24 January 1939

January 24th, 1939 (TUESDAY)

GERMANY: Berlin: Field Marshal Göring appoints the Gestapo chief Reinhardt Heydrich to "solve the Jewish question by emigration and evacuation." SS Gruppenfuerher Heydrich is in charge of the Sicherheitspolizei (security police), the combined forces of both the Gestapo and the Sicherheitsdienst (SD). (Perry Stewart)

CHILE: 30,000 are reported dead in yesterday's earthquake.

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24 January 1940

Yesterday Tomorrow

January 24th, 1940 (WEDNESDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: RAF Bomber Command: Reconnaissance of N-W Germany for naval targets; one aircraft lost.

RAF Fighter Command: Shetlands; bombs dropped on land and aimed at cargo vessel, by unknown number of enemy aircraft. Enemy escaped in low cloud.

With recurrent reports of an imminent invasion by Germany, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain reassures Belgium of Britain's pledge to assist the Belgians if they are attacked.

Destroyers HMS Ledbury and Milne laid down.

Corvette HMS Gladiolus launched.

SPAIN: Madrid: The Spanish council of ministers passes a law banning Freemasonry throughout Spain.

CANADA: Flower-class corvettes HMCS Amherst, Sackville, Moncton, Levis, Shawinigan and Lunenburg ordered.

ATLANTIC OCEAN:

SS Alsacien sunk by U-44 at 39.01N, 09.54W - Grid CG 5552.

SS Bisp sunk by U-23 at 60.47N, 04.34W - Grid AN 1115.

24 January 1941

January 24th, 1941 (FRIDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: The Chiefs of Staff ask Wavell to plan for a possible invasion of Sicily in the event of "dissension" between Italy and Germany.

GERMANY: U-562 launched.

ROMANIA: Bucharest: Antonescu puts down the revolt of the pro-Nazi Iron Guard.

LIBYA: In one of the first tank battles in this arena, the British 4th Armoured Brigade pushes back Italian forces at Mechili. 8 medium Italian tanks are destroyed and one captured. The British lose one cruiser and six light tanks.

KENYA Tana River: With the fall today of the frontier post of Liboi, Lt. Gen. Cunningham is poised to advance from Kenya into Italian Somaliland.

At the same time South African troops are moving across Kenya's northern frontier districts to Moyale for an advance northwards. Cunningham's 12th African Division, made up of East, West and South Africans, has been pushing further south, heading for Jubaland (Southern Italian Somaliland). This is arid country, where thorn thickets stretch to the horizon, and tactics are reduced to tiny groups ambushing other tiny groups. Everywhere there are flies. "Hit them, hit them hard and hit them again!" Cunningham said when his action against the Italians began last month. Some soldiers assume that he meant the flies.

Six months ago Britain had one battalion and a brigade of King's African Rifles in Kenya. Now it has 75,000 men, mostly from African colonies, South Africa and India. Cunningham aims to cross into Italian Somaliland as far as the river Juba and the port of Kismayu, before a major advance further into the territory and onto Ethiopia after the rains in June.

Facing him is an army on paper of 100,000 Italian and 200,000 African troops. In reality it is less formidable. One-third is tied down by Ethiopian guerrillas, and another third is defending Eritrea against the British in Sudan. In addition, the Italians are so short of petrol that they cannot concentrate large numbers in any key spot.

General de Simone, the Italian commander who seized British Somaliland last August, is aware of this, and is forming a line on the river Juba to try to force the British into linear warfare where their mobility would be useless.

AUSTRALIA: The Prime Minister, Robert Menzies, leaves Melbourne, bound for Britain.

Minesweeper HMAS Gawler laid down.

Minesweeper HMAS Lismore commissioned.

CANADA: Minesweeper HMCS Chedabucto laid down North Vancouver, British Columbia.

U.S.A.: Washington: The US has rejected an appeal from the Vichy government to admit Jewish refugees from Germany, of whom there are now many thousands in unoccupied France.

The Vichy government argued that Jewish refugees added to its food and relief difficulties, and asked the United States, either alone or in conjunction with Latin-American countries, to open its doors to German Jewish refugees. However, the United States declined to pass this request on to Latin-American governments for fear of seeming to put pressure on them. The United States has two reasons for declining to admit these refugees: firstly, it believes that refugees should not be distinguished on racial and religious grounds; secondly, no change could be made in the existing immigration laws with their system of quotas.

