This day in military history..

March 21st

1945: In Hungary, the Red Army captures Stuhlweissenburg. In the West, units of the US First Army advance from the Remagen bridgehead toward Siegburg. The US 8th Air Force launches a major attack (650 bombers) against Hamburg.

1918: Final German offensive of the First World War begins - The Germans hoped to split the Allied forces around Amiens and drive towards the English channel. After initial success their advance slowed and was turned into the retreat that eventually led to the end of the First World War.
1942: Air battle for Port Moresby begins - The Japanese had hoped to occupy Port Moresby as a base from which to cut off shipping to Eastern Australia. Their defeat in the Battle of the Coral Sea thwarted the planned naval attack and invasion against Port Moresby.
1918: Germany begins major offensive on the Western Front - Near the Somme River in France, the German army launches its first major offensive on the Western Front in two years. At the beginning of 1918, Germany’s position on the battlefields of Europe looked extremely strong. German armies occupied virtually all of Belgium and much of northern France. With Romania, Russia and Serbia out of the war by the end of 1917, conflict in the east was drawing to a close, leaving the Central Powers free to focus on combating the British and French in the west. Indeed, by March 21, 1918, Russia’s exit had allowed Germany to shift no fewer than 44 divisions of men to the Western Front.
1967: North Vietnam rejects Johnson overture - The North Vietnamese press agency reports that an exchange of notes took place in February between President Lyndon B. Johnson and Ho Chi Minh. The agency said that Ho rejected a proposal made by Johnson for direct talks between the United States and North Vietnam on ending the war. The North Vietnamese demanded that the United States "stop definitely and unconditionally its bombing raids and all other acts of war against North Vietnam."
1972: Khmer Rouge shell Phnom Penh - In Cambodia, more than 100 civilians are killed and 280 wounded as communist artillery and rockets strike Phnom Penh and outlying areas in the heaviest attack since the beginning of the war in 1970. Following the shelling, a communist force of 500 troops attacked and entered Takh Mau, six miles southeast of Pnom Penh, killing at least 25 civilians.
 
March 22nd

1943: German troops of Heeresgruppe Mitte recapture Belgorod.
1945: Units of the US Third Army cross the Rhine at Oppenheim south of Mainz against minimal German resistance.

1942: Japanese aircraft bomb Katherine - This was the only air raid against Katherine in the Second World War, one man was killed.
1945: Corporal Rattey , 25th Battalion, originally from Barmedman, New South Wales, wins the Victoria Cross on Bougainville

1915: Russians take Austrian garrison at Przemysl - After six months of battle, the Austrian garrison at Przemysl (now in Poland), the citadel guarding the northeastern-most point of the Austro-Hungarian empire, falls to the Russians. During the first weeks of World War I in August 1914, Russia had been able to mobilize more quickly than the Central Powers had expected, sending two armies into East Prussia and four into the Austrian province of Galicia, along the northern slopes of the Carpathian Mountains (now southeast Poland and western Ukraine). In Galicia, two armies moved in from the east and two from the west, both steadily advancing through the region, scoring victories over inferior numbers of Austrian troops, including at Lemberg (now Lvov) in early September.
1968: Westmoreland to depart South Vietnam - President Lyndon B. Johnson announces the appointment of Gen. William Westmoreland as Army Chief of Staff; Gen. Creighton Abrams replaced him as commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam. Westmoreland had first assumed command of U.S. Military Assistance Command Vietnam in June 1964, and in that capacity was in charge of all American military forces in Vietnam. One of the war's most controversial figures, General Westmoreland was given many honors when the fighting was going well, but when the war turned sour, many Americans blamed him for problems in Vietnam. Negative feeling about Westmoreland grew particularly strong following the Tet Offensive of 1968.
 
March 23rd

1945: The Red Army reaches the outskirts of Danzig and Gotenhafen. The RAF launches a devastating raid (300 bombers) against Hildesheim near Hannover, a small city of little military and industrial importance.

