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• » 1 Feb 1943

• The 1st Free French Division (later to become the 1st Motorised Division) was established. ww2dbase [AC]

• Destroyer Yukikaze evacuated troops from Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• Japanese troops began to be evacuated from Guadalcanal by destroyers commanded by Rear Admiral Shintaro. ww2dbase [Main Article | TH]

• Repair ship Akashi completed the repair work for destroyer Oyashio and began repair transport Nankai Maru at Truk, Caroline Islands. ww2dbase [Main Article | Tabular Record of Movement | CPC]

• Joseph Stilwell departed Chongqing, China for India. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]

• Cruiser Köln departed a German port for the Baltic Sea. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• As of this month, 1,622,000 prisoners of war and 4,121,000 foreigners were now serving as forced laborers in Germany. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Maximilian von Weichs was promoted to the rank of Generalfeldmarschall. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• Adolf Hitler's special train Amerika was renamed Brandenburg. ww2dbase [CPC]

• Barbers Point Naval Air Station: Air Raid drill. Torpedo Squadron 11 (VT-11; model TBF) departed. Radio transmission facilities usably complete. ww2dbase [Main Article | DS]

• Tenryu was struck from the navy list. ww2dbase [Main Article | Tabular Record of Movement | CPC]
• Nachi arrived at Yokosuka, Japan. ww2dbase [Main Article | Tabular Record of Movement | CPC]

• USS Columbia arrived at Efate, New Hebrides. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]

• USS Tunny entered waters off China. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• The Fletcher-class destroyer USS De Haven was sunk by Japanese aircraft off Savo Island, Solomon Islands. ww2dbase [AC]

• At Auschwitz Concentration Camp in occupied Poland, SS personnel selected 20 Jewish prisoners who were already working at the crematorium in Auschwitz I and readied them for work in the soon-to-be-ready new crematoriums in Birkenau. ww2dbase [Main Article | Facility | CPC]

• Trapped in the ruins of a department store in Stalingrad, Russia, Friedrich Paulus surrendered the southern pocket along with 14 of his generals; Paulus became the first German field marshal to surrender to an enemy force. Fighting continued in the northern pocket, however, and 85 of the 108 transport aircraft dispatched to airdrop supplies to the northern pocket were able to do so. ww2dbase [Main Article | AC, CPC]
• Germans fell back from Demyansk, Russia. ww2dbase [TH]

• The keel of CV-14, originally destined to be USS Hancock, was laid down at Norfolk, Virginia, United States. ww2dbase [Main Article | DS]

1 Feb 1943 Interactive Map