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• Heloglander Rickmer Classen Rickmers signed a contract for a site 65,000 square meters in size at Geesthelle, Bremerhaven, Germany to expand operations. ww2dbase [Rickmers | Bremerhaven, Weser-Ems | AG]

18 May 1856 Interactive Map

• William Simpson was born. ww2dbase [William Simpson | CPC]

• Emilio Esteban Infantes was born. ww2dbase [Emilio Esteban Infantes | CPC]

• Werner von Blomberg was promoted to the rank of Oberleutnant. ww2dbase [Werner von Blomberg | CPC]

• Prince Hiroyasu's fifth child, Princess Atsuko, was born. ww2dbase [Hiroyasu | CPC]

• John Fox was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. ww2dbase [John Fox | Cincinnati, Ohio | CPC]

• George Welch was born. ww2dbase [George Welch | CPC]

• Prince Naruhiko married Princess Toshiko, ninth daughter of Emperor Meiji. ww2dbase [Naruhiko | CPC]

• USS R-1 arrived at New London, Connecticut, United States. ww2dbase [R-1 | New London, Connecticut | CPC]
• USS R-5 arrived at Newport, Rhode Island, United States. ww2dbase [R-5 | Newport, Rhode Island | CPC]
• Joseph Stilwell began a period of leave in the United States. ww2dbase [Joseph Stilwell | CPC]

• Giulio Cesare was decommissioned from service. ww2dbase [Giulio Cesare | CPC]
• Conte di Cavour was decommissioned from service. ww2dbase [Conte di Cavour | CPC]

• Joseph Goebbels arrived in Berlin, Germany. ww2dbase [Joseph Goebbels | Berlin | CPC]

• Franklin Roosevelt established the Tennessee Valley Authority for power generation and flood control in the namesake region in the United States. ww2dbase [Franklin Roosevelt | CPC]

• The world's worst air disaster to date, involving a heavier-than-air craft, occurred when the Soviet ANT-20 "Maxim Gorky" collided with another aircraft near Tushino, Russia, killing 56 on board. ww2dbase [AC]

• Clifton Cates was made the executive officer of the 4th Marine Regiment. ww2dbase [Clifton Cates | Shanghai | CPC]

• A degree from Adolf Hitler permitted Heinrich Himmler to call up older men on the outbreak of war to replace the permanent units of concentration camp guards. This would allow the younger men to be drafted into the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Regiments of a new SS Division, to be called Totenkopf. ww2dbase [Heinrich Himmler | AC]

• German troops captured Antwerp, Belgium; meanwhile, the German government re-incorporated into its borders the territory that Germany ceded to Belgium per the Versailles Treaty. In France, Erwin Rommel's German 7th Panzer Division reached Cambrai where it halted to consolidate his supply lines; in the past 5 days the division advanced 85 miles and captured 10,000 French prisoners and tanks, suffering only 150 casualties. The French called the German 7th Panzer Division the "Ghost Division" for its ability to strike in unexpected and vulnerable places. Elsewhere in France, German troops captured Petonne and Amiens. ww2dbase [Invasion of France and the Low Countries | TH]
• German submarines U-60 and U-62 departed Kiel. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Arthur Seyß-Inquart was appointed Reich Commissar of the Netherlands. ww2dbase [Arthur Seyß-Inquart | CPC]
• British Prime Minister Churchill sent a telegram to US President Roosevelt, noting "if American assistance is to play any part it must be available [soon]." ww2dbase [Winston Churchill | CPC]
• HMS Effingham was scuttled by torpedo after suffering serious damage incurred on the previous day after striking the Faksen Shoal off Norway. ww2dbase [Effingham | CPC]

• Walter Grabmann, flying a Bf 110 heavy fighter, was shot down by British Hurricane fighters over Douai, France; he parachuted to safety but was captured. ww2dbase [Walter Grabmann | Douai, Nord-Pas-de-Calais | CPC]