1945: Waitavolo and Tol plantations captured by Australians, New Britain - In 1942 the Tol plantation was the scene of the massacre of some 150 Australians as they attempted to flee Rabaul. The capture of the plantations in 1945 enabled the Australian XXX division to establish a line across the Gazelle Peninsula from which they were able to conduct patrols against Japanese positions in the North of New Britain.

1775: Patrick Henry voices American opposition to British policy - During a speech before the second Virginia House of Burgesses, Patrick Henry presses for military action against the British with the most stirring oratory of the revolutionary age:
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
1862: Battle of Kernstown, Virginia - Confederate General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson suffers a rare defeat when his attack on Union forces in the Shenandoah Valley fails. Jackson was trying to prevent Union General Nathaniel Banks from sending troops from the Shenandoah to General George McClellan's army near Washington. McClellan was preparing to send his massive army by water to the James Peninsular southeast of Richmond for a summer campaign against the Confederate capital. When Turner Ashby, Jackson's cavalry commander, detected that Yankee troops were moving out of the valley, Jackson decided to attack and keep the Union troops divided.
1918: Paris hit by shells from new German gun - At 7:20 in the morning, an explosion in the Place de la Republique in Paris announces the first attack of a new German gun. The Pariskanone, or Paris gun, as it came to be known, was manufactured by Krupps; it was 210mm, with a 118-foot-long barrel, which could fire a shell the impressive distance of some 130,000 feet, or 25 miles, into the air. Three of them fired on Paris that day from a gun site at Crépy-en-Laonnaise, 74 miles away.
1944: Germans slaughter Italian civilians - German occupiers shoot more than 300 Italian civilians as a reprisal for an Italian partisan attack on an SS unit. Since the Italian surrender in the summer of 1943, German troops had occupied wider swaths of the peninsula to prevent the Allies from using Italy as a base of operations against German strongholds elsewhere, such as the Balkans. An Allied occupation of Italy would also put into their hands Italian airbases, further threatening German air power.
Italian partisans (antifascist guerrilla fighters) aided the Allied battle against the Germans. The Italian Resistance had been fighting underground against the fascist government of Mussolini long before its surrender, and now it fought against German fascism. The main weapon of a guerrilla, defined roughly as a member of a small-scale "irregular" fighting force that relies on limited and quick engagements of a conventional fighting force, is sabotage. Aside from killing enemy soldiers, the destruction of communication lines, transportation centers, and supply lines are essential guerrilla tactics. Italian partisans operating in Rome threw a bomb at an SS unit, killing 33 soldiers. The very next day, the Germans rounded up 335 Italian civilians and took them to the Adeatine caves. They were all shot dead as revenge for the SS soldiers. Of the civilian victims, 253 were Catholic, 70 were Jewish and the remaining 12 were unidentified.
 
World War II

March 24th

1941: In Libya, the newly arrived Afrikakorps under Generaloberst Rommel begins an offensive and recaptures El Agheila, the farthest point reached by the British 8th Army (Wavell) in February.
1944: The Luftwaffe attacks London with 90 medium bombers (He-111s and Ju-88s), while the RAF bombs Berlin with 810 heavy Lancasters. In Italy, the US Fifth Army's (Clark) bridgehead at Anzio is bombarded by German heavy long-range guns (Screaming Mimies) and Luftwaffe aircraft using guided bombs, causing severe casualties in men, ships, and equipment. Persistent US and British attacks against the Gustav Line at Cassino are repulsed by the German defenders.
1945: In a major effort (Operation Plunder), units of the British Second Army (Dempsey) cross the lower Rhine at Wesel, followed by 40,000 US and British airborne troops (Operation Varsity). The US Third Army captures Speyer and Ludwigshafen on the upper Rhine. In the East, the 1st Ukrainian Front captures Neisse in Upper Silesia.
source: http://www.feldgrau.com/march.html

