24 Feb 1942

US Pacific Islands
5 Oct 1943

US Pacific Islands
  • Task Force 19 consisting of Essex-class carriers Essex, Lexington, and Yorktown with light carriers Cowpens, Independence, and Belleau Wood escorted by cruisers New Orleans, San Francisco, Birmingham, Nashville, Santa Fe, and Mobile and destroyers Hull, Hazelwood, Bancroft, Caldwell, Coghlan, Braine, Halford, Kidd, Bullard, Chauncey, John Rodgers, Harrison, Murray, Ringgold, Sigsbee, Schroeder, Dashiell, Conner, Burns, Boyd, and Bradford began two days of strikes against Wake Island. So intense was the bombardment that island commander Rear Admiral Sakaibara Shigemitsu was convinced it was a prelude to an invasion and he ordered the execution of all 98 remaining POWs that had been there since 23 Dec 1941, many of whom had been civilian contractors at the time of their capture. ww2dbase [Yorktown (Essex-class) | Independence | Cowpens | San Francisco | Essex | Nashville | Hull | Lexington (Essex-class) | New Orleans | Wake Island | DS]
4 Sep 1945

Photo(s) dated 4 Sep 1945
Raising the US flag over Wake Island after JapanJapanese RAdm Shigematsu Sakaibara signing the surrender of Wake Island to US Marine BGen Lawson Sanderson aboard USS Levy, 4 Sep 1945. Care was made to ensure the Japanese surrendered Wake to the Marines.

Timeline Section Founder: Thomas Houlihan
Contributors: Alan Chanter, C. Peter Chen, Thomas Houlihan, Hugh Martyr, David Stubblebine
Special Thanks: Rory Curtis




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Japanese troops guarding a section of a railway near the village of Changxindian, Hebei Province, China, west of the city of Beiping, 10 Aug 1937; seen in the 1 Sep 1937 issue of the Japanese publication Asahigraph


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"No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. You win the war by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country!"

George Patton, 31 May 1944


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