A US spokesman added that his government did not want to be a party to forced migration which might have "serious and unhappy consequences to the economic and social equilibrium" in the receiving states.

Knox writes to Stimson that the Navy expected the Army to bolster the defenses of Hawaii.

Chesapeake Bay: Roosevelt welcomes Britain's new ambassador, Lord Halifax, who has arrived in the battleship, King George V.

New York City: The motion picture "High Sierra" opens at the Strand Theater. Directed by Raoul Walsh, this crime drama based on a W.R. Burnett novel stars Ida Lupino, Humphrey Bogart, Arthur Kennedy, Joan Leslie, Henry Hull, Barton MacLane and Cornel Wilde. This film makes Bogart a star.

ATLANTIC OCEAN: SS Vespasian sunk by U-123 at 55N, 15W - Grid AL 5244.

24 January 1942

January 24th, 1942 (SATURDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: Destroyer HMS Inconstant commissioned.

GERMANY: U-218, U-440, U-514 commissioned.

U-309 is laid down.

NORWAY: U-586, U-587 and U-588 went into position off Norway west of the Hebrides in preparation for an anticipated Allied invasion of Norway.

U.S.S.R.: Soviet forces on the Donets front in the Ukraine break through German positions in the Izyum area and capture Barvenkova, about 40 miles (64 kilometres) east of Lozovaya; in the Valdai Hills sector to the north, the Soviets deepen the salient between Cholm and Rzhev to the vicinity of Velikle Luki, where the Germans are firmly established. German troops of Army Group Center recapture Suchinitshe near Kaluga.

Moscow: Partisan detachments living and fighting behind the German lines have linked up with the 250th Airborne Regiment and two battalions of the 201st Airborne Brigade dropped south-west of Vyazma, which is now under heavy attack by the advancing Red Army.

The guerrillas and the paratroopers are fighting side by side to cut the German communications with the front. With the partisans acting as guides, the white-shrouded paras are ghosting through the forest to launch swift hit-and-run raids on supply lines and headquarters. This combination of irregular and regular troops is a new tactic on the Russian front. Individual officers and experts have been dropped to the partisans before, but this is the first time that they have been used in a co-ordinated campaign by the Stavka, the Russian High Command.

With the German defence line breaking up into defended locations, known as "Hedgehogs", there is room for such forces to manoeuvre, and even to hold large areas with established bases and landing strips for light aircraft.

Polar Fleet and White Sea Flotilla: Shipping loss. Dispatch-ship "Vesna" - unknown case, close to Eina bay.
Black Sea Fleet and Azov Flotilla: Shipping loss: MS "TSch-250" (uncompleted hull) - grounded by storm in Kerch strait (Sergey Anisimov)(69)

Soviet paratroopers end their series of drops behind German lines south-west of Vyazma.

LIBYA: The British Eighth Army's 13 Corps prepares to counterattack or, if the enemy cannot be contained, to fall back on line Derna-Mechili as the Axis offensive halts briefly.

BURMA: Rear elements of the Mergui garrison arrive at Rangoon. Moulmein is now threatened.
P-40 pilots of the 1st and 2d Fighter Squadrons, American Volunteer Group (AVG, aka, “The Flying Tigers”) shoot down four Japanese Army bombers and eight Japanese Army fighters over Rangoon between 0945 and 1030 hours local.

Percy Bartelt of the AVG becomes in ace in this action. (Skip Guidry)

MALAYA: The outline of the plan for withdrawal to Singapore Island is issued. Hard fighting continues at Batu Pahat. The Japanese are approaching Kluang, in the Indian 9th Division sector.
The 942 men of the Australian 2/4th Machine Gun Battalion and 1907 other Australian reinforcements arrive in Singapore. The reinforcements are woefully undertrained; some had only seven days training as soldiers and many had never fired a rifle.
The remainder of the Japanese 18th Division lands at Singora.

NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES: The Japanese Eastern Invasion Force lands at Kendari on Celebes Island. A USN seaplane tender (destroyer), USS Childs (AVD-1, ex DD-241), is leaving Kendari harbor and spots the Japanese. A rain squall obscures the seaplane tender for a while, allowing her to avoid two Japanese destroyers. Than she is attacked by six Japanese aircraft at 0800 hours local but escapes to the south. By the evening, Kendari is fully occupied by the Japanese. Most of the Dutch troops are captured by Japanese; some fight a guerilla war for a short period, while others try to escape to safer parts of archipelago. Kendari Airdrome is considered the best in the Netherlands East Indies and was immediately put into operation by the Japanese 21st Air Flotilla.
    USN submarine USS Swordfish (SS-193) sinks a Japanese gunboat north of Kema, Celebes Island.
     Carrier-based aircraft from the aircraft carriers HIJMS Soryu and HIJMS Hiryu bomb Ambon Island.
     The first of a small group of USAAF Far East Air Force P-40s reaches Blimbing Airdrome, Java from Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia.

In the Battle off Balikpapan, Borneo, or the Battle of Makassar Strait, four U.S. destroyers attack the Japanese Borneo invasion convoy. Destroyer USS John D. Ford (DD-228) is damaged by gunfire at position 01.20N, 117.01E but sinks transport Tsuruga Maru; destroyer USS Parrott (DD-218) sinks transport Sumanoura Maru; destroyers USS Paul Jones (DD-230) and USS Pope (DD-225) sink transport Tatsukami Maru; USS Paul Jones also sinks cargo ship Kuretaki Maru; and USS Parrott also sinks Patrol Boat No.37, in position 00.10N, 118.00E. A fifth (TSUGURA MARU) was sunk by a Dutch submarine (K-KVIII) before the destroyer attack. (Ric Pelvin and Jack McKillop)

USAAF B-17s based at Malang, Java, and Netherland East Indies Air Force Martin Model 139WHs (export version of the USAAF B-10) and Brewster 339s (export version of USN F2A Buffalo) bomb invasion shipping, sinking transports Nana Maru and Jukka Maru, in position 00.10N, 118.00E.

BISMARCK ARCHIPELAGO: Five RAAF Catalinas attack Japanese shipping in Rabaul Harbour but no hits are scored.

COMMONWEALTH OF THE PHILIPPINES: On Bataan, the II Corps begins disengaging and withdrawing combat troops. The Japanese maintain intense pressure on the Philippine Division and attack the covering force, but the bulk of the troops withdraw successfully. The situation in the I Corps area deteriorates rapidly. The 1st Division, Philippine Army, exhausted by prolonged fighting along the main line of resistance and critically in need of supplies and ammunition, remains under pressure. Additional strength is applied against the Japanese roadblock on the West Road without avail. In the Service Command Area of southern Bataan, the Japanese cannot be ousted from Quinauan and Longoskawayan Points. Sailors and marines succeed, however, in regaining Pucot Hill and driving the Japanese back to Longoskawayan and Lapiay Points; they are supported by the last four P-40s on Luzon.
Eight USAAF Far East Air Force B-17 Flying Fortresses based on Java, stage through Del Monte Field on Mindanao,to attack Japanese targets. Two aircraft are lost in crash landings.

AUSTRALIA: Melbourne: The Rising Sun flies over Australian territory today after landings by 5,000 Japanese troops on the island chains of New Britain and New Ireland in Australian New Guinea. A massive assault by aircraft from four carriers preceded the landings in New Ireland and at Rabaul, the capital of New Britain. Thirty warships escorted the invasion fleet, and more than 100 aircraft took part, opposed by a force of eight obsolete RAAF Wirraway fighters which were quickly shot down. Without aircover, and outnumbered, the small defending force had to withdraw.

The Combined Chiefs of Staff order that the Darwin, Northern Territory, area be incorporated into the Australian-British-Dutch-American (ABDA) Command.
The USAAF Far East Air Force orders the 20th Pursuit Squadron (Provisional) to fly its 18 P-40s to Port Moresby, New Guinea.

Minesweeper HMAS Armidale is launched.

PACIFIC OCEAN: US Marines land on the island of Samoa to protect it from the Japanese.

