September 16th, 1940
UNITED KINGDOM:
Battle of Britain:
RAF Fighter Command: Slight enemy activity, mainly in south-east and East Anglia. At night London, the Midlands and Merseyside are bombed.
During the early morning London is bombed, wrecking the Strand Shell Mex building and damaging the Gaiety Theatre, St. Thomas’s, Guys and Lambeth hospitals.
During the following night bombers caused seven huge fires in the East End and also hit parts of Birmingham and Wakefield Prison.
Losses: Luftwaffe, 9; RAF, 1.
In the morning six shells land on Dover.
Corvette HMS Campion laid down. (Dave Shirlaw)
GERMANY: U-135 laid down. (Dave Shirlaw)
ATLANTIC OCEAN: U-99 sank SS Lotos in Convoy SC-3. (Dave Shirlaw)
U.S.A.: The Congress passes the Burke-Wadsworth Bill (the Selective Training and Service Act) by wide margins in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. This bill provides for the first peacetime draft (conscription) in the history of the United States but also provides that not more than 900,000 men are to be in training at any one time and it limits military service to 12 months. It also provides for the establishment of the Selective Service System as an independent Federal agency. President Franklin D. Roosevelt immediately signs the bill into law. The first draftees will be selected next month. (Jack McKillop)
The first call up of National Guard units occurs. Called into Federal service are 4 divisions, 12 brigades, 50 regiments and 4 observation squadrons from 26 states. The divisions are New Jersey’s 44th, Oklahoma’s 45th, Oregon’s 41st, and South Carolina’s 30th. Eighteen of the 50 regiments are coast artillery regiments. Here for more detailed unit information. (Jack McKillop)
The keel of the Iowa-class battleship New Jersey (BB-62) is laid at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, Pennsylvania. The “Big J,” as she will be nicknamed, becomes the most decorated battleship in the history of the USN. (Jack McKillop)
Representative Samuel T Rayburn of Texas is elected Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, a post he will hold for 17-years. (Jack McKillop)
In baseball, a rhubarb erupts at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York, during a game between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers. The fight results in a suspension and fine for Dodgers’ manager Leo Durocher for “inciting a riot.” Perhaps better known from the game is the photo showing an obese Brooklyn fan astride George Magerkurth, pummeling the veteran umpire. (Jack McKillop)
EGYPT: Sidi Barrani: Italian troops have managed to fight their way to this Egyptian coastal outpost as Lieutenant-General Maitland Wilson, GOC Egypt, and his heavily outnumbered force of British and Indian troops are withdrawing to a prepared defence line at Mersa Matruh.
Although the next battle could be decisive - with an Italian victory leaving Egypt open to Marshal Graziani’s army - the Italians are fortifying Sidi Barrani, with the marshal ignoring furious orders from the Duce to attack, preferring to put up monuments to his “victorious advance”. While Mussolini fumes, Churchill in beleaguered Britain has taken the “awful and right” decision to despatch 150 tanks and other desperately-needed weapons to General Wavell, Britain’s C-in-C Middle East.
Although small in number - with fewer than 30,000 men facing 250,000 Italians - the hard core of Wavell’s army is professional, tough and confident. The question now is whether the British line can hold until the tanks are unloaded in Alexandria.
LIBYA: The Italian destroyers Aquilone and Borea are sunk off Bengasi by British bombers. (Jack McKillop)
http://worldwar2daybyday.blogspot.com/
Day 382 September 16, 1940
Battle of Britain Day 69. Rain and clouds hinder flying. Luftwaffe pilots are demoralized after yesterday’s mauling at the hands of RAF fighter pilots. They had been attacked by over 300 fighters, despite having been told RAF had only 50 remaining. Daytime bombing of London is abandoned, although Luftwaffe will resume attacking RAF facilities during the day and continue bombing London at night. At 7.30 AM, 100+ German fighters make a half-hearted raid on Kent to draw up British fighters, but RAF does not respond and the Bf109s turn back. 1 Ju88 which is shot down by a Spitfire which then runs out of fuel and crashes in the North Sea (pilot Sgt T.C. Iveson bales out and is brought ashore by a Royal Navy motor torpedo boat). Overnight, RAF bombers hit invasion barges in Channel ports along the French, Belgian and Dutch coasts. Luftwaffe mounts intensive night bombing of London’s East End, Liverpool, Manchester, Coventry, Birmingham and Bristol. http://www.battleofbritain1940.net/0043.html
North Africa. In Egypt, Italian troops of the 1st Blackshirt Division (23 Marzo) reach the village of Sidi Barrani about 60 miles from the Libyan border. Here they halt and dig in, 70 miles short of the main British defenses at Mersa Matruh. Marshal Graziani is unsure of the size of the British forces facing him, unconvinced about the quality of his own troops and worried about 150 mile supply line across the desert from Tobruk, Libya. Despite being urged onwards by Mussolini, Graziani feels he has met the strategic goal of the invasion (from Mussolini’s own orders “Once again I repeat that there are no territorial objectives. It is not a question of aiming for Alexandria nor even Sallum. I am only asking that you attack the British forces facing you.”)
At 2.41 AM, U-99 sinks Norwegian steamer Lotos (1500 tons of timber) off the North coast of Ireland. All 17 crew escape in 2 lifeboats, reaching Ireland or the Outer Hebrides, Scotland, in 3 to 5 days. In the Irish Sea between Ireland and Scotland, German bombers badly damage British troopship SS Aska, carrying 186 crew and 358 French troops from Bathurst, West Africa, to Liverpool (either to return to France or join the Free French forces in Britain). 11 crew and 19 troops are lost but the survivors are taken off by minesweeper HMS Jason.
Vichy French steamer Poitiers is en route to Dakar from Libreville, French Equatorial Africa (now Gabon), when she is intercepted by British cruiser HMS Cumberland which has been searching for the French cruisers now at Dakar. After scuttling SS Poitiers, the crew are rescued by HMS Cumberland which then sinks Poitiers by gunfire.