• Italy annexed Dalmatia into its borders. ww2dbase [TH]
• Battleship Bismarck anchored in the bay at 1200 hours to embark supplies and fuel for Operation Rheinübung. ww2dbase [Bismarck | CPC]
• Prinz Eugen departed for Operation Rheinübung. ww2dbase [Prinz Eugen | CPC]
• German submarine U-107 sank British ship Piako 130 miles west of Freetown, Sierra Leone, British West Africa at 2227 hours; 10 were killed, 65 survived and rescued by British sloop HMS Bridgewater. ww2dbase [CPC]
• British battleship HMS Nelson and aircraft carrier HMS Eagle, en route from Cape Town, South Africa to Freetown, Sierra Leone, British West Africa in search of German armed merchant cruiser Atlantis, sailed within 7 kilometers of the German ship without detecting her. ww2dbase [Eagle | CPC]
• German dive bombers attacked British hospital ship Aba 50 miles south of Crete, Greece. Petty Officer Alfred Sephton of British light cruiser HMS Coventry won the Victoria Cross for directing anti-aircraft fire against the German aircraft despite being partially blinded by a machine gun bullet; he would die from his injuries on the next day. In anticipation of a German invasion of Crete, Greece, 700 Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders were transported from Port Said, Egypt, on troopship Glengyle; they would land at Tymbaki, Crete after sundown. ww2dbase [Balkans Campaign | CPC]
• British aircraft from RAF Habbaniya bombed Iraqi positions in Falluja throughout the day. Meanwhile, Arab troops loyal to Britain relieved the besieged RAF Habbaniyah which was defended only by out-of-date training aircraft. The base had been under attack from the pro-German forces of General Rashid Ali using Bf 110 and He 111 aircraft. ww2dbase [Campaigns in the Middle East | CPC]

• General Mosley Mayne, British commander of Indian 5th Division, had lunch with Italian commander Duke of Aosta at Amba Alagi, Abyssinia. The Italian duke agreed to not destroy guns, to not destroy supplies, and to dismantle or identify mines. ww2dbase [Invasion of Italian East Africa | Amba Alagi | CPC]

• HMS York, crippled at Suda Bay, Crete, Greece, was further damaged by German aircraft. ww2dbase [Balkans Campaign | York | Suda Bay, Crete | CPC]

• After sundown, German battleship Bismarck and cruiser Prinz Eugen departed Gotenhafen (Gdynia), occupied Poland for the North Atlantic. The fleet was commanded by Admiral Günther Lütjens aboard Bismarck. ww2dbase [Battle of Denmark Strait | Deutsche Werke Gotenhafen | Gdynia, Pomorskie | CPC]

• Soviet leadership began a purge against Soviet Air Force officers. ww2dbase [CPC]

18 May 1941 Interactive Map

• The Royal Navy rejected American request for one of the three British carriers in the Indian Ocean to serve in the Southwest Pacific. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Most of the retreating troops of BURCORPS reached India. ww2dbase [Invasion of Burma | CPC]
• German submarine U-162 sank Norwegian tanker Beth (sailing in service of the British Royal Fleet Auxiliary force) off Barbados at 0210 hours. U-558 sank Dutch ship Fauna 25 miles northwest of British North Caicos island at 0615 hours. German submarine U-156 sank American ship Quaker City 460 miles east of Martinique at 1018 hours; 10 were killed, 29 survived. At 1852 hours, U-156 fired what would be the first of four torpedoes at British tanker San Eliseo between this evening and the next morning as she unsuccessfully chased the tanker. ww2dbase [Second Happy Time | CPC]
• German submarine U-125 sank US tanker Mercury Sun in the Caribbean Sea at 0606 hours. At 2150 hours, U-125 struck again, sinking US ship William J. Salman. ww2dbase [Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico Campaigns | CPC]
• Soviet submarine ShCh-205 sank Turkish ship Duatepe with torpedoes and schooner Kaynardzha with the deck gun 10 miles off Bulgaria; these ships were suspected of smuggling weapons to southern Ukraine for German forces. ww2dbase [ShCh-205 | CPC]
• British submarine HMS Turbulent arrived in the Gulf of Sirte north of Libya in the early hours of the day. At 0510 hours, 50 miles northwest of Benghazi, she spotted and sank Italian ship Bolsena. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Sydir Kovpak was made a Hero of the Soviet Union for the first time. ww2dbase [Sydir Kovpak | CPC]

• Australian 14th Militia Brigade arrived at Port Moresby, British Territory of Papua on New Guinea island. ww2dbase [New Guinea-Papua Campaign, Phase 2 | Port Moresby | CPC]

• RAF bombers conducted a raid on Mannheim, Germany. ww2dbase [Bombing of Hamburg, Dresden, and Other Cities | Mannheim, Baden | TH]
• Prinz Eugen arrived at Kiel, Germany to receive a new stern, which was destroyed on 23 Feb by a torpedo from HMS Trident. ww2dbase [Prinz Eugen | Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein | CPC]

• At Pearl Harbor, US Territory of Hawaii, Edwin Layton informed Joseph Rochefort that while Chester Nimitz would like to receive further evidence that Midway Atoll was indeed the next Japanese target. Meanwhile, Chester Nimitz ordered William Halsey to bring his carrier group back to the Hawaiian Islands as a precaution. ww2dbase [Battle of Midway and the Aleutian Islands | Pearl Harbor Navy Base and Ford Island Naval Air Station | Honolulu, Oahu | CPC]

• Nikita Khrushchev phoned Joseph Stalin at Moscow, Russia, requesting Stalin to pause the Kharkov offensive in Ukraine in order to focus on other more important campaigns; Stalin rejected the request. ww2dbase [Joseph Stalin | Moscow | CPC]

• 14th and 16th Panzer Divisions of the German 1st Panzer Army destroyed 130 Soviet tanks in combat in Ukraine, forcing Soviet forces to evacuate forward airfields at Izium and Petrovskaia. Semyon Timoshenko requested for permission to fall back from his positions near Kharkov, Ukraine due to this latest German counteroffensive; Joseph Stalin refused to grant his permission, ordering Timoshenko to continue the westward offensive. ww2dbase [Second Battle of Kharkov | Kharkov | TH, CPC]

• The newspaper New York Times published an article in an inside page that Germans had killed 100,000 Jews in the Baltic states, 100,000 in Poland, and 200,000 in Russia. ww2dbase [Discovery of Concentration Camps and the Holocaust | New York | CPC]

18 May 1942 Interactive Map

• The Papal Nuncio in Romania asked the Romanian foreign minister to allow the immigration of 8,000 Jewish orphans in Transnistria to Palestine. ww2dbase [CPC]
• After sundown, German submarine U-304 spotted Allied convoy SC 130 in the North Atlantic. ww2dbase [Black May | CPC]
• The Japanese Navy formed the 12th Air Fleet on paper with Vice Admiral Michitaro Tozuka in command and Rear Admiral Yoshiyuki Ichimiya as the chief of staff. ww2dbase [CPC]
• USS Pollack sank Japanese ship Terushima Maru in the Marshall Islands with two of three torpedoes fired. ww2dbase [Pollack | CPC]
• Nikolai Kamanin was promoted to the rank of major general to take command of the 8th Combined Air Corps. ww2dbase [Nikolai Kamanin | CPC]

• Japanese 3rd Division captured Songzi, Hubei Province, China. ww2dbase [Battle of Exi | Songzi, Hubei | CPC]

• At 0730 hours, a Spitfire aircraft of No. 542 Squadron RAF flew across the Ruhr region in Germany and photographed the extent of the damage from the Dambuster Raid. ww2dbase [Dambuster Raid | CPC]

• Auxiliary Aircraft Carrier USS Bogue and her task group departed Iceland and joined the escort of Convoy ON-184. ww2dbase [Black May | Bogue | Hvalfjörður | DS]

• The keel of Submarine No. 5091 was laid down at Kobe, Hyogo Prefecture, Japan by Kawasaki Shipbuilding Corporation. ww2dbase [I-14 | Kobe, Hyogo | CPC]

• Naka arrived at Jaluit Atoll, Marshall Islands. ww2dbase [Naka | Jaluit | CPC]

• Joseph Rochefort was detached from the Western Sea Frontier based in San Fracisco, California, United States. ww2dbase [Joseph Rochefort | San Francisco, California | CPC]

18 May 1943 Interactive Map

• Allied bombers conducted a raid on Belgrade, Yugoslavia. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Anglo-Indian troops attacked Japanese positions at Ninthoukgong, India. ww2dbase [Battle of Imphal-Kohima | CPC]
• Joseph Stilwell arrived at the Myitkyina airfield in Burma just a day after the airfield was captured, congratulating Frank Merrill in advance for the capture of the rest of the city, which he believed would be achieved within days. Later on the same day, Merrill dispatched a Chinese unit to attack the city; the attack was called off when two Chinese battalions mistakenly engaged each other in a fierce firefight. ww2dbase [Battle of Myitkyina | CPC]
• The Buckley-class destroyer-escort USS England (Commander W. B. Pendleton) attacked and sank Japanese submarine I-16, the first of six enemy submarines to be sunk by USS England over a twelve-day period. ww2dbase [AC]
• Martin Gottfried Weiss was promoted to the rank of SS-Obersturmbannführer. ww2dbase [Martin Gottfried Weiss | CPC]

• British 78th Division linked up with the Polish Corps in the Liri River valley 3.2 kilometers west of Cassino, Italy. Later on the same day, Polish troops captured the ruins of the Monte Cassino monastery. ww2dbase [Battle of Monte Cassino | Cassino, Lazio | TH, CPC]

• Kichisaburo Nomura was made a Privy Councillor. ww2dbase [Kichisaburo Nomura | CPC]

• USS Puffer attacked a Japanese convoy in the South China Sea, firing 9 torpedoes, 2 of which hit and sank freighter Shinryu Maru. ww2dbase [Puffer | South China Sea | CPC]