NEW BRITAIN: Private W. Cook and the seven other PoWs are taken to Tol Plantation by their Japanese captors. There they are tied up in groups of two or three and eventually taken out by their captors to be executed. Private Cook's group of three are asked in sign language if they prefer to be shot or bayoneted. They ask to be shot. They are instead all bayoneted in the back repeatedly. Private Cook receives five wounds and is left for dead; unable to hold his breath and is bayoneted a further six times. Private Cook, still alive, manages to untie his hands and makes his way to the beach. At dusk he sees the smoke from a camp fire and staggers towards it. The next morning he finds a small party under the command of Colonel Scanlan. Private Cook survives the war although he loses his voice as a result of a bayonet wound to his throat. (Daniel Ross)

CANADA: HMCS Wetaskiwin, a Flower-class corvette, LCdr. Guy Stanley Windeyer, RCN, CO, arrived at Halifax, Nova Scotia, en route to a refit in Liverpool, Nova Scotia. Wetaskiwin completed six round trips to Iceland in eight months as part of the Newfoundland Escort Force and was worn out. During that time, she participated in two major convoy battles - SC-42 (Sep 41) and SC-48 (Oct 41), during which U-boats sank 27 merchant ships totaling over 120,000 tons.

U.S.A.: The Special Court of Inquiry on Pearl Harbor, headed by Supreme Court Justice Owen J Roberts, places the main responsibility for the 7 December 1941 disaster on Admiral Husband E Kimmel and Lieutenant General Walter C Short, accusing them of neglecting to heed attack warnings, failing to confer with each other, and taking only minimum precautions.

PANAMA CANAL ZONE: The US submarine S-26 (SS-131), commanded by Earle C. Hawk, is lost after being rammed by U.S. escort (PC460) in the Gulf of Panama. 46 hands lost and 2 survived (Joe Sauder)

PERU: The government breaks diplomatic relations with Germany, Italy and Japan.

URUGUAY: The government breaks off diplomatic relations with the Axis powers.

ATLANTIC OCEAN:

At 0240, the unescorted SS Empire Gem was torpedoed by U-66 east of Cape Hatteras. The burning tanker later sank in 35°02N/75°33W. 43 crewmembers and six gunners were lost. The master and the radio operator were picked up by a US Coast Guard cutter and landed at Hatteras Inlet on 25 January.

SS Ringstad sunk by U-333 at 45.50N, 51.04W - Grid BC 4700 .

At 0653, SS Empire Wildebeeste, dispersed from Convoy ON-53, was torpedoed and sunk by U-106 east of New York. Eight crewmembers and one gunner were lost. The master, 18 crewmembers and three gunners were picked up by destroyer USS Lang and landed at Bermuda.

24 January 1943

January 24th, 1943 (MONDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: Minesweeper HMS Gorgon and Grecian launched.

ARCTIC SEA: U-625 fired four torpedoes at convoy escorts HMS Kent and Bermuda, but all missed.

SOLOMON ISLANDS: Admiral Ainsworth leads a US naval taskforce into the Kula Gulf to bombard a Japanese airfield site on Kolombangara north of Guadalcanal. Cruisers Honolulu, St. Louis, Nashville, Helena and destroyers Nicholas, DeHaven, Radford and O'Bannon are involved.

Later in the day, aircraft of Carrier Air Group Six (CVG-6) in the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga (CV-3), Douglas SBD Dauntlesses of Bombing Squadron Six (VB-6), Grumman F4F Wildcats of Fighting Squadron Six (VF-6) and Grumman TBF Avengers of Torpedo Squadron Six (VT-6), bomb the same objectives.

U.S.A.: Wyoming: A local lecture is given on how to render fat from a skunk without the smell. (Pat Holscher)

Submarines USS Raton and Pargo launched.

Destroyer escorts USS Douglas L Howard and Frederick C Davis launched.

CARIBBEAN SEA: Drifting wreck of tanker British Vigilance sunk by U-105.

24 January 1944

January 24th, 1944 (MONDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: MAC carrier Empire Macdermott launched.

U.S.S.R.: 1st and 2nd Ukraine Fronts begin a major offensive. Capturing Pushkin and Pashovsk in the Ukraine.

ARCTIC OCEAN: German submarines attack Murmansk-bound convoy JW 56A. U.S. freighter SS Penelope Barker is torpedoed and sunk by U-278 about 115 miles (185 kilometres) from North Cape, Norway; 15 crewmen are killed.

