Posted on 03/27/2010 6:30:06 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
* I’m picturing Robert Montgomery and John Wayne tooling along off Cavite Naval Base in December ’41.
If I recall correctly, the Soviets did aid the Kriegsmarine on at least one occasion, providing the help of an icebreaker for at least one of the commerce raiders.
Higgins Industries Motor Torpedo Boat Diagram Collection in the Louisiana Digital Library
http://louisdl.louislibraries.org/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/HIC
http://www.onwar.com/chrono/1940/mar40/f27mar40.htm
Franco-German artillery duels
Wednesday, March 27, 1940 www.onwar.com
On the Western Front... In the Saar and Vosges regions, there are artillery duels between German and French forces
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.etherington/month/thismonth/27.htm
March 27th, 1940
UNITED KINGDOM: RAF Coastal Command: German patrol vessel bombed and sunk in North Sea.
FRANCE: The government asks the USSR to recall its ambassador in Paris.
GERMANY: Heinrich Himmler orders the building of Auschwitz Concentration Camp in Poland. (Michael Ballard)
Higgins came from your neck of the woods, didn’t he?
Higgins was in New Orleans. I live in the north central part of the state. The culture between North and South Louisiana is as great as any state in the nation.
It is even more pronounced that Northern and Southern California.
I think the situation here has developed into a divide between coastal California and inland California.
New Orleans. Louisiana. Baton Rouge. North Louisiana Piney Woods. Roots. I got them in spades.
My mom’s family goes back to the late 1700’s in the area just south of Baton Rouge. The bastards AIN’T running me off. I can deal the politicians just as much misery as they deal me.
Back to the music, listen to this NPR story about one of Louisiana’s own, Antoine “Fats” Domino. It will make the hair stand up on your neck.
http://worldwar2daybyday.blogspot.com/
Day 209 March 27, 1940
To prepare for Supreme War Council meeting on March 28, the British War Cabinet debates Paul Reynaud’s note suggesting attacks on Soviet oilfields at Baku and shipping in the Black Sea. They unanimously reject the idea of any attacks on USSR, to avoid conflict with the Soviets in addition to Germany. The British position is communicated to General Gamelin and the other French Chiefs of Staff at a preliminary meeting. Reports of these deliberations by the French news agency Havas, apparently from official French sources, further infuriate the British and alert Germany to possible Allied intentions.
U-22 goes missing in the North Sea probably lost to a mine (all 27 hands lost).
"Higgins produced 199 78-foot boats. The Higgins boats, built by Higgins Industries in New Orleans, Louisiana, were 78-foot (24 m) boats of the PT-71 or PT-235 or PT-625 classes. The Higgins boats had the same beam, full load displacement, engine, generators, shaft power, trial speed, armament, and crew accommodation as the 80-foot (24 m) Elco boats."Many Higgins boats were sent to the Soviet Union and Great Britain at the beginning of the war, so many of the lower-numbered squadrons in the U.S. Navy were made up exclusively of Elcos.
"The first Higgins boats for the U.S. Navy were used in the Battle for the Aleutian Islands (Attu and Kiska) as part of Squadron 13 and 16, and others (RON15 and RON22) in the Mediterranean against the Germans. They were also used during the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944.
"A somewhat odd footnote is that even though only half as many Higgins boats were produced, far more survive (seven hulls, 3 of which have been restored to their World War II configuration), than of the more numerous Elco boats, thus seemingly demonstrating the superior construction of the Higgins boat.
Of the remaining Elco boats only three hulls (one restored) are known to exist at this time."
"Motor Torpedo Boat PT-658 is a Higgins design PT boat, similar in function but slightly different in design and layout from the more common Elco boats." 
"The 78 foot Higgins PT Boat, the USS PT-658 has been completely restored to its original 1945 configuration during the years 1995 to 2005. PT-658 is now fully functional and afloat.
"It is the only 100% authentically restored US Navy PT Boat that is operational today in the world. The USS PT-658 is located in Portland, Oregon at the Swan Island Naval Reserve Center Pier."
HMS Ark Royal (91) -- 22,000 tons, 800 ft long by 95 ft beam.
It carried about 50 Fairey Swordfish and Blackburn Skuas.
Swordfish over Ark Royal:
Under attack in the Mediterranean, 1940:
Skuas ready to take off:
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