The FReeper Foxhole Remembers Operation Carthage (3/21/1945) - Jan. 2nd, 2004

www.milhist.dk ^ | Klaus Velschow

[SAMWolf]

Lord,

Keep our Troops forever in Your care

Give them victory over the enemy...

Grant them a safe and swift return...

Bless those who mourn the lost.
.

FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer
for all those serving their country at this time.

...................................................................................... ...........................................

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Operation Carthage:
The Bombing of the Shellhus
March 21, 1945

The Shellhus, or in English the Shell-building, was (and still is) situated near the centre of Copenhagen, 500 metres west of the Town hall. It is on the north side of Kampmandsgade between Nyrupsgade and Vester Farimagsgade (see map at right).Since the spring of 1944 the German secret police (Gestapo) had used it as headquarters. In the fall of 1944 several cells were established on the top floor to minimize transportation of prisoners from Vestre faengsel (a large prison in Copenhagen) to interrogation and torture in the Shellhus.

Shellhuset, circa 1940

By the end of 1944 the resistance-movement in Copenhagen was in danger of being rolled up by the Gestapo. Many of the leaders had been arrested and a lot of material was filed in the archives of the Shellhus. Leading members of the resistance-movement requested an attack by air on the Shellhus via SOE in London. By December 1944 the plan was ready, but the German counter attack in the Ardennes stopped the attack. By the end of january 1945 the RAF was ready, but the attack was postponed probably due to the weather. In the middle of March the situation for the resistance-movement became intolerable. A desperate telegram was sent to London beggin for an attack: If the resistance-movement was at all important the RAF had to attack at all costs.



On march 21st at 0855, 20 Mosquitos of the no. 2 light bomber group, escorted by 30 Mustangs from the 11th fighter group took off from RAF Fersfield in Norfolk. 18 of the bombers were Mosquito F.B. Mk. VI and 2 were Mosquito B. Mk. IV from the film production unit (FPU).

The bombers carried 44x500 pound bombs. The Mustangs were Mk III's. The formation arrived at Tissoe, a lake in western Zeeland, and split up in three waves: no. 1: 7 Mosquitos (one FPU) and 12 Mustangs, no. 2: 6 Mosquitos and no. 3: 7 Mosquitos (one FPU). Apparently the three waves took different routes to Copenhagen, although they all approached Copenhagen from the south-west.

The plan was to find the city of Koge some 30 km (20 miles) south of Copenhagen, then turn and follow the coast to Avedoere where they would turn north towards the Carlsberg brewery, passing it on the East-side. The last checkpoint was "Det Ny Teater", a theatre on the southeastern corner of the most southern of the four lakes. From the theater the planes would attack the Shellhus from the south.


Model used to plan the mission

It was only the first wave that followed the planned approach. The two following waves took a more direct course to Copenhagen. The third wave came in from west instead of south.

When the first wave passed the goods yard one of the Mosquitos hit a 30 metre lamp post and crashed near the French school (see the map). The rest of the wave found and bombed the target. The second wave got confused by the smoke and flames from the crashed Mosquito. Some realized the mistake before they bombed and turned toward the Shellhus, but only one of the planes were able to bomb the target. One or two of the planes in the 2nd wave dropped their bombs on the French school. The third wave approached Copenhagen from the west, passing the ZOO on their way in. All but one of the planes in the third wave dropped their bombs on the French school killing 123 civilians of whom 87 were children.


The circles represents exploded bombs

The Shellhus was hit by 8x500 pound bombs, 6 in the western wing towards Nyropsgade, and 2 in the eastern wing towards Vester Farimagsgade. The west wing collapsed and a fire started. It was a windy day: 12 metres per second from west. The fire spread to the rest of the building and it burned down.

At the time of the attack 26 members of the resistance were in the Shellhus: 23 in their cells on the top floor and 3 under interogation on the 5th floor.


The Burning Shell house building in Copenhagen

The attack has always been seen as a success because of the many surviving prisoners. Some accounts of the attack state that the bombers targeted the lower parts of the building, trying to avoid damage to the cells on the top floor.

The reason for the targeting of the lower parts could be the obvious, that the planes aimed at the centre of the building to be sure to hit some of it. As the author of one of the books about the attack points out: "No pilots, not even the best of RAF, were able to destroy a concrete building without destroying the upper floors."



