Long Beach, California • December 23, 1941 Of all the workhorse aircraft in World War II, none was more widely and effectively deployed than the Douglas C‑47 military transport. Nicknamed the “Gooney Bird” by American crewmen and passengers, the C‑47 Skytrain was a derivative of the Douglas propeller-driven commercial airliner, the DC‑3. (The British and Australians…
Milan, Italy • October 27, 1922 On this date in 1922 in Italy, riots instigated by Benito Mussolini’s National Fascist Party (Partito Nazionale Fascista) erupted in several Italian towns. The Fascists called on the national government to resign. The next day 4 columns of Mussolini’s paramilitary insurgents, Blackshirts (Camicie nere) or squadristi as they were called,…
El Alamein, Northwestern Egypt • October 23, 1942 In 1942 El Alamein was a mean little railway station roughly 275 miles/440 km east of the Libyan-Egyptian border. The First Battle of El Alamein was fought there between July 1 and 27, 1942, by a mixed German-Italian army under newly minted Field Marshal Erwin Rommel in command of Panzer Army…
Dieppe, German-Occupied France • August 19, 1942 Ever since the German Wehrmacht (armed forces) had launched its surprise Blitzkrieg on the Soviet Union in June 1941 (Operation Barbarossa) the Allies had been sensitive to Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s increasingly desperate appeals to Western leaders to open a “second front now” in Northwestern Europe. British Prime Minister…
London, England • July 25, 1942 On this date in 1942 U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt learned that the Combined Chiefs of Staff (CCS), an amalgam of the high-ranking military officers of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff (War and Navy Departments) and their British counterparts, the British Chiefs of Staff Committee, had established the…
Near Scoglitti, Sicily, Italy • July 10, 1943 On this date 21-year-old Oklahoma national guardsman Bill Mauldin landed on the southwest coast of Sicily with K Company, 180th Infantry Regiment, 45th Division as part of Operation Husky (July 9/10 to August 17, 1943). Mauldin is less known for his 3‑year service in World War II than for his cartoon…
London, England • June 24, 1942 On this date in 1942 Maj. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower arrived in London, England, to assume administrative and operational command of the European Theater of Operations, United States Army. At the time (end of May) the U.S. Army in Europe consisted of 3 infantry regiments. Set up 16 days prior to…
Tunis, Tunisia • November 9, 1942 On this date in 1942, one day after the largest amphibious invasion force in history to that time landed Allied troops on the French Algerian and Moroccan coasts, German troops, tanks, and aircraft started pouring into neighboring Tunisia from nearby bases in Italy. Operation Torch, under the command of…
Milan, Italy · October 27, 1922 On this date in 1922 in Italy, riots instigated by Benito Mussolini’s National Fascist Party (Partito Nazionale Fascista) erupted in several Italian towns. The Fascists called on the government to resign. The next day four columns of Mussolini’s paramilitary Blackshirts (Camicie nere, or squadristi) began a march from the…