your remark in a previous conference when Mr. Hull suggested (more forces to Manila) and the question arose as to getting them out and your 100% reply, from my standpoint, was that you might not mind losing one or two cruisers, but that you did not want to take a chance on losing 5 or 6.

This is contained in Charles Beard's "President Roosevelt and the Coming of War 1941 (2003), p 424. I can't find any confirmation for this claim, which is a favorite of conspiracy theorists. That doesn't mean it isn't factual, though.

Another outcome of this meeting is that the US government decides to warn American nationals in vulnerable Asian targets such as Rangoon, Burma, and Singapore to leave while they still can.

Wendell Willkie appears before the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee as the committee prepares to conclude its consideration of the Lend-Lease bill. He recommends passing the bill and quickly sending help to Great Britain because otherwise, the US would be at war with Germany within a month. Among his recommendations is that every American bomber in the US Army Air Corp should be sent at once to join the RAF, in addition to five or ten destroyers per month. Willkie does, however, suggest that specific time limits be attached to the President's exercise of lend-lease powers - this is a major concern of many, both within the government and outside it.

Willkie's opinion is given great weight because he just returned from a fact-finding mission in London for President Roosevelt - made at his own expense. Since Willkie was the 1940 Republican Presidential candidate, this suggests that who won that election really made little difference in the long-run course of events. After his testimony, Willkie continues his cozy relationship with his former opponent by meeting with him at the White House.

Look Magazine, 11 February 1941.

Dutch Government: The British severed diplomatic relations with Romania on the 10th, and the Dutch Government-in-exile (in London) follows suit today.

Dutch Homefront: Tensions between local German supporters and those defending Jewish interests have been sparking over the last week. Pitched battles break out today in Amsterdam's Waterlooplein. Pro-German Dutch militia "Weerbaarheidsafdeling" (defense section) is prominent in these attacks, targeting the old Jewish section of the city. Those fighting against the WA are effective, mortally wounding WA member Hendrik Koot (he dies of his wounds on 14 February).

American Homefront: There is a major gas leak in South Philadelphia which erupts into an explosion and fire. A row of eight houses is destroyed on Greenwich Street. The lots are cleared, and the lots remain empty for many years, used by neighborhoods to park their cars or grow vegetables. At least four people die, including a policeman, James J. Clarke, trying to rescue a mother and her two daughters.

Future History: William M. Landham is born in Canton, Georgia. As "Sonny" Landham, he begins an acting career in adult films. He later turns to mainstream films, appearing in such classics as "The Warriors" (he's the subway cop whose legs are broken by Michael Beck), "Predator" and "48 Hours." He also acts in such series as "The A-Team" and "The Fall Guy." Landham achieves his greatest degree of fame by appearing in an episode of "Miami Vice" as Toad, one of Reb Brown's Violator gang in the episode "Viking Bikers from Hell." Sonny later attempts to run for political office in Georgia and Kentucky, but to date has not been elected.

Destruction in South Philadelphia, 11 February 1941.

February 1941

February 1, 1941: US Military Reorganization
February 2, 1941: Wehrmacht Supermen
February 3, 1941: World Will Hold Its Breath
February 4, 1941: USO Forms
February 5, 1941: Hitler Thanks Irish Woman
February 6, 1941: Operation Sunflower
February 7, 1941: Fox Killed in the Open
February 8, 1941: Lend Lease Passes House
February 9, 1941: Give Us The Tools
February 10, 1941: Operation Colossus
February 11, 1941: Afrika Korps
February 12, 1941: Rommel in Africa
February 13, 1941: Operation Composition
February 14, 1941: Nomura in Washington
February 15, 1941: Churchill's Warning
February 16, 1941: Operation Adolphus
February 17, 1941: Invade Ireland?
February 18, 1941: Panzerwaffe Upgrade
February 19, 1941: Three Nights Blitz
February 20, 1941: Prien's Farewell
February 21, 1941: Swansea Blitz Ends
February 22, 1941: Amsterdam Pogrom
February 23, 1941: OB-288 Convoy Destruction
February 24, 1941: Okuda Spies
February 25, 1941: Mogadishu Taken
February 26, 1941: OB-290 Convoy Destruction
February 27, 1941: Operation Abstention
February 28, 1941: Ariets Warns Stalin

2020