The reason why so many (18 of 26) prisoners survived is probably that relatively few bombs hit the building. As mentioned above, 6 bombs exploded in the western wing. There were 9 prisoners in this part of the building, 6 were killed instantly and one more died when jumping from the 5th floor to the ground. All 14 prisoners in the southern wing survived (no bombs hit this part of the building). The 3 remaining prisoners were under interrogation on the 5th floor, one died. There were no prisoners in the eastern wing. The German casualties were around 50 Germans and 50 Danes who worked for the Gestapo.

Of the 20 Mosquito's taking part in the attack 16 returned. One crashed in the goods yard before bombing and three more were shot down off the coast of northern Zeeland after the attack. 3 Mustangs had to turn around shortly after takeoff.


Mustang fighter flying low over Copenhagen during the attack

One Mustang crashed in a park north of the Shellhus. The primary objective for the fighters was to attack AA positions in central Copenhagen. 9 RAF pilots and crew were killed in the attack. 3 are buried at Bispebjerg kirkegaard the remaining 6 crashed over the sea and they were never found.

The Museum of Resistance (Frihedsmuseet) has on display one of the models of Copenhagen built and used by the RAF when they planned the attack.

The Shellhus today

The Shellhus of today is the head office of the Shell Oil Company in Denmark. Mounted on the wall of the building is a bronze-cast of a propeller from one of the crashed Mosquito bombers. Below the propeller is a plaque with the names of the RAF crews members who were killed in the attack.

Thanks to Freeper Iris7 for suggesting this thread

[SAMWolf]

Attack on Shell Building,
Copenhagen, 21 March 1945

On the morning of 21 March 1945, a special force of Mosquitos from No 140 Wing took off from an aerodrome in England to attack the Gestapo Headquarters in Copenhagen.

De Havilland Mosquito Fb Mk IV

Before the attack could be carried out, several weeks of careful planning were necessary. Two large scale models, one representing the city, and the other the Gestapo building, were used to brief the pilots in every detail - trees, lake and houses - were pointed out on these models which took 340 man hours to construct.

The target was a large building, U-shaped, and six storeys in height. From information received it was known that the entire Gestapo staff for the whole of Denmark as well as a large number of criminal police were housed in this headquarters.

The Mosquitos took off in three waves of six, together with two Mosquitos of the RAF Film Unit at exactly nine o'clock in the morning - the time that the Gestapo workers would be arriving at the Headquarters. After flying across the North Sea for over two hours, they made landfall exactly as planned on the coast of Jutland and soon the city of Copenhagen came into view.

Bumpy Trip



It had been an exceedingly bumpy trip. The first wave attacked the Headquarters from roof top level - so low, in fact, that the aircraft flown by Wg Cdr Kleboe struck one of the buildings and although he made a gallant effort to carry on with a damaged wing, he was seen to crash later in one of the city's boulevards.

Successful Mission

This was the most unfortunate incident of the raid because the other aircraft, seeing the flames of this burning machine, attacked that spot thinking it was the headquarters.



A reconnaissance aircraft of No 34 Wing took off the following day and photographed the area. Interception reports of these photographs showed that the target had received severe damage. The top storey and roof of the south front were destroyed and the remainder was partially gutted and destroyed. The west wing was destroyed nearly to ground level and the east wing, the top storey and roof were destroyed and the floor below damaged. Rescue work was in progress when the photographs were taken. A photograph received later from Underground sources shows the building ablaze from end to end - concrete evidence the mission was most successful.



Mustangs of Fighter Command played a dual role. They escorted the fighter-bombers on both outward and return journeys and during the actual attack they were detailed to silence flak positions in the vicinity. But the attack was such a complete surprise that anti-aircraft defences did not go into action until the Mosquitos were on their way home. The only real opposition was from ships in the harbour.

Accurate Navigation

The leading navigator did his job so thoroughly that all the aircraft landed back at base only two minutes after the original schedule.



The Huns put out a rumour that the officials were out at a funeral at the time of the attack but official information from Denmark states that 151 Gestapo men were killed and 30 Danish patriots imprisoned in the building got away.



The cruiser Leipzig was in the harbour at the time of the raid and it got underway as the Mosquitos attacked as the Huns apparently were under the impression that we were after the remnants of the German Navy.