1901: Veldfontein - Australians capture Boer convoy and guns at Veldfontein 1942: Port Moresby bombed by Japanese - The Japanese had hoped to occupy Port Moresby as a base from which to cut off shipping to Eastern Australia. Their defeat in the Battle of the Coral Sea thwarted the planned naval attack and invasion against Port Moresby.
source: http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/thismonth/index.asp

1918: German forces cross the Somme River, achieving their first goal of the major spring offensive begun three days earlier on the Western Front. Operation “Michael,” engineered by the German chief of the general staff, Erich von Ludendorff, aimed to decisively break through the Allied lines on the Western Front and destroy the British and French forces. The offensive began on the morning of March 21, 1918, with an aggressive bombardment.
1944: Wingate dies in Burma = Maj. Gen. Orde Wingate, leader of the 77th Indian Brigade, also called the Chindits, dies in a transport plane crash. He was 41 years old.
1975: North Vietnamese launch "Ho Chi Minh Campaign" - The North Vietnamese "Ho Chi Minh Campaign" begins. Despite the 1973 Paris Peace Accords cease fire, the fighting had continued between South Vietnamese forces and the North Vietnamese troops in South Vietnam. In December 1974, the North Vietnamese launched a major attack against the lightly defended province of Phuoc Long, located north of Saigon along the Cambodian border. They successfully overran the provincial capital at Phuoc Binh on January 6, 1975. President Richard Nixon had repeatedly promised South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu that the United States would come to the aid of South Vietnam if the North Vietnamese committed a major violation of the Peace Accords. However, by the time the communists had taken Phuoc Long, Nixon had resigned from office and his successor, Gerald Ford, was unable to convince a hostile Congress to make good on Nixon's promises to Saigon.

1765 - American Revolutionary War: The Kingdom of Great Britain passes the Quartering Act that requires the 13 American colonies to house British troops.
1944 - In an event later dramatized in the movie The Great Escape, 76 prisoners begin breaking out of Stalag Luft III.
1999 - Kosovo War: NATO commences air bombardment against Yugoslavia, marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign country.
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_24
 
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All kinds of history

March 25th


1941: Yugoslavia joins the Tripartite Pact.
1945: The British Second Army captures Wesel which has been nearly 100% destroyed by Allied bombing.
source: http://www.feldgrau.com/march.html

1945: Chowne, VC - Lieutenant Chowne, 2/2 Battalion AIF, originally from Sydney, New South Wales, wins the Victoria Cross posthumously at Dagua, New Guinea. source: http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/thismonth/index.asp

1802 - The Treaty of Amiens is signed as a "Definitive Treaty of Peace" between France and United Kingdom.
1821 - Greece declares its independence from the Ottoman Empire, beginning the Greek War of Independence.
1865 - American Civil War: In Virginia, Confederate forces capture Fort Stedman from the Union in a bloody battle.
1971 - Bangladesh Liberation War: Beginning of Operation Searchlight of Pakistan Army against East Pakistani civilians.
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_25

1968: Johnson meets with the "Wise Men" - After being told by Defense Secretary Clark Clifford that the Vietnam War is a "real loser," President Johnson, still uncertain about his course of action, decides to convene a nine-man panel of retired presidential advisors. The group, which became known as the "Wise Men," included the respected generals Omar Bradley and Matthew Ridgway, distinguished State Department figures like Dean Acheson and George Ball, and McGeorge Bundy, National Security advisor to both the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. After two days of deliberation the group reached a consensus: they advised against any further troop increases and recommended that the administration seek a negotiated peace. Although Johnson was initially furious at their conclusions, he quickly came to believe that they were right. On March 31, Johnson announced on television that he was restricting the bombing of North Vietnam to the area just north of the Demilitarized Zone. Additionally, he committed the United States to discuss peace at any time or place. Then Johnson announced that he would not pursue reelection for the presidency. source: http://www.historychannel.com/

1942: US troops occupy the Society Islands.
1944: Manstein persuades Hitler to allow the First Panzer Army to break out to the west of Lvov, not south.
1945: The U.S. Navy begins the pre-invasion bombardment of Okinawa firing more than half a million shells and rockets in a week. Greek partisans temporarily take over Samos Island from the Italian garrison. The U.S. First Army breaks out of the Remagen bridgehead.
source: http://www.worldwar-2.net/timelines/timelines-index.htm
 
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okay, here goes!

