http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.etherington/month/thismonth/04.htm
October 4th, 1940
UNITED KINGDOM:
Battle of Britain:
Park issues new observations and instructions to sector controllers and to squadron commanders, whose pilots are becoming fretful at the frequency with which they are still at an unfavourable height when they meet the enemy. Park assured them:
“I wish the squadron commanders and sector controllers to know everything humanly possible is being done by group to increase the warning received of incoming raids. ... With the prevailing cloudy skies and inaccurate heights given by the RDF the group controllers’ most difficult problem is to know the height of the incoming raids.”
Park then detailed what steps were being taken to correct this situation, including the formation of a special reconnaissance flight at Gravesend.
“Whatever time permits I wish you to get the readiness squadrons in company over sector aerodromes. Spitfires 25,000 feet, Hurricanes 20,000 feet, and wait until they report they are in good position before sending them to patrol lines or to intercept raids having a good track in fairly clear weather.
Losses: Luftwaffe, 12; RAF, 3.
Sir Charles F.A. Portal, KCB, DSO, MC is chosen to be Chief of the Air Staff, with effect from 24 October, to replace Sir Cyril Newall, who has been appointed Governor of New Zealand. Air Marshal Sir Richard Peirse is named Portal’s successor as C-in-C Bomber Command.
London: Churchill asks Roosevelt to send US ships to help defend Singapore, a British colony.
ITALY:
Brenner Pass: “The War is won,” Hitler told Mussolini today when the two met for three-hours in an armoured train - a gift from the Fuhrer to the Duce. The British people were under an “inhuman strain” and, Hitler claimed, it was only a matter of time before they cracked.
In Berlin, foreign office spokesmen told neutral journalists that the principal subject discussed by the two leaders and their foreign ministers was an appeal to the British to call off the war. However, the Italians were quick to note that Hitler no longer talks about invading Britain.
Count Ciano, notes in his diary, that this obvious setback for their Axis partner put Mussolini in an exceptionally good mood. “Rarely have I seen the Duce in such good humour.”
In Rome, Il Popolo di Roma (newspaper) commenting on the talks, speaks of a long war in prospect, with Germany unable to invade Britain this year.
CANADA: Corvettes HMCS Summerside and Louisburg laid down Quebec City, Province of Quebec.
Patrol vessel HMCS Otter commissioned. (Dave Shirlaw)
U.S.A.: Baseball!
The motion picture “Knute Rockne-All American” premieres in South Bend, Indiana. Directed by Lloyd Bacon, this American football biography stars Pat O’Brien as Knute Rockne, Ronald Reagan as George Gipp and Donald Crisp. The premiere is attended by O’Brien and Reagan. (Jack McKillop)
http://worldwar2daybyday.blogspot.com/
Day 400 October 4, 1940
Battle of Britain Day 87. Rain and mist again cause poor visibility over Southern England and Luftwaffe sends a steady stream of reconnaissance flights and single bomber raids with peak intensity around 3 PM. Bombs are dropped in Kent and near London hitting mainly homes, farms and few factories. 2 Ju88 bombers are shot down for the loss of 3 RAF fighters (1 pilot killed). There is widespread bombing on a small scale overnight but London is heavily bombed between 7 and 9 PM.
Operation Lucid. Fire ships (tankers War Nizam & War African filled with 50% heavy fuel oil, 25% diesel oil and 25% petrol) depart Sheerness and Harwich escorted by 11 destroyers, 6 minesweepers and torpedo boats. However, rough seas force the operation to be cancelled.
General Charles de Gaulle arrives in Douala, French Cameroon (which is sympathetic to the Free French) on board British cruiser HMS Devonshire, to organize the invasion of neighbouring Gabon (loyal to Vichy France). After the failed invasion of French West Africa at Dakar, de Gaulle is keen rally support for the Free French cause in Equatorial Africa, to mount operations from Chad into Italian-held Libya and to deny Germany use of the Atlantic coast for basing submarines and surface raiders to disrupt Allied shipping around Africa.
British submarine HMS Rainbow collides with Italian steamer Antonietta Costa and sinks in the Adriatic Sea, 20 miles North of Brindisi, Southern Italy (all 55 hands lost). Submarine HMS Triton shells shore installations at Vado Ligure and Savona, near Genoa, Northern Italy. Triton also sinks Italian steamer Franca Fassio 20 miles to Southwest of Savona, in the Ligurian Sea. Submarine HMS Tetrarch attacks another Italian merchant ship nearby, without success.