Aircraft involved in the attack (all Mosquito Mk.VI)
No 487 Squadron
RS570 'X'	Gp Capt R N Bateson / Sqn Ldr E B Sismore (Raid Leader)
PZ402 'A'	Wg Cdr F M Denton / Fg Off A J Coe (damaged, belly landed at base)
PZ462 'J'	Flt Lt R J Dempsey / Flt Sgt E J Paige (hit by flak, 1 engine u/s, returned safely)
PZ339 'T'	Sqn Ldr W P Kemp / Flt Lt R Peel
SZ985 'M'	Fg Off G L Peet / Fg Off L A Graham
NT123 'Z'	Flt Lt D V Pattison / Flt Sgt F Pygram (missing)
No 464 Squadron
PZ353	Flt Lt W K Shrimpton RAAF (Pilot) / Fg Off P R Lake RAAF
PZ463	Flt Lt C B Thompson / Sgt H D Carter
PZ309	Flt Lt A J Smith RAAF / Flt Sgt H L Green RAAF
SZ999	Fg Off H G Dawson RAAF / Fg Off P T Murray (missing)
RS609	Fg Off J H Palmer RAAF / 2nd Lt H H Becker RNorAF (missing)
SZ968	Wg Cdr Iredale RAAF / Fg Off Johnson
All aircraft took off at 0840; last back landed 1405.
No 21 Squadron
SZ977	Wg Cdr P A Kleboe / Fg Off K Hall (missing)
PZ306	Sqn Ldr A F Carlisle / Flt Lt N J Ingram
LR388	Sqn Ldr A C Henderson / Flt Lt W A Moore
HR162	Flt Lt M Hetherington / Fg Off J K Bell
No 21 Squadron records list only these four aircraft and crews above as taking part in this operation.
All aircraft took off at 0835; the three which returned did so at 1355.

[SAMWolf]

Basil Embry was the leader of the Royal Air Force team involved in three bombing raids on Gestapo headquarters in Denmark.



Between the end of October 1944 and April 1945, we made three attacks on Gestapo headquarters in Denmark. In each instance the primary object was to destroy Gestapo records and evidence against patriots who were under arrest or about to be arrested for their activities against the Germans, with the secondary object of trying to release the prisoners held in the headquarters and killing as many Gestapo men as possible.



The first raid was directed against the Gestapo headquarters for Jutland, which was in a building in Aarhus University.



The second raid was against the Gestapo headquarters in Copenhagen. The Gestapo had occupied the offices of the Shell Oil Company in the centre of the town, and the building was known as the Shell House. As usual we had the target and the approaches to it modelled, and planned the operation with the greatest care because the slightest error in navigation or bombing would cause heavy casualties among the Danes. Shortly before the operation took place, I was worried to learn that a large number of the Resistance Movement were imprisoned in one wing of the building and it seemed certain they would perish in the attack. I discussed this with Major Truelson temporarily attached to my headquarters while we were planning the operation, and he assured me that they would sooner die from our bombing than at the hands of the Germans, adding, "Who knows-some might not be killed and succeed in escaping, as happened at Aarhus, and anyhow their death will save many more Danish lives, so don't worry."



We lost three Mosquitos and one Mustang on this occasion, but succeeded in completely demolishing the Shell House, destroying all Gestapo records, liberating all the prisoners without the loss of a single life, and killing twenty-six Gestapo. It will always remain a miracle to me that anyone inside the building survived to tell the tale.



The third and last attack on the Gestapo in Denmark was on the 17th April when we raided their headquarters at Odense. Bob Bateson with Sismore his navigator again led, Peter and I flying as his No. 2. We had great difficulty in finding the target, a house in a thickly populated area and well camouflaged with netting. We must have been in the target area at least half an hour searching and of course just inviting trouble from German fighters. Happily they never appeared and eventually we found and destroyed our objective. The difficulty we had turned out to be fortunate, for it gave the people in the area time to disperse and not a single Danish life was lost.