ITALY: Anzio: Luftwaffe aircraft attack and sink the British hospital ship ST. DAVID; they also damage destroyer USS PLUNKETT (DD-431) and minesweeper USS PREVAIL (AM-107); an aerial torpedo damages destroyer USS MAYO (DD-422); Allied troops pause, giving Germany time to bring up reinforcements.

Anzio: Capt. Jenkin Robert Oswald Thompson (b.1911), RAMC, after four years of gallant service on hospital ships, went down with the ST. DAVID while trying to save a trapped patient. (George Cross)

During a Luftwaffe air raid on Allied shipping at Naples, U.S. freighter SS F.A.C. Muhlenberg is damaged by bomb and by near-miss of bomb; the ship's crew and port firefighting crews extinguish the fires. Seven crewmen are killed.

The Battle of Cassino begins. The US 100th Infantry Battalion fights in the first two assaults. (Gene Hanson)

NEW BRITAIN: Over 200 US aircraft, including USMC TBF Avengers, supported by a large concentration of RNZAF, USAAF, USMC and USN fighters, raid Japanese shipping at Rabaul, in the Bismark Archipelago, destroying 83 Japanese planes - one of many such raids which are now being launched by the four carrier groups now at the disposal of the US Admiral Spruance.

They sink the water tanker Koan Maru, aircraft transport Lyon Maru (previously rendered un-navigable on 17 January) and army cargo ships Taisho Maru and Yamayuri Maru, in position 04.13S, 152.22E.

NEW GUINEA: Japanese planes bomb U.S. shipping in Dreger Bay, damaging freighter SS John Muir with one direct hit and at least four near-misses that injure 16 men.

CANADA:

Tug HMCS Auburnville assigned to Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Patrol vessel HMCS Sans Peur departed Esquimalt, British Columbia for Halifax, Nova Scotia.

U.S.A.:

Submarine USS Bream commissioned.

Destroyer escorts USS Coates, Daniel, Garfield Thomas and Hollis commissioned.

Destroyer escort USS Lloyd E Acree laid down.

Aircraft carrier USS Hancock launched.

24 January 1945

January 24th, 1945 (WEDNESDAY)

FRANCE: General Joseph "Uncle Joe" Stilwell takes over command of US Army Ground Forces. (Marc James Small)

GERMANY: Berlin: Guderian meets von Ribbentrop, the foreign minister, and tells him bluntly "the war is lost."

U-3035 is launched.

Silesia: The Red Army captures Gleiwitz.

HUNGARY: Around noon the first Soviet tanks reach Buda coming from Budakeszi in the north.

ARCTIC SEA: U-295 hit a mine and was damaged so badly that she had to return to base.

COMMONWEALTH OF THE PHILIPPINES: Calapan is taken by US forces. Organized Japanese resistance on Mindoro Island, Philippines ends.

PACIFIC: In the Volcano Islands, USN Task Group 94.9 (Rear Admiral Oscar C. Badger, consisting of the battleship USS Indiana (BB-58), three heavy cruisers, seven destroyers and a light minelayer and preceded by a barrier patrol of PB4Y Liberators, bombards Iwo Jima, together with USAAF B-24 Liberators escorted by P-38 Lightnings. Northeast of Iwo Jima, destroyers USS Dunlap (DD-384) and USS Fanning (DD-385) sink transport I-Go Yoneyama Maru and auxiliary minesweepers Keinan Maru and No.7 Showa Maru, a small Japanese three-ship convoy that had just arrived that morning. (83)

NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES: Sumatra: The Fleet Air Arm delivered a major air strike against the vital Japanese oil refineries at Palembang in Sumatra, launched from four fleet aircraft carriers.

CANADA: The following AP report was released to the newswires - Shallow Lake, Ontario. defence minister general A.G.L. McNaughton said tonight that "today the North Atlantic is, as it hasn't been for months past, alive with German submarines." "We are having ships sunk day by day," said General McNaughton in telling a political rally here why he had not been able to campaign last week as government candidate in the North Grey by-election of February 5. The following AP report was released to the newswires - The probable sinking of a U-boat in the Atlantic, four hundred miles from Britain, was reported by RAF Coastal Command tonight - another sign that submarine packs might be on the prowl. Norwegian reports said the Germans recently stationed one hundred new U-boats at Norwegian ports as far north as Narvik.

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