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The following events occurred in March 1942:

March 1, 1942 (Sunday)

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March 2, 1942 (Monday)

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March 3, 1942 (Tuesday)

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March 4, 1942 (Wednesday)

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  • The Japanese conducted Operation K, a reconnaissance of Pearl Harbor and disruption of repair and salvage operations there. Two Kawanishi H8K flying boats were dispatched but failed to see much due to heavy clouds and only did negligible bombing damage.
  • The Sook Ching massacre ended in Singapore. Official Japanese statistics show fewer than 5,000 killed while the Singaporean Chinese community claims the numbers to be around 100,000.
  • The British sloop Yarra was sunk in the Indian Ocean by Japanese cruisers.

March 5, 1942 (Thursday)

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March 6, 1942 (Friday)

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  • Elements of the Japanese 2nd Infantry Division on Java entered Buitenzorg, while Dutch forces withdrew toward Bandung.[8]
  • Romania broke off diplomatic relations with Brazil.[3]
  • A controversial political cartoon by Philip Zec appeared in the Daily Mirror, depicting a merchant seaman clinging to the remains of a ship in rough seas with the caption, "The price of petrol has been increased by one penny – Official." Winston Churchill interpreted the cartoon as "defeatist" and considered taking action to ban the Daily Mirror from publication.[9]

March 7, 1942 (Saturday)

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March 8, 1942 (Sunday)

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March 9, 1942 (Monday)

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March 10, 1942 (Tuesday)

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March 11, 1942 (Wednesday)

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March 12, 1942 (Thursday)

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  • The Battle of Java ended in Japanese victory.
  • The U.K. Ministry of War Production was renamed the Ministry of Production and Oliver Lyttelton was appointed its new head.
  • Brothers Anthony and William Esposito were executed by electric chair five minutes apart at Sing Sing for the January 14, 1941 slaying of a police officer and a holdup victim, which had led to a sensational trial in which they feigned insanity. Both brothers were in such fragile health that they had to be brought into the death chamber in wheelchairs because they had refused all food for the past 10 months that was not fed them forcibly.[21]
  • The American cargo ship Texan was torpedoed, shelled and sunk by German submarine U-126.
  • German submarine U-613 was commissioned.
  • Born:
  • Died:

March 13, 1942 (Friday)

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March 14, 1942 (Saturday)

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  • U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt sent a proposal to all 48 state governors that speed limits throughout the nation be reduced to 40 miles per hour (64 km/h) to conserve rubber.[23]
  • German submarine U-133 sank off the Greek island of Salamis after striking a naval mine.
  • German submarines U-177 and U-260 were commissioned.
  • Died: René Bull, 69, British illustrator and photographer

March 15, 1942 (Sunday)

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  • Nazi occupying forces and local collaborationists committed the First Dünamünde Action in the Biķernieki forest near Riga, massacring about 1,900 people.
  • German submarine U-503 was depth charged and sunk off Newfoundland by a Lockheed Hudson.
  • The British destroyer Vortigern was torpedoed and sunk off Cromer by the German E-boat S-104.
  • While sailing from Norfolk, Virginia to Beaumont, Texas, the United States Navy tanker Olean was torpedoed and heavily damaged by the German submarine U-158. The ship was abandoned, towed to Hampton Roads and repaired.

March 16, 1942 (Monday)

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  • A tornado outbreak struck a large area of the Central and Southern United States. 153 people were killed over the next two days.
  • Members of the far-right Swiss National Front were sentenced to long prison terms for propagandistic activities.[24]
  • German submarine U-706 was commissioned.
  • Born: James Soong, Chinese-born Taiwanese politician, in Xiangtan

March 17, 1942 (Tuesday)

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March 18, 1942 (Wednesday)

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March 19, 1942 (Thursday)

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March 20, 1942 (Friday)

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  • The Battle of Oktwin in the Burma Campaign began.
  • When reporters met the train of General Douglas MacArthur north of Adelaide, Australia, he declared: "The President of the United States ordered me to break through the Japanese lines and proceed from Corregidor to Australia for the purpose, as I understand it, of organizing the American offensive against Japan, a primary object of which is the relief of the Philippines. I came through and I shall return."[28]
  • The British destroyer Heythrop was torpedoed northeast of Bardia by German submarine U-652. She was towed by the destroyer Eridge towards Tobruk but foundered five hours later.[29]

March 21, 1942 (Saturday)

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March 22, 1942 (Sunday)

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  • Second Battle of Sirte, the escorting warships of a British convoy to Malta held off a much more powerful Regia Marina (Italian Navy) squadron.
  • Allied forces abandoned the Magwe airfield in Burma, 100 miles (160 km) east of Akyab.[33]
  • Cripps' mission: The British government sent Stafford Cripps to India to disclose the British constitutional proposals for a postwar India. Britain promised self-government for India after the war in exchange for their co-operation in the war effort.[33]
  • The BBC began transmitting news bulletins in Morse Code for the benefit of resistance fighters in occupied Europe.[34]
  • The Manzanar Japanese-American internment camp first opened.[35]

March 23, 1942 (Monday)

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March 24, 1942 (Tuesday)

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March 25, 1942 (Wednesday)

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March 26, 1942 (Thursday)

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March 27, 1942 (Friday)

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March 28, 1942 (Saturday)

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March 29, 1942 (Sunday)

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March 30, 1942 (Monday)