Additional Sources:

members.iinet.net.au/~gduncan
www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk
www.din-bog.dk/nyboder
frihed.natmus.dk/rundvisninger
www.brooksart.com
www.daveswarbirds.com
www.raf.mod.uk

[SAMWolf]

OPERATION CARTHAGE. (March 21, 1945)

At the request of the Danish resistance movement, a force of RAF Mosquitos attacked the Gestapo Headquarters in Copenhagen. The Gestapo had taken over the five storey Shell House, pre-war H/Q of the Shell Petroleum Company. On the day of the raid it housed a large number of Danish resistance fighters who had been arrested and were being interrogated as the first bombs fell. Some prisoners were killed but many escaped during the bombing. Around one hundred Gestapo agents and their Danish collaborators were killed.


A statue marks the site at Jeanne d'Arc Catholic School, showing a nun clutching two terrified children looking up at the sky,

Although the raid was successful, a horrific tragedy occurred nearby. One of the Mosquitos, on its bombing run, struck a light mast in the railway goods yard, veered to the left and crashed in a ball of fire near the Jeanne d'Arc Catholic School. The fire and smoke from the crash was mistakenly targeted by the next wave of Mosquitos which dropped their bombs on and around the crash site.

The resulting fires soon spread to other buildings and eventually engulfed the school which burned to the ground in less than two hours. Eighty-six children and ten teachers lost their lives in this tragedy and sixty-seven were injured. When rescuers reached the school cellars they found the bodies of forty-two children huddled together. All had drowned in water from the firemen's hoses.

[SAMWolf]

Veterans for Constitution Restoration is a non-profit, non-partisan educational and grassroots activist organization. The primary area of concern to all VetsCoR members is that our national and local educational systems fall short in teaching students and all American citizens the history and underlying principles on which our Constitutional republic-based system of self-government was founded. VetsCoR members are also very concerned that the Federal government long ago over-stepped its limited authority as clearly specified in the United States Constitution, as well as the Founding Fathers' supporting letters, essays, and other public documents.

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[snippy_about_it]

FALL IN to the FReeper Foxhole!



Good Friday Morning Everyone


If you would like added to our ping list let us know.

[Aeronaut]

Good morning Snippy.

[E.G.C.]

Good morning, Snippy and everyone at the Freeper Foxhole.

What happened with my late arrival yesterday was one of the hard drive in my ISP' s primary database crashed and they had to go to an alternate server. We'll see what happens today.:-D

[Iris7]

Read somewhere that the Danish Underground were closely tied with SOE, with "routine" air travel to Britain via very chilly trips in Mosquito bomb bays, all sorts of supply, mostly by boat by way of Sweden, etc.

The Gestapo were closing in, had picked up way too many people who knew way, way too much. The Danes held prisoner in the Shell House were smuggling out notes with pretty good detail, and some going in. Probably notes written on cigarette papers. The Danes had people inside the building besides the prisoners, naturally.

The Danes and the SOE (sorry - SOE is Special Operations Executive, a wartime bunch of truly wild folks. Men and women would parachute in, knowing that the Gestapo had turned their networks, knowing that it was the Gestapo on the ground waiting for them, to try to save their people. Routinely folks would rear guard when it was their turn, or make a diversion, or lead Gestapo pursuit astray, knowing that the result was death. Most carried cyanide pills. The really tough made the Gestapo kill them, after the Gestapo had paid the price. Hand grenades were a popular accessory. Bunch of stories from those days, but for some reason I haven't found much but fragments published. Could be they simply did not live to tell their stories.)

Anyway, the Danes and the SOE were desperate to get their people out. The first choice was a commando style attack, which couldn't be made feasible because you would have to fight upward floor to floor against a couple hundred enemies, win, and get out before the big Wehrmacht reinforcements arrived. Run your own numbers, mine say it couldn't be done. If the force was powerful enough you couldn't hide it after the raid, and extraction under fire looked very costly if possible. No SEALS in those days, remember!! All sorts of plans were planned out in the military sense, times, distances, possible enemy responses, logistics, personnel, etc., and nothing could be made to work. The prisoners, the Danes held in the Shell House, then asked for cyanide pills for each of them delivered by the same route the messages were traveling. Nobody liked this one. There were lots of the very best people brainstorming this problem, and as I recollect it was Squadron Leader Sismore, the fellow who did the perfect navigation for the raid, who came up with the answer.

The bombs were fuzed with a slight delay, enough for the bomb to go from the roof all the way to the lowest basement. The cells were on the top floor, interrogation on the fifth (good detail there, SAM, didn't know this 5th floor stuff - and the photos of the rescue work are great!) and the Gestapo records were in the basement. Worked pretty good too.