March 27

- 1306 - Robert I of Scotland and Elizabeth de Burgh are crowned king and Queen of the Scots.

1625 - Charles I becomes King of England, Scotland and Ireland as well as claiming the title King of France.

1794 - The government of the United States establishes a permanent United States Navy and authorizes the building of six frigates.

1794 - Denmark and Sweden form a neutrality
compact.

1814 - War of 1812: In central Alabama, Unite States forces under General Andrew Jackson defeat the Creek at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend.

1836 - Texas Revolution: Goliad massacre - Antoni López de Santa Anna orders the Mexican army to kill about 400 Texans at Goliad, Texas.

1846 - Mexican-American War: Siege of Fort Texas.

1923 - FART construction completed. (LOL, just though its funny :roll: )

1938 - Battle of Tai er zhuang

1942 - World War II: United Kingdom forces raid the U-boat base at St. Nazaire, France.

1945 - World War II: Operation Starvation, the aerial mining of Japan's ports and waterways begins.

1990 - Propaganda: The United States begins broadcasting TV Martí to Cuba.
.
2002 - Passover Massacre: A suicide bomber kills 29 people in Netanya, Israel.

2004 - HMS Scylla, a decommissioned Leander frigate, is sunk as an artificial reef off Cornwall, the first of its kind in Europe

8)

:bravo: to me!
 
tomtom22 said:
1918: German forces cross the Somme River, achieving their first goal of the major spring offensive begun three days earlier on the Western Front. Operation “Michael,” engineered by the German chief of the general staff, Erich von Ludendorff, aimed to decisively break through the Allied lines on the Western Front and destroy the British and French forces. The offensive began on the morning of March 21, 1918, with an aggressive bombardment.
Click to expand...

Just a quick note, Erich Luddendorf, though was Prussian, was not of the aristocracy and therefore is not entitled to Von in his name. This is a fairly common mistakes as he was probably the only Senior German General of WWI not to be a Prussian Aristocrat
 
sorry for the delay. Busy life of an 18 yr old :mrgreen:


first of April

done quickly sorryyy :mrgreen:

:salute:
 
April 5th

1942: Hitler orders plans for the execution of Fall Blau (Operation Blue), the new summer offensive on the southern front in the East designed to reach the Volga, as well as to capture the Caucasus oilfields.
1944: German forces of Heeresgruppe Mitte (von Kluge) encircled in the Kowel pocket are relieved after bitter fighting.
1945: The Soviet 3rd Ukrainian Front reaches the outskirts of Vienna which has minimal German forces to defend it. In the West, the French First Army (de Tassigny) captures Karlsruhe on the upper Rine. The US 8th Air Force carries out another heavy attack (450 bombers) against Kiel which causes severe damage to the cruisers Hipper and Emden.
source: http://www.feldgrau.com/april.html

1951: 3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, involved in Operation Rugged, Korea - Operation Rugged involved United Nations' forces crossing the 38th Parallel and occupying strong defensive positions formed by a line of hills codenamed the Kansas Line and including Hills Salmon, Cod and Sardine, 45 kilometres north of Seoul.
source: http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/thismonth/index.asp

1242 - During a battle on the ice of Chudskoye Lake, Russian forces rebuff an invasion attempt by the Teutonic Knights.
1654 - The Treaty of Westminster, ending the First Anglo-Dutch War, is signed.
1862 - American Civil War: Battle of Yorktown. The battle begins when Union forces under General George McClellan close in on the Confederate capital Richmond, Virginia. (Editor's note: The first battle for Yorktown during the Revolutionary War was the one for which two World War II aircraft carriers were named for.)
1942 - Second World War: Japanese Navy attacks Colombo in Ceylon (Sri Lanka). Royal Navy Cruisers HMS Cornwall and HMS Dorsetshire are sunk southwest of the island.
1972 - Vietnam War: North Vietnamese forces invade Binh Long Province, launching a second front of the Nguyen Hue Offensive.
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_5

