Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

To: Homer_J_Simpson

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.etherington/month/thismonth/07.htm

May 7th, 1941

UNITED KINGDOM: Liverpool and Hull are bombed. For the seventh successive night Liverpool and Merseyside are ablaze. The raids began on 1 May under cloudless moonlit skies and since then the fires, especially in the docks, have never gone out. In the city the Custom House, Corn Exchange, Museum and Central Station were destroyed. Lewis’s department store was gutted and a wing of Walton jail was demolished killing 22 prisoners. A Mersey Ferry, the Royal Daffodil, was sunk and a school shelter was hit, killing 160. Sixty patients and staff of a hospital died in a direct hit. One of the worst fires occurred at the Bryant and May match factory.
Troops have been brought in to help clear the streets of wreckage. Cars have been banned from entering the centre, and so many telephone cables and exchanges are out of action that people have been unable to get through.

There have been 1,450 killed in this “May Week”.

Westminster: In a speech to the House of Commons Churchill says: “Some have compared Hitler’s conquests with those of Napoleon. It may be that Spain and Russia will shortly furnish new chapters to that theme. It must be remembered, however, that Napoleon’s armies carried with them the fierce, liberating and equalitarian winds of the French Revolution, whereas Hitler’s empire has nothing behind it but racial self-assertion, espionage, pillage, corruption and the Prussian boot.” (Peter Kilduff)

Corvette HMS Mignonette commissioned. (Dave Shirlaw)

GERMANY: U-260, U-662 laid down.

U-352 launched. (Dave Shirlaw)

MEDITERRANEAN SEA: Units of the Mediterranean fleet shell Benghazi during the night.

Operation Tiger, an attempt to get a British convoy to North Africa, begins.

Minesweeper HMS Stoke is bombed and sinks in Tobruk harbour during an air attack. (Alex Gordon)(108)

CHINA: Japanese troops assault Shansi in an attempt to occupy the Chungtiao mountains.

CANADA: Corvette HMCS Summerside launched. (Dave Shirlaw)

U.S.A.: Destroyer USS Woolsey commissioned. (Dave Shirlaw)

ATLANTIC OCEAN: A cruiser force tries to capture the weather trawler München off Iceland. It yields an Enigma cipher machine and codebook when captured by the British destroyer HMS Somali.

On U-93, three crewmembers were wounded in an accident with the machine gun.

Between 2310 and 2312, U-94 fired four torpedoes at Convoy OB-318 about 200 miles SW of Reykjavik and reported four ships sunk, but U-94 interpreted depth charges dropped by destroyer HMS Bulldog and sloop HMS Rochester immediately after the torpedoes had detonated on Ixion and Eastern Star as hits on other ships. The both escorts dropped together 67 depth charges on the U-boat, damaging it slightly. The master and 18 crewmembers from the Ixion were picked up by corvette HMS Marigold and landed at Greenock. 68 crewmembers and nine gunners were picked up by the British merchantman Nailsea Moor and landed at Sydney. The Eastern Star was hit by one torpedo and sank some hours later in 61°25N/24°18W. All crewmembers abandoned ship in the lifeboats and were picked up by armed trawler HMS Daneman shortly thereafter. (Dave Shirlaw)


6 posted on 05/07/2011 6:49:25 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies ]


To: Homer_J_Simpson

http://worldwar2daybyday.blogspot.com/

Day 615 May 7, 1941

Royal Navy knows that German weather ships in the North Atlantic receive encrypted signals using the German naval Enigma codes. Off Iceland, British destroyer HMS Somali captures German weather ship Munchen and her Enigma code book.

In the Arabian Sea 400 miles off Somaliland, German armed merchant cruiser Pinguin shells small British tanker British Emperor, which send a stream of radio signals reporting the attack as the crew is taken off. British Emperor is finally sunk with torpedoes but Royal Navy cruiser HMS Cornwall homes in on the signals to hunt for the raider.

150 miles South of Iceland at 11 PM, U-94 sinks British SS Ixion and Norwegian SS Eastern Star (all hands rescued). Convoy escorts destroyer HMS Bulldog and sloop HMS Rochester drop 98 depth charges over 4 hours but U-94 suffers only minor damage. Italian submarine Tazzoli sinks Norwegian SS Ferlane off West Africa (all hands rescued). German bombers sink British minesweeper HMS Stoke at Tobruk (21 killed, survivors rescued by gunboat HMS Ladybird).

Iraq. 20th and 21st Indian Brigades move out of Basra and capture the nearby port of Ashar.

Overnight, British cruiser HMS Ajax and destroyers HMS Havock, Hotspur & Imperial (en route to meet the Tiger convoy) take a detour to bombard Benghazi, Libya, sinking Italian steamers Tenace & Capitano Cecchi.

Overnight, Luftwaffe bombs Liverpool for the last of 7 nights (75% of the port capacity has been destroyed). Destroyer HMS Hurricane is hit by bomb at Gladstone Dock, causing structural damage (under repair until December). Hull is also bombed.


7 posted on 05/07/2011 6:51:45 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson