Putten raid happened from October 1st to 2nd 660 men were taken away after a failed attack on a German official in November 1944
After a four-day battle, the U.S. Fifth Army captured Monte Battaglia on the Gothic Line in Italy, helped by the Italian partisans.[1] The II and the IV Corp of the Army launch an offensive towards Bologna, that will end in a month with heavy losses and a limited gain of ground.
The St. Louis Browns won the American League pennant on the final day of the season by beating the New York Yankees 5-2. The Browns, who had never won a pennant in franchise history and would not win another as a St. Louis team, were helped immensely by the wartime roster depletion across baseball that happened to affect them less than the other ballclubs. The average major league team had ten 4-F players on its roster, but the Browns had eighteen.[2][3]
Died:Rudolf Schmundt, 48, German Army officer (died of wounds sustained in the 20 July bomb plot)
Five pilots of No. 401 Squadron RCAF participated in the shooting down of a Messerschmitt Me 262 over the Netherlands, marking the first time that a jet fighter had been shot down by enemy fire.[13]
Sonderkommando revolt: The Sonderkommando (Nazi death camp prisoners deployed to remove corpses from the gas chambers and burn them) at Auschwitz-Birkenau revolted with makeshift weapons. Three SS guards were killed, but more than 200 members of the Sonderkommando died in the fighting. Hundreds of prisoners escaped but were all soon captured and executed.
The Battle of Tehumardi was fought at night on the Estonian island of Saaremaa between retreating German troops and a Soviet Estonian rifle division. Both sides fought blindly, firing into the darkness or feeling for the enemy by touch.[15]
Died:Nicolò Cortese, 37, Italian priest, killed in Trieste by the Gestapo’s torturers for his help to Jews and partisans; called "the Italian Father Kolbe"; Wendell Willkie, 52, American lawyer, corporate executive and 1940 Republican presidential candidate (heart attack).
On the Italian front, while the Wehrmacht stopped the offensive of the II American Corp on the Bologna Apennines in Livergnano, the V English Corp passed the Rubicon and conquers Longiano and Savignano.[20]
InGenoa, the explosion of a German ammunition deposit in the San Benigno quarter (caused by lightning or, according to some never confirmed theories, by a partisan attack) caused hundreds of deaths. The victims included German soldiers, Genoese civilians living in the area and refugees in air-raid shelters.
InPiedmont, a coalition of "blue" (monarchist) and "red" (communist) partisans occupied Alba, without fighting; the blue ranks included the future writer Beppe Fenoglio, who would describe the event in his novels. The town became the most important urban center freed by the Resistance's forces, before being reconquered by the Fascists a month later.[21]
A secret Hungarian delegation signed a ceasefire agreement in Moscow. Hungary agreed to declare war on Germany and give up all territory gained since 1937.[6]
Italian front: While the tenacious opposition of the Wehrmacht stopped the American offensive on the Boronia hills in Livergnano and at Monte Battaglia, on Romagna the British, Indian and Canadian troops passed the Rubicon at many points, directed to Cesena; the New Zealanders conquered Gatteo.[24]
The British destroyer Loyal struck a mine in the Tyrrhenian Sea and was rendered a constructive total loss.
The attacks of the American Fifth Army were stopped at Mount Cavallara; the offensive to Bologna was temporarily suspended, at 20 kilometres (12 mi) by the target.[25]
In Italy, the American Fifth Army had some success on the Apennine front; a South African division entered Grizzana, and the German Army left Livergnano. In Romagna, the Polish II Corps went into action.[33]
The German and Fascist troops reconquered Domodossola, which for forty days had been the capital of an independent republic, ruled by the partisans and the antifascist parties.[34]
The Canadian frigate Magog was torpedoed and damaged in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence by German submarine U-1223 and rendered a constructive total loss.
Died:Erwin Rommel, 52, German field marshal (allowed to commit suicide by the Nazis rather than face trial and reprisals against his family for his knowledge of the July Bomb Plot)
The ceasefire between Hungary and the Soviet Union was publicized. Regent of Hungary Miklós Horthy made a radio broadcast announcing that he had made a separate peace with the Soviet Union withdrawing Hungary from the war.[35] Germans respond immediately with Operation Panzerfaust.