1982: A British Naval Task Force leaves for the Falkland Islands, which have been invaded by Argentina
source: http://www.tnl.net/when/4/5

1918: First stage of German spring offensive ends - General Erich von Ludendorff formally ends “Operation Michael,” the first stage of the final major German offensive of World War I. Operation Michael had produced the biggest gains of territory on the Western Front by either side since 1914. The Germans had advanced almost 40 miles, inflicted some 200,000 casualties and captured 70,000 prisoners and more than 1,000 Allied guns. The costs of battle were high, however: Germans suffered nearly as many casualties as their enemies and lacked the fresh reserves and supplies the Allies enjoyed following the American entrance into the war.
source: http://www.historychannel.com/tdih/

1917: German forces finish their withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line.
1940: RAF launch attacks against ships at Wilhelmshaven. Norway and Sweden are both informed of the allied intention to mine Norwegian waters.
1942: Fuhrer Directive 41 rolls off the mimeograph machines in Rastenberg and the Wehrmacht has its marching orders for 1942. Leningrad is to finally be captured, but that's a secondary objective. The big plan is in the South, which involves 2nd Army and 4th Panzer Army breaking through to Voronezh on the Don. 6th Army will break out South of Kharkov and combine with the 4th Panzer Army to surround the enemy. After that, the 4th Panzer Army and 6th Army will drive East under the command of Army Group B and surround Stalingrad from the North, while Army Group A's 17th Army and 1st Panzer Army will do so from the South. Once Stalingrad is taken, the 6th Army will hold the flank defense line while Army Group A drives South into the Caucasus to seize the oilfields and become the northern punch of a grand pincer movement (the southern half being Rommel) to seize Suez, the Nile Delta, the Middle-East and its oilfields.
1944: The RAF and USAAF conduct the first of 24 round-the-clock raids on the Ploiesti oil refineries in Romania. A Jewish inmate, Siegfried Lederer, escapes from Auschwitz-Birkenau and makes it safely to Czechoslovakia. He then warns the Elders of the Council at Theresienstadt about Auschwitz.
1945: A U.S. military government is established on Okinawa. The US 8th Air Force carries out another heavy attack (450 bombers) against Kiel. The 3rd Ukrainian Front reaches the railway North West of Vienna, cutting rail link with Linz. Eighteen U.S. divisions begin the clearance of Ruhr Pocket.
 
Busy day in WW II

April 7th

1940: Units of the Kriegsmarine carrying troops and equipment set sail from German ports to begin Operation Weserübung (Weser Exercise), the invasion of Denmark and Norway.
1941: Great Britain severs diplomatic relations with Hungary. German troops capture Skopje in Macedonia. In Libya, the Afrikakorps captures Derna.
1944: In the East, the Red Army breaks through the German lines at Kerch in the eastern Crimea.
1945: Preceded by a tremendous artillery and air bombardment, the 3rd Belorussian Front begins its final assault against Königsberg. In the West, the US Ninth Army captures Hameln and Eisenach on the road to Leipzig.
source: http://www.feldgrau.com/april.html

1939: Italy invades Albania
source: http://www.tnl.net/when/4/7

1916:Australians reach the Western Front - Australians were introduced to fighting on the Western Front in what was called the 'nursery sector' in the relatively quiet area around Armentieres, France.
1918:Lieutenant P.V. Storkey, VC - Lieutenant Storkey, 19th Battalion, originally from Hawkes Bay, New Zealand, wins the Victoria Cross at Bois de Hangard
1967:Major P.J. Badcoe, VC - Badcoe, Australian Army Training Team, Vietnam, originally from Adelaide, South Australia, was awarded the Victoria Cross posthumously for a series of actions in South Vietnam between February and April 1967.
source: http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/thismonth/index.asp

