Replies

http://www.etherit.co.uk/month/thismonth/24.htm

July 24th, 1944 (MONDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: Captain Glenn Miller, the big band leader, is promoted to Major in recognition of his and his band’s hard work. In one month they played at 35 different bases and during their ‘spare time’ did 40 broadcasts.

Frigate HMCS Ribble (ex HMS Ribble) commissioned in Scotland.

FRANCE: The US Cobra attack west of St Lo is postponed due to bad weather.

Whilst acting as HQ ship for troops ashore destroyer HMS Goathland is mined NNE of Courcelles. She is towed back to Portsmouth but not repaired. (Alex Gordon)(108)

Mission 492: Heavy bombers are scheduled to participate in a US First Army offensive (Operation COBRA) to penetrate the German defenses west of Saint-Lo and secure Coutances; 1,586 bombers and 671 fighters are dispatched but bad weather causes the ground forces to delay the attack until next day, and cloud conditions cause 1,102 bombers to abort. Escort for the bombers is provided by 478 P-38 Lightnings, P-47 Thunderbolts and P-51 Mustangs; they claim 1-0-1 Luftwaffe aircraft in the air and 1-0-1 on the ground; 3 P-38s are lost. Targets hit are:

1. Of 909 B-17s dispatched, 343 hit the Periers/St Lo area and 35 hit the Granville railroad junction; a B-17 is lost.

2. 109 of 677 B-24s dispatched bomb targets of opportunity including road intersections and rail lines; 2 B-24s are lost.

143 P-51s fly a sweep over Lechfeld and Leipheim Airfields in Germany; they claim 3-0-0 aircraft in the air and 12-0-16 on the ground; 2 P-51s are lost.

Mission 493: 7 B-17s drop leaflets in France during the night. Six B-24s fly CARPETBAGGER missions during the night.

11 groups of Ninth Air Force bombers scheduled to participate in Operation COBRA have missions cancelled due to weather; 5 groups of B-26s hit rail bridges and 5 groups of B-26s and A-20 Havocs strike 3 fuel and ammunition dumps; fighters fly escort to the bombers, fly area cover, bomb installations in the Laval-Nantes-Le Mans-Chartres areas, and hit bridges and supply dumps in support of the US First Army.

The postponement order did not reach all crews in time. Friendly casualties occurred in three instances. When another plane in the formation was destroyed by flak, a bombardier accidentally toggled his bomb load on an Allied airstrip, damaging planes and equipment. A lead bombardier experienced “difficulty with the bomb release mechanism” and part of his load dropped, causing eleven other bombardiers to drop, thinking they were over the target. Finally, a formation of five medium bombers from the Ninth Air Force dropped seven miles north of the target, amid the 30th Infantry Division. This latter strike inflicted the heaviest casualties 25 killed and 131 wounded-on the first day that Cobra was attempted.

ITALY: The Fifteenth Air Force dispatches 200+ bombers to attack targets in France and Italy; B-17s attack tank repair and ball bearing works in Turin, Italy; B-24s attack the harbor at Genoa, Italy, and airfields at Valence/La Tresorerie and Les Chanoines, France; fighters hit troop concentrations at Sjenica, Prijepolje, Pljevlja, and Andrijevica; fighters provide escort and strafe the Prizren, Yugoslavia area.

GERMANY: U-1164 (Type VIIC/41) Is stricken at Kiel after being damaged by British bombs. She is broken up. (Alex Gordon)

POLAND: Lublin falls to Rokossovsky. The First Ukraine Front captures the site of Majdanek Concentration Camp.
Lublin: Russian troops have discovered scenes of the utmost barbarity in the concentration camp of Majdanek on the outskirts of this Polish city. Hundreds of corpses hardly recognizable as human beings lie behind the barbed wire of the camp. The Russians also found seven sinister buildings in which people were gassed to death before being burnt in an incinerator. It seems that so great was the killing, the incinerator could not cope with all the bodies. Stories about the horrors of Hitler’s death camps have been circulating in the west for some time, but this is the first time that one of the camps has been captured. The stories did not exaggerate.

EUROPE: German armed forces adopt the Nazi salute, as a gesture of solidarity.

FINLAND: Marshal Mannerheim informs the political leadership that the German help is not enough. He wants that measures are taken to free Finland from the obligations of the Ribbentrop-pact. In practice this would mean that the President of the Republic Risto Ryti should resign. There has already been a tacit agreement between the military and political leadeship that if and when the Ribbentrop-pact becomes a liability (i.e. when the time comes to make peace with Soviet Union) Ryti should resign (as he was *personally* bound by the pact) and he will be replaced by Mannerheim.
MARIANAS ISLANDS: General Schmidt’s V Amphibious Corps, 15,600 Marines, lands on Tinian. TF 52, under Admiral Hill, is in direct support. Admiral’s Ainsworth and Oldendorf provide fire support for these landings. The 2nd and 4th Marine Divisions are landed. Opposing them, Admiral Kakuta and Colonel Ogata with 6,200 soldiers. This landing marks the first use of Napalm in the Pacific.
This invasion is supported by Seventh Air Force P-47s based on Saipan and 52 carrier-based FM Wildcats and TBM Avengers.

During the bombardment, the USS Colorado is hit by 22 Japanese shells from their coastal batteries. She takes extensive superficial damage without any loss of combat power. (Tony DiGuilian)

ALEUTIAN ISLANDS: Two B-25 Mitchells fly a negative shipping search.

CANADA: Frigate HMCS Kokanee arrived Halifax from builder Esquimalt, British Columbia.

U.S.A.: The U.S. Navy’s Court of Inquiry into the 7 December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor opens. The court is headed by Admiral Orin G. Murfin and Vice Admirals Edward C Kalbfus and Adolphus Andrews, all of whom are retired.