On This Day ... in 1807 & Others
A squadron of ships under Vice-Admiral Sir John Duckworth
forced a passage of the Dardanelles, and completely destroyed a Turkish fleet of 13 ships.
1915: British and French warships began a bombardment of the Turkish forts guarding the Dardanelles. This first bombardment proved a significant misjudgement, precisely because of its success; the Turks and their German advisers realised how inadequate the defences in the area were, and put in hand efforts to reinforce them that would later cost the allies serious losses.
1917: HMS Q-18, disguised as Lady Olive, was attacked by the U-boat UC-18 a few miles west of Jersey. The sinking Q-18 lured UC-18 within range before opening fire with her concealed guns, and managed to sink the submarine before going down herself.
1942: Japanese aircraft mounted their first air raid on Darwin, Australia. Over the next twenty months, the port was to endure some 64 air raids. Royal Australian Air Force, Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Force units were all involved in its defence during the period.
The attack was carried out by 188 aircraft: 36 fighters, 71 level bombers and 81 dive-bombers from the Kaga, Akagi, Hiryu & Soryu. This was equivalent to the force that attacked Pearl Harbor. 54 medium bombers from Kendari in the Celebes carried out a second attack.
The attack began just before 1000 when fighters strafed the ships in the harbour and shot down the few defending American fighters. The level bombers followed, concentrating on the port and town while dive-bombers attacked the ships. In ten minutes Darwin ceased to be an operational port. The wharf was destroyed and the merchant vessels Neptuna & Barossa damaged. The destroyer USS Peary was caught running for the open sea, her magazines exploded and she sank with heavy loss of life, her guns still in action.
The US transports Meigs and Mauna Loa were sunk as was the tanker British Motorist and the Australian transport Zealandia. Transports Portmar & Tulagi were holed and beached.
An attack by dive-bombers on the wharf hit Neptuna again and her cargo of depth charges exploded, shaking the town and killing 45. Barossa was burnt out and beached.
The RAN vessels in the harbour fought back desperately but only the sloops Swan & Warrego possessed anything like an adequate AA armament. Especially vulnerable was the corvette Katoomba sitting high and dry in a floating dry dock. She forced at least one attacker to turn away.
The depot ship Platypus was damaged by near misses, which sank the lugger Mavie alongside.
Strafing aircraft caused fatal casualties on the boom defense vessels Kara Kara and Kangaroo and the auxiliary Gunbar. The hospital ship Manunda, despite her clear markings, was bombed and heavily damaged with 12 dead and 58 wounded.
North of Darwin two merchant vessels, Don Isidro & Florence B, were destroyed. There was also heavy damage and loss of life in the town and at the airfield. The medium bombers attacked at midday concentrating on the airfield and causing further damage.
The attack was considered then, and many Australians still believe, to presage a Japanese attack on Australia. It was however simply intended to neutralize Darwin as a base from where Allied forces might operate against the Japanese invasion of the Eastern Netherlands Indies. In this it was outstandingly successful.
1945: During the 14th Army's advance through Burma, a mass of retreating Japanese became surrounded & trapped in a saltwater crocodile infested mangrove swamp. The Japanese refused to surrender & instead took their chances in the swamp. Matters came to a head on the the night of the 19th.
That night was the most horrible that any member of the [marine launch] crews ever experienced. The scattered rifle shots in the pitch black swamp punctured by the screams of wounded men crushed in the jaws of huge reptiles, and the blurred worrying sound of spinning crocodiles made a cacophony of hell that has rarely been duplicated on earth. At dawn the vultures arrived to clean up what the crocodiles had left. … Of about 1,000 Japanese soldiers that entered the swamps of Ramree, only about 20 were found alive.
Comments
1945 - John Basilone, Iwo Jima, enough said.
Posted by: Bram | February 21, 2006 12:46 PM
"Of about 1,000 Japanese soldiers that entered the swamps of Ramree, only about 20 were found alive."
They started it.
Posted by: Kim du Toit | February 20, 2010 1:56 PM