• The deportation of Crimean Tatars began. ww2dbase [Deportation of Crimean Tatars | Krym | CPC]

• USS Ranger departed New York bound for Norfolk, Virginia. ww2dbase [Ranger | New York | DS]

18 May 1944 Interactive Map

• Specially-modified American B-29 bombers arrived at Tinian, Mariana Islands in preparation of future atomic bomb missions. ww2dbase [Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki | CPC]
• Destroyer USS Longshaw, stuck on a reef, was sunk by Japanese shore battery at Okinawa, Japan. ww2dbase [Okinawa Campaign | CPC]
• King George VI of the United Kingdom awarded Philip Gardner a Victoria Cross for his daring rescue of comrades at Tobruk, Libya on 23 Nov 1941. ww2dbase [George VI | CPC]
• USS Missouri arrived at Apra Harbor, Guam, Mariana Islands. In the afternoon, she became the flagship of Admiral William Halsey of the US Navy 3rd Fleet. ww2dbase [Missouri | CPC]
• Captain Keiji Furutani was named the commanding officer of light carrier Hosho. ww2dbase [Hosho | CPC]
• Marshal Tito, in negotiations with British and US representatives over disputed territory, claimed to have the right to add Trieste to Yugoslav territory, and refused to leave the area. ww2dbase [Josip Tito | AC]

• German Field Marshal Ferdinand Schörner was captured by Americans in Austria. ww2dbase [Prague Strategic Offensive | CPC]
• Ferdinand Schörner surrendered to the Americans in Austria. ww2dbase [Ferdinand Schörner | CPC]

• USS Flying Fish arrived at Guam, Mariana Islands. ww2dbase [Flying Fish | CPC]
• USS Springer arrived at Guam, ending her second war patrol. ww2dbase [Springer | CPC]

• P-47 Thunderbolt aircraft based in Ie Shima near Okinawa attacked airfields on Kyushu, Japan. ww2dbase [CPC]

• USS Segundo encountered two bodies floating in the water in the East China Sea; her crew identified them to be one American and one Japanese. ww2dbase [Segundo | East China Sea | CPC]
• USS Bergall damaged a small Japanese vessel with her deck gun in the South China Sea. ww2dbase [Bergall | South China Sea | CPC]

• In the morning, four PV-1 Ventura aircraft of US Navy VPB-137 squadron took off from Clark Field in the Philippines to attack a sugar refinery and butanol plant operated by the Meiji Corporation in Taito (now Taitung), Taiwan. The four approached from the southeast in low altitude and dropped a total of 12 500-pound bombs on the target. One of them was hit by a 25-millimeter shell from a nearby anti-aircraft gun emplacement, injuring the turret gunner. The four aircraft proceeded northward toward Karenko (now Hualien), attacking targets of opportunity along the way, before turning out to sea to return to the Philippines. ww2dbase [Taito | CPC]

• US Navy gave the firm North American Aviation a contract for three XP-86 prototype jet fighters. ww2dbase [CPC]

18 May 1945 Interactive Map

• USS Gunnel was decommissioned from service at New London, Connecticut, United States. ww2dbase [Gunnel | New London, Connecticut | CPC]

18 May 1946 Interactive Map

• Chinese communist forces captured Huaide County, Jilin Province, China. ww2dbase [Jilin | CPC]

• Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic leaders ordered all non-Russian-language village names in Krym (Crimea), Russia to be given Russian-language names. ww2dbase [Deportation of Crimean Tatars | Krym | CPC]

• Tang Enbo successfully transported 200,000 taels (about 200 kilograms) of government gold from Shanghai, China to Taiwan. ww2dbase [Tang Enbo | CPC]

• USS Charr arrived at San Francisco Naval Shipyard, California, United States for overhaul. ww2dbase [Charr | San Francisco, California | CPC]

• Crown Prince Yi Un gained Japanese citizenship. ww2dbase [Yi Un | CPC]

• USS Wasp departed waters off Bermuda. ww2dbase [Wasp (Essex-class) | Boston, Massachusetts | CPC]

18 May 1963 Interactive Map

• The hull of submarine Sea Cat was sold for scrap. ww2dbase [Sea Cat | CPC]
• Submarine Sennet was sold to Southern Scrap Material Company, Limited of New Orleans, Louisiana, United States for US$103,889. ww2dbase [Sennet | CPC]

• Lu Han's memorial service was held in Beijing, China. ww2dbase [Lu Han | Beijing | CPC]

• Eleonore Baur passed away in Oberhaching, Germany. ww2dbase [Eleonore Baur | Oberhaching | CPC]

• Erich Traub passed away in his sleep in Rosenheim, West Germany. ww2dbase [Erich Traub | Rosenheim | CPC]