Now comes the human nature part. Sismore wanted as I recall five Mosquitos, not twenty. Sismore thought that five could get the job done nicely, and more would not increase the likelihood of success. Sismore's war record is of the highest quality and his abilities, coolness, intelligence, honor and luck were held in very high esteem by his peers. As I recollect he was twenty two years old, but don't hold me to that. Some higher up figured that if the fellow who knew what he was doing wanted five Mosquitos then twenty would be better.

My understanding that the Catholic girls school was bombed because the Shell House was obscured by flying debris from the earlier hits and the bombs went long.

Thanks, SAM, for the opportunity to tell this story. I never tire of it.

You know this dumb spell checker doesn't know the word "fuze"? Kicks back "fuse"!! Good grief!!

[Iris7]

"My understanding that the Catholic girls school was bombed because the Shell House was obscured by flying debris from the earlier hits and the bombs went long."

Well, turns out I was incorrect on this one. Still, if only Sismore and the first wave of seven had done the mission, no further bombers would have targeted the mosquito crash site.

[snippy_about_it]

Good morning Sam.

I didn't know anything about this story. I'm sure it was a difficult decision for the resistance movement to ask for an attack but a necessary one. Unfortunate about the school children but an understandable mistake in the heat of war.

Thanks for the interesting read.

[snippy_about_it]

Good morning Aeronaut.

[snippy_about_it]

Good morning EGC. Good luck to your ISP that they don't have too much "down time".

[snippy_about_it]

I found this obit I thought might be interesting for today's thread:

Leading WWII resistance figure Ole Lippmann dies
September 6 2002

One of Denmark's leading World War II resistance figures, Ole Lippmann, has died. He was 86.

Lippman, who asked the Royal Air Force to bomb the Gestapo headquarters in an air raid that ended up being the deadliest wartime operation in Denmark, died Tuesday in Copenhagen.

After receiving intelligence that the Germans were planning to arrest the leadership of the banned Freedom Council, Lippmann, as liaison between the Danish resistance and the allies, requested that the RAF attack the Gestapo headquarters in downtown Copenhagen on March 21, 1945.

The raid, which eventually thwarted the Gestapo's arrest plans, became the deadliest World War II operation in Denmark when British warplanes mistakenly bombed a school and killed 86 pupils and 13 adults.

Most of warplanes hit their target but one aircraft crashed behind the school. The following wave of planes thought the billows of smoke from the crash indicated the target and dropped their cargo of bombs on the school.

In an interview with the Berlingske Tidende newspaper, Lippman later said it was terrible to make the decision to have the Gestapo headquarters bombed because he knew civilian casualties were likely.

The school bombing "was extremely tragic" but ordering the raid was the right decision, he was quoted as saying.

The Freedom Council was founded to lead the resistance groups, which blew up factories that worked for Nazi Germany, and destroyed or damaged railway tracks, bridges, military facilities, and oil and petrol tanks. Denmark was occupied from April 9, 1940.

"He was second to none and an extremely modest man," said Frank Zorn, a fellow resistance fighter.

In the last three months of the German occupation, Lippmann was promoted to the Allies' highest ranking official in the Special Operations Executive in Denmark. It was he who welcomed the British troops led by General Harry Dewing as they arrived on May 5, 1945, a day after the Germans had surrendered.

During the first years of the occupation, Danes protested silently. Every morning, King Christian X rode on horseback through Copenhagen, returning his peoples' salutes but looking away when he met German soldiers.

But by mid-1942, illegal press and sabotage actions against the roughly 210,000 German troops began. The turning point came in August 1943, when people started staging strikes and riots across the Scandinavian nation.

The government resigned after Germans declared martial law.

[snippy_about_it]

Good morning Iris7. Keep those suggestions coming. ;-)

[Darksheare]

WOW.
Freeing Gestapo prisoners without loss of a single prisoner life.
That is Providence.

[The Mayor]

A generous man devises generous things, and by generosity he shall stand. —Isaiah 32:8

God's plans include you. Do your plans include God?

[Iris7]

Like your obituary for Ole Lippmann. Never knew his name. I do now. Quite a man.