1862 - American Civil War: Battle of Shiloh ends - Union Army under General Ulysses S. Grant defeat the Confederates near Shiloh, Tennessee.
1945 - World War II: The Japanese battleship Yamato is sunk 200 miles north of Okinawa while in-route to a suicide mission.
1967 - Six-Day War: Israeli fighters shoot down seven Syrian MIG-21s.
2003 - US troops capture Baghdad; Saddam Hussein's regime falls two days later.
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_7

1776: U.S. Navy captures first British warship - Navy Captain John Barry, commander of the American warship Lexington, makes the first American naval capture of a British vessel when he takes command of the British warship HMS Edward off the coast of Virginia. The capture of the Edward and its cargo turned Captain Barry into a national hero and boosted the morale of the Continental forces.
1975: North Vietnamese forces begin preparations for final offensive - North Vietnamese forces prepare to launch the "Ho Chi Minh Campaign," designed to set the conditions for a final communist victory in South Vietnam. By this time, well over two-thirds of South Vietnam was under communist control as South Vietnamese forces had fallen back in panic when the North Vietnamese pressed the attack.
source:

1941: Derna is captured the 5th Light Division along with Generals Neame and O'Connor later in the day. Great Britain severs diplomatic relations with Hungary. German troops capture Skopje in Macedonia forcing the Yugoslav forces to withdraw in the south of the country, which exposes the Greek flank. British promise allegiance to Yugoslavia. Germans pushed towards Salonika.
1942: After 4 days of desperate fighting on Bataan, the Japanese have managed to penetrate 4 miles in to the US-Filipino lines, bringing General Wainwright's forces to the brink of collapse.
1943: The Japanese air force begins a 10-day, round-the-clock bombing offensive against US shipping in the Solomon's. Eighth Army joins up with the U.S. 2nd Corps in central Tunisia, while the British First Army makes progress in the North. Hitler spends the better part of four days at Klessheim Castle near Salzburg (which has recently been refurbished as a Nazi Party conference center and spa) alternately browbeating and cajoling Mussolini to keep Italy in the war. Concerned by Mussolini's evaporating morale, Hitler spends the rest of April summoning to Klessheim the leaders Vichy France, Norway, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and Croatia for a series of pep talks. With the war's tide clearly turning against the Axis, the Fuhrer has limited success.
1944: Two Jewish inmates escape from Auschwitz-Birkenau and make it safely to Czechoslovakia. One of them, Rudolf Vrba, submits a report to the Papal Nuncio in Slovakia which is forwarded to the Vatican. Goebbels takes overall control of Berlin.
1945: The first land-based U.S. fighters from Iwo Jima overfly Japan. The battle of East China Sea begins as U.S. aircraft from Task Force 58 sink the Japanese super-battleship Yamato in a three-hour battle, 60 miles to the Southeast of Japan. Japanese casualties are reported as 2,488 sailors killed, four destroyers sunk, 58 aircraft destroyed. Army Group Centre under General Schörner continues with its attacks against the 2nd and 4th Ukrainian front. In Yugoslavia, German Army Group E under General Löhr evacuates it remaining troops from Sarajevo. The U.S. First Army takes Göttingen, 25 miles Northeast of Kassel. The US Ninth Army captures Hameln and Eisenach.
source: http://www.worldwar-2.net/timelines/timelines-index.htm
 
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tomtom22 said:

1776: U.S. Navy captures first British warship - Navy Captain John Barry, commander of the American warship Lexington, makes the first American naval capture of a British vessel when he takes command of the British warship HMS Edward off the coast of Virginia. The capture of the Edward and its cargo turned Captain Barry into a national hero and boosted the morale of the Continental forces.
Click to expand...

well at least we got something from that era :bravo:
 
Lots of good stuff!