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March 31, 1942 (Tuesday)

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Notes

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  1. ^ Matthäus, Jürgen (2013). Jewish Responses to Persecution: Volume III, 1941–1942. Lanham, Maryland: AltaMira Press. p. 531. ISBN 978-0-7591-2259-8.
  2. ^ Williams, Mary H. (1960). Special Studies, Chronology, 1941–1945. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 27.
  3. ^ a b Doody, Richard. "A Timeline of Diplomatic Ruptures, Unannounced Invasions, Declarations of War, Armistices and Surrenders". The World at War. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  4. ^ Sturma, Michael (2011). Surface and Destroy: The Submarine Gun War in the Pacific. Kentucky University Press. p. 91. ISBN 978-0-8131-2999-0.
  5. ^ Williford, Glen (2010). Racing the Sunrise: The Reinforcement of America's Pacific Outposts, 1941–1942. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-61251-256-3.
  6. ^ Comenas, Gary. "Abstract Expressionism". warholstars.org. Archived from the original on May 2, 2015. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  7. ^ World and Its Peoples: Eastern and Southern Asia, Volume 10. Marshall Cavendish Corporation. 2008. p. 1392. ISBN 978-0-7614-7643-6.
  8. ^ "War Diary for Friday, 6 March 1942". Stone & Stone Second World War Books. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  9. ^ Douglas, Roy (1991). The World War 1939–1945: The Cartoonists' Vision. New York: Routledge. p. 141. ISBN 978-0-415-07141-3.
  10. ^ "Events occurring on Saturday, March 7, 1942". WW2 Timelines. 2011. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  11. ^ Yust, Walter, ed. (1943). 1943 Britannica Book of the Year. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. p. 4.
  12. ^ Evans, A. A.; Gibbons, David (2012). The Illustrated Timeline of World War II. Rosen Publishing. p. 99. ISBN 978-1-4488-4795-2.
  13. ^ "Chronology 1942". indiana.edu. 2002. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  14. ^ "The conquest of Borneo Island, 1941–1942". Forgotten Campaign: The Dutch East Indies Campaign 1941–1942. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  15. ^ "Manhattan Project Chronology". Atomic Archive. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  16. ^ "1942: Key Dates". United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  17. ^ "History | Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory". www.jhuapl.edu. Retrieved 2023-03-10.
  18. ^ "Events occurring on Tuesday, March 10, 1942". WW2 Timelines. 2011. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  19. ^ Kuniholm, Bruce Robellet (1980). The Origins of the Cold War in the Near East: Great Power Conflict and. Princeton University Press. p. 145. ISBN 978-1-4008-5575-9.
  20. ^ "Brazil Approaches Open Hostilities with Germany". Daily Illini. Champaign, Illinois: 1. March 12, 1942.
  21. ^ "Esposito Brothers Die In Chair; Killed 2 in Holdup". Wilkes-Barre Times Leader. Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. March 13, 1942. p. 20.
  22. ^ Dundas, Barbara; Durflinger, Serge. "The Canadian Women's Army Corps, 1941–1946". Canadian War Museum. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  23. ^ "F. D. R. Calls for 40-Mile Speed Limit". Brooklyn Eagle. Brooklyn. March 14, 1942. p. 1.
  24. ^ "Was war am 16. März 1942". chroniknet. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  25. ^ "Events occurring on Tuesday, March 17, 1942". WW2 Timelines. 2011. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  26. ^ "On This Day: March 17". The New York Times. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  27. ^ a b c d Mercer, Derrik, ed. (1989). Chronicle of the 20th Century. London: Chronicle Communications Ltd. pp. 563–564. ISBN 978-0-582-03919-3.
  28. ^ Horner, David. "General MacArthur's War: The South and Southwest Pacific campaigns 1942–45." The Pacific War Companion: From Pearl Harbor to Hiroshima. Ed. Daniel Marston. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2005. p. 124. ISBN 978-1-84603-212-7.
  29. ^ "HMS Heythrop". uboat.net. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  30. ^ Eglan, Jared (2015). Beasts of War: The Militarization of Animals. Lulu Press. p. 59. ISBN 978-1-329-51613-7.
  31. ^ Goode, Fred C. (2014). No Surrender in Burma: Operations Behind Japanese Lines, Captivity and Torture. Pen & Sword Books. ISBN 978-1-4738-4096-6.
  32. ^ "March 21, 1942". The Second World War - A Day By Day Account. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  33. ^ a b "Events occurring on Sunday, March 22, 1942". WW2 Timelines. 2011. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  34. ^ "Chronomedia: 1942". Terra Media. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  35. ^ "Manzanar, California". Japanese American Veterans Association. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  36. ^ Tucker, Spencer C. (2010). A Global Chronology of Conflict: From the Ancient World to the Modern Middle East. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, LLC. p. 1958. ISBN 978-1-85109-672-5.
  37. ^ "Brazilians Smash Nazi Spy Ring". Daily Illini. Champaign, Illinois: 1. March 27, 1942.
  38. ^ Chronology and Index of the Second World War, 1938–1945. Research Publications. 1990. p. 115. ISBN 978-0-88736-568-3.
  39. ^ Blumenkranz 1972, p. 404.
  40. ^ "Was war am 27. März 1942". chroniknet. Retrieved February 1, 2016.
  41. ^ "Joe Louis". BoxRec. Retrieved February 1, 2016.