""He was second to none and an extremely modest man," said Frank Zorn, a fellow resistance fighter." High praise. High praise.

[Iris7]

Thanks, Snippy, you are a sweetie.

Mr. Gage, I admire your erudition about period aircraft, and hope you might be willing to do a Mosquito piece.

I saw Kermit Weeks' Mosquito up at Oshkosh once, when the machine needed work and was parked outside during the fly in. Very compact and British. Going to have to get a real look at it someday, am interested in how the engine mounts transition to the (spruce) composite structure. Landing gear mounts look to be part of the same structure. Have seen good photos of all the parts easy to understand, where the mind's eye needs no photos, but never a one where they would be really useful!!

When the Canadians put the Mosquito into production they couldn't figure out how to spin the fuselage nose cone, something like a 1000 series aluminum, maybe. They asked Detroit for help. Detroit said they couldn't. I have wanted to try building one myself since I read that story! Bet you there are some interesting annealing steps!

[Valin]

On This Day In History


Birthdates which occurred on January 02:
1642 Mehmed IV sultan (Turkey)
1647 Nathaniel Bacon leader of Bacon's Rebellion, Virginia (1676)
1699 Osman III sultan (Turkey)
1727 James Wolfe commanded British Army (captured Québec)
1752 Philip Freneau poet of American Revolution (The American Village)
1777 Christian D Rauch German sculptor
1822 Rudolph J E Clausius Germany, physicist (thermodynamics)
1835 Charles Russell Lowell Jr Brigadier General (Union volunteers)
1857 Frederick Opper cartoonist (Willie and His Papa, Maud the Mule, Alphonse & Gaston)
1860 William C Mills museum curator (excavated Ohio Indian mounds)
1861 Helen Herron Taft 1st lady (1909-13)
1873 Anton Pannekoek Dutch astronomer/marxist theorist (Communist Tactics)
1880 Louis Breguet French aviation pioneer
1895 Count Folke Bernadotte Sweden, statesman (Red Cross, UN)
1901 Robert Marshall founder (Wilderness Society)
1904 Sally Rand Hickory County MO, stripper (fan dance)
1913 Ernest Sidey British air marshal
1920 Isaac Asimov Russia, scientist/writer (I Robot, Foundation Trilogy)
1925 William J Crowe Jr Kentucky, chairman joint chiefs of staff
1928 Dan Rostenkowski (Representative-D-IL, -94), House Ways & Means Committee chair
1928 Vaughn Beals Cambridge MA, CEO (Harley Davidson motorcycle)
1932 Dabney Coleman Austin Texas, (That Girl, Mary Hartman, Buffalo Bill)
1936 Roger Miller Fort Worth TX, country singer (King of the Road, Dang Me)
1939 Jim Bakker televangelist (PTL Club)/philanderer (Jessica Hahn)
1949 Chick Churchill Wales, keyboardist (Ten Years After-I'm Going Home)
1950 Lou Gramm rocker (Foreigner-Midnight Blue, Ready Or Not)
1952 Ricky Van Shelton Grit VA, country singer (Wild-Eyed Dream)
1954 Ludmila Borozna USSR, volleyball player (Olympics-gold-1972)
1966 Tia Carrere [Althea Janairo], Honolulu, actress(?) (Wayne's World)

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Deaths which occurred on January 02:
0017 Publius Ovidius Naso Roman poet, dies
1861 Frederik Willem IV king Prussia (1840-61)/Germ (1849-61), dies at 65
1863 Roger Weightman Hanson Confederate Brigadier General, dies in battle at 35
1892 George B Airy English astronomer/writer, dies at 90
1904 James Longstreet Confederate General, dies at 82
1918 Sijbe K Bakker vicar/theologist (Christian-Socialism), dies at 42
1923 Sam Carter black resident of Rosewood FL, lynched by KKK
1963 Jack Carson actor (Star is Born, Mildred Pierce), dies at 52
1963 Dick Powell actor/director (Dick Powell Theater), dies at 58
1974 Tex Ritter country singer (5 Star Jubilee), dies at 67
1977 Erroll Garner jazz pianist (Misty), dies at 53
1981 David Lynch singer (Platters-My Prayer), dies at 51
1990 Alan Hale Jr actor (Skipper Jonas Grumby-Gilligan's Island), dies of cancer at 71
1994 Dixy Lee Ray chairwoman (US Atomic Energy Commission), dies at 79
1995 Mohammed Siyad Barre President of Somalia (1969-91), dies
2001 Former Attorney General and Secretary of State William P. Rogers died in Bethesda, Md., at age 87.