April 8th

1940: British naval vessels lay mines in Norwegian waters in preparation for landings by British and French forces at Namsos, Narvik and Andalsnes.
1943: Units of the British Eighth Army (Montgomery) capture Sfax in Tunisia.
1944: Troops of Heeresgruppe Ukraine (von Manstein) encircled at Kamenets-Podolsk break out to their own lines.
1945: Heavy fighting in the center of Vienna. The Red Air Force drops 1,500 tons of bombs on Königsberg. In the West, the British Second Army reaches Hildesheim, while the US Seventh Army (Patch) captures Pforzheim near the upper Rhine.
source: http://www.feldgrau.com/april.html

1917:Captain J.E. Newland, VC. (8 April & 15 April 1917) - Newland, 12th Battalion, originally from Geelong, Victoria, wins the Victoria Cross at Lagnicourt
1917: Sergeant J.W.Whittle, VC. (8 April & 15 April 1917) - Whittle, 2nd Battalion, originally from Huon Island, Tasmania, wins the Victoria Cross for actions at Boursies and Lagnicourt.
1918: Repatriation Department established - Once soldiers were demobilised all tasks aimed at their rehabilitation and return to civilian life became the responsibility of the Repatriation Department.
source: http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/thismonth/index.asp

1940: British submarines torpedo three German ships. Destroyer Glowworm is sunk after reporting German fleet movements and ramming cruiser Hipper. British naval vessels lay mines in Norwegian waters in preparation for landings by British and French forces at Namsos, Narvik and Andalsnes. The Polish submarine ‘Orzel’ sinks the German transport ship ‘Rio de Janeiro’ at 11:50. The Norwegians rescue several German soldiers who claim they are on their way to help the Norwegians against the British.
1941: The British 'Northern Force' captures Massawa, the last Italian stronghold in Eritrea. This removes any remaining threat to British convoys sailing through the Red Sea. After a temporary lull, the Luftwaffe launches a heavy attack against Coventry.
1942: The badly damaged cruiser HMS Penelope, limps in to Gibraltar.
1944: The Russians reach the Slovakian border. They also continue their advance into Romania. The final Russian offensive to destroy the German 17th Army in Crimea begins.
1945: The 2nd Ukrainian front continues its advance into northern Czechoslovakia and establishes a bridgehead across the rivers Morava and Donau (East and Northeast of Vienna). Heavy fighting in the centre of Vienna. The Red Air Force drops 1,500 tons of bombs on Königsberg. A British SAS Brigade paratroops into eastern Holland, to clear the way for Canadians troops who are moving North. The British Second Army reaches Hildesheim, while the US Seventh Army captures Pforzheim near the upper Rhine.
source: http://www.worldwar-2.net/timelines/timelines-index.htm

1832 - Black Hawk War: Around 300 United States 6th Infantry troops leave Jefferson Barracks, St. Louis to fight the Sauk Native Americans.
1864 - American Civil War: Battle of Mansfield - Union General Nathaniel Banks' Red River Campaign is thwarted by Confederate General Richard Taylor's forces at Mansfield, Louisiana.
1942 - World War II: Siege of Leningrad - Soviet Union forces open a much-needed railway link to Leningrad.
1945 - At the POW camp at Flossenbürg, pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer is hanged.
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_8

1972: North Vietnamese forces open a third front - North Vietnamese 2nd Division troops drive out of Laos and Cambodia to open a third front of their offensive in the Central Highlands, attacking at Kontum and Pleiku in attempt to cut South Vietnam in two. If successful, this would give North Vietnam control of the northern half of South Vietnam.
1981: General Omar Bradley, commander of the 12th Army Group who ensured Allied victory over Germany, dies on this day in 1981. Born on February 12, 1893, Bradley was a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point (Dwight Eisenhower was a classmate). During the opening days of World War II, he commanded the Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, and was later placed at the head of the II Corps for the North African campaign, proving instrumental in the fall of Tunisia and the surrender of over 250,000 Axis soldiers. He led forces in the invasion and capture of Sicily and joined his troops in the Normandy invasion, which culminated in the symbolic liberation of Paris by Bradley's troops. He was promoted to commander of the U.S. 12th Army Group, the largest force ever placed under an American group commander, and led successful operations in France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, and Czechoslovakia.
 
