Map of US Army Air Corps Atlantic Ferrying and Transport Routes, 1941 (Craven, Wesley F. & Cate, James L. The Army Air Forces in World War II. Volume One: Plans and Early Operations; September 1939 to August 1942, public domain)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 21, 1941: French resistance shoots Nazi administrator in Bordeaux, Maj. Hans-Gottfried Reimers.
Pan Am begins DC-3 military air transport services to Egypt.
USS Hornet (CV-8), late 1941 (US Naval History & Heritage Command: NH 81313)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 20, 1941: Carrier USS Hornet (CV-8) is commissioned under Capt. Marc Mitscher.
Germans massacre 2324 Serbian men and boys in Kragujevac in response to partisan killing of ten Germans.
French resistance assassinates Col. Karl Hotz, German commander in Nantes.
Women and elderly men from Moscow digging tank trap outside the city, Oct. 1941 (public domain via United States Information Agency)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 19, 1941: Stalin announces he’ll stay in Moscow, and he declares a state of siege.
Germans close Vyazma pocket in Russia, taking 670,000 Soviet POWs.
British poster for Target for Tonight (Imperial War Museum: Art.IWM PST 4015)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 18, 1941: Gen. Hideki Tojo becomes Prime Minister of Japan and forms a military government.
US movie premiere of Target for Tonight, a documentary about an RAF bombing raid on Germany.
In Tokyo, Japanese arrest Soviet spy Richard Sorge, who is posing as a German correspondent.
Japanese Prime Minister Tojo and his cabinet ministers, Tokyo, Japan, 18 Oct 1941 (public domain via Wikipedia)
Destroyer USS Kearny at Reykjavik, Iceland, 19 October 1941, two days after being torpedoed by U-568; destroyer USS Monssen is alongside; note the torpedo hole (US Naval History and Heritage Command: 80-G-28788)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 17, 1941: In Convoy SC-48 off Iceland, German U-boat U-568 torpedoes and damages destroyer USS Kearny; first US casualties of the war—11 killed, 22 wounded.
U-boats sink seven other ships in Convoy SC-48.
US Army Air Force establishes Air Service Command (supply and maintenance) under Brig. Gen. Henry Miller at Wright Field, OH.
Soviet poster urging defense of Moscow, October 1941
80 Years Ago—Oct. 16, 1941: Except for Stalin, the Soviet government evacuates from Moscow to Kuibyshev.
German & Romanian troops take Odessa, Ukraine.
Japanese government under Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe resigns.
Germans begin deportation of Jews from Germany and Luxembourg.
Odessa soon after capture by Germans; abandoned Soviet vehicles and barricades, October 1941 (public domain via Wikipedia)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 15, 1941: As the Germans advance, the Soviets evacuate 35,000 troops from Odessa in the Ukraine by sea in one night and destroy the port facilities.
Map of the German advance on Moscow, 26 Aug-5 Dec 1941(The History Department of the United States Military Academy)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 14, 1941: Germans encircle 6 Soviet armies near Vyazma, Russia, and take Vyazma.
Germany announces that all German Jews will be deported.
German night-fighter unit badge, WWII (public domain via Wikipedia)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 13, 1941: Hitler orders Luftwaffe to stop night intruder raids against British air bases, although they were effective.
German infantrymen fighting in Russia, fall 1941 (US National Archives)
80 Years Ago—Oct. 12, 1941: Germans take Bryansk, Russia.
Nazis massacre 11,000 Jews from Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine.