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Reported: MISSING in ACTION

1966 MAC LAUGHLIN DONALD C.---BALTIMORE MD.
1967 MENGES GEORGE BRUCE---MAPLE HEIGHTS OH.
[REMAINS RETURNED 08/80 BY INDIGINOUS]
1970 BROOKS NICHOLAS G.---NEWBURGH NY.
[REMAINS RETURNED 02/03/82]
1970 FRYAR BRUCE C.---RIDGEWOOD NJ.
1970 LINDSTROM RONNIE G.---DULUTH MN.
1970 WEST JOHN T.---BALTIMORE MD.

POW / MIA Data & Bios supplied by
the P.O.W. NETWORK. Skidmore, MO. USA.

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On this day...
0069 Roman Lower Rhine army proclaims its commander, Vitellius, emperor
0533 John II begins his reign as Catholic Pope
1235 Emperor Joseph II orders Jews of Galicia Austria to adopt family names
1492 Spain recaptures Granada from the Moors (Granada Day)
1570 Tsar Ivan the Terrible march to Novgorod begins
1585 Spain & Catholic France sign Saint League of Joinville
1602 Spanish forces in Ireland surrender to the English at Kinsdale
1757 British troops occupy Calcutta India
1776 1st revolutionary flag displayed
1776 Austria ends interrogation torture
1788 Georgia is 4th state to ratify US constitution
1790 Mozart's opera "Cosi fan tutti" premieres, Vienna
1800 Free black community of Philadelphia PA petitions Congress to abolish slavery
1811 US Senator Thomas Pickering is 1st senator censured (revealed confidential documents communicated by the President of the US)
1831 Liberator, abolitionist newspaper, begins publishing in Boston
1832 1st Curling club in US (Orchard Lake Curling Club) opens
1839 1st photo of the Moon (French photographer Louis Daguerre)
1861 Colonel Charles Stone is put in charge of organizing DC militia
1861 SC seizes inactive Fort Johnson in Charleston Harbor
1863 Battle of Murfreesboro (Stone's River) ends
1879 Northwestern League (minor baseball league) organized, Rockford IL
1882 Because of anti-monopoly laws, Standard Oil is organized as a trust
1885 General Wolseley receives last distress signal of General Gordon in Khartoum
1890 Record 19'2" alligator shot in Louisiana by E A McIlhenny
1896 Battle at Doornkop, South Africa (Boers beat Dr Jamesons troops)
1900 E Verlinger begins manufacturing 7" single-sided records (Montréal)
1903 President T Roosevelt shuts down post office in Indianola MI, for refusing to accept its appointed postmistress because she was black
1905 Japanese troops capture Port Arthur
1908 Canadian branch of the Royal Mint opens in Ottawa
1910 1st junior high schools in US open in Berkeley CA
1911 Brooklyn Dodgers president Charles Ebbets announces purchase of grounds to build a new concrete-and-steel stadium to seat 30,000
1913 National Woman's Party forms
1919 Anti-British uprising in Ireland
1919 Lithuania gains independence
1920 10,000 US union & socialist organizers arrested (Palmer Raids)
1921 1st religious service radio broadcast in US, KDKA-Pittsburgh
1923 Ku Klux Klan surprise attack on black residential area Rosewood FL, 8 killed (compensation awarded in 1995)
1929 US & Canada agree to preserve Niagara Falls
1933 US troops leave Nicaragua
1934 1st state liquor stores open, in Pennsylvania
1935 Bruno R Hauptmann trial begins for kidnap-murder of Lindbergh baby
1936 1st electron tube to enable night vision described, St Louis MO
1938 Book publisher Simon and Schuster founded
1942 Japanese troops occupy Manila Philippines
1944 1st use of helicopters during warfare (British Atlantic patrol)
1945 Allied air raid on Neurenberg
1947 Mahatma Gandhi begins march for peace in East-Bengali
1948 WNDT (now WNET) TV channel 13 in New York-Newark, New York (PBS) begins
1949 KDKA TV channel 2 in Pittsburgh, PA (CBS) begins broadcasting
1954 Herman Wouks "Caine Mutiny" premieres in New York City NY
1955 1st "Bob Cummings Show" premieres on NBC (later on CBS)
1959 USSR launches Mechta (Luna 1) for 1st lunar fly-by, 1st solar orbit
1959 Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista flees
1960 Senator John F Kennedy, announces his candidacy for President
1960 1st redshank old world shore bird reported in North America (Halifax)
1960 John Reynolds sets age of solar system at 4,950,000,000 years
1961 Hawaii's, then all time low temperature, 14ºF recorded atop Haleakale
1962 Nighttime version of "Password" with Allen Ludden premieres on CBS
1965 New York Jets sign quarterback Joe Namath
1965 Obverse design of all Canadian coins is changed to depict the Queen with a slightly more mature look
1966 American G.I.s move into the Mekong Delta for the first time.
1966 1st Jewish child born in Spain since 1492 expulsion
1967 U.S. planes down seven enemy planes
1968 Christiaan Barnard performs 2nd heart transplant
1974 55 MPH speed limit imposed by Richard Nixon
1974 Worst fire in Argentine history destroys 1.2 million acres
1975 US Department of Interior designates grizzly bear a threatened species
1977 Bowie Kuhn suspends Braves owner Ted Turner for one year due to tampering charges in Gary Matthews free-agency signing
1978 Rhino Records releases their 1st album "Wildmania"
1979 Sid Vicious' trial for murder of girlfriend Nancy Spingen begins
1984 Riot in Tunis kills over 100
1984 Wilson Goode, sworn-in as Philadelphia's 1st black mayor
1988 Mulroney & Reagan sign Canada-US free trade agreement
1990 Sting joins wrestlings 4 Horsemen (Flair, Arn Anderson, Ole Anderson)
1995 Most distant galaxy yet discovered found by scientists using Keck telescope in Hawaii (estimated 15 billion light years away)