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Some ancient history

April 9th

1940: With no opposition from the Danish Army, German forces occupy the whole of Denmark, while other seaborne and parachute troops are landed at Oslo, Kristiansand, Stavanger, Trondheim, Bergen and Narvik in Norway. During these operations, the Kriegsmarine loses the cruisers Blücher (sunk by Norwegian coastal batteries), Königsberg and Karlsruhe to British naval action.
1941: In the Balkans, German forces occupy Nish in Yugoslavia and Salonika in Greece. In Libya, the Afrikakorps captures Bardia.
1945: In the East, the fortress city of Königsberg falls to the Red Army. In Italy, the US fifth Army (Clark) begins an offensive toward Bologna and the Po river valley.
source: http://www.feldgrau.com/april.html

1917: Private T.J.B. Kenny VC _ Kenny, 2nd Battalion, originally from Paddington, New South Wales, wins the Victoria Cross at Hermies, France.
1942:HMAS Vampire sunk - The destroyer, HMAS Vampire and the aircraft carrier HMS Hermes were sunk by Japanese bombers off Colombo in the Bay of Bengal.
1968: HMAS Sydney arrived at Vung Tau: 1 RAR disembarked, 7RAR embarked. - The 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment disembarked, the 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment embarked. HMAS Sydney made 21 voyages to Vietnam during the war.
source: http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/thismonth/index.asp

193 - Septimius Severus is proclaimed Roman Emperor by the army in Illyricum (in the Balkans).
1241 - Battle of Liegnitz: Mongol forces defeats the Polish and German armies.
1865 - American Civil War: Robert E. Lee surrenders the Army of Northern Virginia (26,765 troops) to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia, effectively ending the war.
1916 - World War I: Battle of Verdun - German forces launch their third offensive of the battle.
1917 - World War I: Battle of Arras - The battle begins with Canadian forces executing a massive assault on the Vimy Ridge.
1942 - World War II: Battle of Bataan/Bataan Death March - United States forces surrender on the Bataan Peninsula. 78,000 troops are captured, including 12,000 Americans, but 2,000 escape to Corregidor. This is the largest capitulation in US History. Japanese Navy launches air raid on Trincomalee in Ceylon (Sri Lanka)
1945 - World War II: The German pocket battleship Admiral Scheer is sunk.
2003 - 2003 invasion of Iraq: Baghdad, Iraq falls to American forces.
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_9

1918: Battle of the Lys begins - German troops launch “Operation Georgette,” the second phase of their final, last-ditch spring offensive, against Allied positions in Armentieres, France, on the River Lys.
source: http://www.historychannel.com/tdih/tdih.jsp?

1941: German forces capture Nis and Monastir in Yugoslavia. German tanks enter Thessalonika, trapping the Greek 2nd Army in the Metaxas line, forcing them to surrender. The RAF attack Kiel in an attempt to knock out the port facilities.
1942: The Germans make some limited advances towards their surrounded units at Kholm-Staraya, Russa. Russian troops attack furiously at Kerch in the Crimea, but there have no success because of the stubborn German defense.
1943: Exterminations at Chelmno cease. The camp will be reactivated in the spring of 1944 to liquidate ghettos. In all, Chelmno will total 300,000 deaths.
1944: Fierce fighting across the District Commissioner’s tennis court at Kohima. The Japanese renew their struggle with the 17th Indian Division, South West of Imphal. The remains of the 1st Panzer Army regain the German lines after a 150-mile forced march. The Red Army breaks through the German lines at Kerch in the eastern Crimea.
1945: The British Eighth Army launches its final offensive in Italy with a 1,800-plane and 1,500-gun bombardment of the German positions East of Bologna. The U.S. Fifth Army begins its offensive toward Bologna and the Po river valley. Army Group E is now completely isolated from the main German forces, but continues its struggle against Titos partisan forces in Yugoslavia.
source: http://www.worldwar-2.net/timelines/timelines-index.htm
 
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