With the Gothic Line now penetrated, the U.S. Fifth Army launched a new offensive toward Bologna with the objective of taking the city before the onset of winter.[1]InRomagna, the 10. Indian Division is the first allied unit to pass the Savio River.
The Battle of Leyte began when American forces and Filipino guerrillas under the command of General Douglas MacArthur launched an amphibious invasion of the Gulf of Leyte in the Philippines.
Rival partisans in Athens began fighting each other.[10]
Contact was lost with the USS Escolar. The American submarine was probably lost to a mine in the Yellow Sea.
Died:Pavel Haas, 45, Czech composer (murdered at Auschwitz concentration camp); Hans Krása, 44, Czech composer (murdered at Auschwitz)
German submarine U-957 collided with a German merchant ship at Lofoten, Norway and was withdrawn from service two days later as a result of the damage sustained.
The Philippines Campaign began. Douglas MacArthur made a speech from a portable radio set at Leyte that began: "This is the Voice of Freedom, General MacArthur speaking. People of the Philippines: I have returned."[43]
The Belgrade Offensive ended in Partisan/Soviet victory when the capture of Belgrade itself was completed.
Despite heavy rain, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt rode in an open car through 51 miles (82 km) of New York City streets on his way to make a speech at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. With a little over two weeks left to go in the presidential election campaign, Roosevelt's ride through the city in the pouring rain without any proper covering was an attempt to show that he was still healthy.[44]
Canadian Private Ernest Smith earned the Victoria Cross for his actions over the night of October 21–22 on the Savio in Italy. Smith disabled a German tank and then killed four panzergrenadiers and damaged another tank while protecting a wounded comrade.
The Battle of Leyte Gulf began between U.S./Australian and Japanese forces at Leyte Gulf in the Philippines, possibly the largest naval battle in history. The Japanese cruisers Atago and Maya were sunk off Palawan by the American submarines Darter and Dace, respectively.
German submarine U-985 struck a mine at Lista, Norway and was withdrawn from service.
In the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the American aircraft carrier USS Princeton was crippled by a kamikaze aircraft attack and was scuttled. Japanese destroyer Wakaba was bombed and sunk by American aircraft from USS Franklin.
The Japanese battleship Musashi was bombed and sunk in the Sibuyan Sea by U.S. aircraft.
The American submarine Shark was depth charged and sunk in the Luzon Strait by Japanese warships.
The American submarine Darter ran aground in the Palawan Strait and was scuttled to prevent capture by the Japanese.
The Japanese hell shipArisan Maru was torpedoed and sunk in the South China Sea by an American submarine. Only nine of the 1,781 Allied and civilian prisoners of war survived.
The American submarine Tang was sunk by one of her own torpedoes near Formosa.
The Allies officially recognized the Italian government under Ivanoe Bonomi.[6]
Florence Foster Jenkins, the amateur operatic soprano known for her lack of singing ability, made her first proper public appearance at a sold-out Carnegie Hall.
The British Eighth Army reached Forlì. The Allied advance in Italy had slowed considerably in recent days and time was running out to realize the objective of taking Bologna before winter.[1]
25 British Mosquito planes carried out the successful Aarhus Air Raid targeting the Gestapo headquarters at Aarhus University in Denmark.
The last German forces evacuated Salonika ahead of the arrival of a force of the British Special Boat Service. German vessels in the port were also scuttled, removing the last Kriegsmarine presence in the Aegean Sea.[51]
French serial killer Marcel Petiot was apprehended at a Paris Métro station when he was recognized despite having grown a beard.[52]
Died:Henrietta Crosman, 83, American stage and film actress; Russell Foskett, 27, Australian aviator and flying ace (plane crash in the Aegean Sea)
^DeRouen, Karl R.; Heo, Uk, eds. (2007). Civil Wars of the World: Major Conflicts Since World War II, Volume 1. Oxford: ABC-CLIO. p. 370. ISBN978-1-85109-919-1.