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Holidays
Note: Some Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"

Georgia : Constitution Ratification Day (1788)
Haiti : Ancestor/Hero's Day
Japan : Kakizome
Japan : Shigoto Hajime-Begin Work Day [beginning of the work year]
Spain : Granada Day (1492)
Switzerland : Berchtold's Tag, founding of Berne
US : Betsy Ross Day (1776)
US : Diet Resolution Week (Day 2)
Date Your Mate Month.

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Religious Observances
Christian : Commemoration of St Macarius the Younger, martyr
old Roman Catholic : Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus (most years)
Unification Church : Day of Victory of Love
Roman Catholic : Memorial of St Basil the Great, Gregory Nazianzen, bishops
Roman Catholic : Commemoration of St Gaspar del Bufalo, Italian priest
Lutheran : Commemoration of Johann Loehe, pastor
Jewish : Asarah B'Tevet (Siege of Jerusalem); Tevet 10, 5756

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Religious History
1744 Colonial missionary to the American Indians David Brainerd wrote in his journal: 'We are a long time in learning that all our strength and salvation is in God.'
1909 Future Foursquare Gospel church founder Aimee Elizabeth [n‚e Kennedy] Semple [later McPherson], 19, along with her husband Robert Semple, was ordained to the ministry in Chicago by evangelist William H. Durham.
1921 The first religious program heard over the radio was broadcast from Calvary Episcopal Church of Pittsburgh over local radio station KDKA. (The first licensed radio station in the US, KDKA had been on the air only two months.)
1968 Swiss Reformed theologian Karl Barth wrote in a letter: 'In the Church of Jesus Christ there can and should be no non-theologians.'
1971 A team of Israeli scholars announced the discovery in Jerusalem of a 2,000-year-old skeleton of a crucified male. Found in a cave-tomb, it was the first direct physical evidence of the well-documented Roman method of execution.

Source: William D. Blake. ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987.

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Thought for the day :
"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."

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Question of the day...
If peanut butter cookies are made from peanut butter, then what are Girl Scout cookies made out of?

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Murphys Law of the day...(Newton's Little-known Seventh Law)
A bird in the hand is safer than one overhead

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Astounding Fact #10,204...
Elizabeth I of England suffered from anthophobia, a fear of roses.

[Soaring Feather]

Good morning everyone in The FOXHOLE!