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• Before dawn, British destroyer HMS Decoy, destroyer HMS Hereward, and gunboat HMS Ladybird landed 200 commandos and 24 Royal Marines on the Italian-held Dodecanese island of Castelorizo, off the coast of Turkey, capturing a small Italian garrison. Italian aircraft responded, damaging HMS Ladybird, but was able to retrieve the raiders and sail for the British Crown Colony of Cyprus. The codename for the raid was Operation Abstention. ww2dbase [TH]
• Werner Mölders claimed his 60th victory. ww2dbase [Werner Mölders | CPC]
• American scientists Glenn Seaborg and Arthur Wahl discovered Plutonium. ww2dbase [Operation Trinity and Manhattan Project | CPC]
• German bombers sank 4 merchant ships and German motor torpedo boats sank 1 merchant ship at various locations on the British coast. ww2dbase [CPC]
• German submarine U-70 sank Swedish ship Gotenborg south of Iceland. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Francisco Franco refused Hitler's 6 Feb 1941 request for Spain to enter the war. ww2dbase [Francisco Franco | CPC]

• German submarine U-47 attacked Allied convoy OB-290 190 miles northwest of Ireland before dawn, sinking 3 merchant ships (5,254-ton Belgian vessel Kasongo, 3,636-ton Norwegian vessel Borgland, and 3,197-ton Swedish vessel Rydboholm) and damage 1 (8,106-ton British vessel Diala). U-47 was attacked by depth charges, which called for assistance in the form of Fw 200 bombers of I. Gruppe KG 40 based in Bordeaux, France. The aircraft attacked from three different directions from 0900 to 1845 hours, sinking 7 ships without losing any aircraft. The victims of the Fw 200 bombers were 4,328-ton British vessel Swinburne (all survived), 7,181-ton British vessel Mahanada (3 killed), 4,966-ton British vessel Llanwern (27 killed), 8,156-ton Dutch merchant steamer Amstelland (1 killed), 4,328-ton Dutch merchant steamer Beursplein (21 killed), 4,340-ton Greek merchant steamer Kyriekoula (all survived), and 2,580-ton Norwegian merchant steamer Solferino (3 killed). ww2dbase [U-47 | CPC, HM]
• Jaguar and Iltis completed laying a minefield off Eastbourne, England, United Kingdom. ww2dbase [Iltis | Jaguar | English Channel | CPC]

• In a night-time sortie by the German 1st MTB Flotilla, the boat S28, commanded by Lieutenant Commander Klug, sank the 1,123-ton British freighter Minorca off the Norfolk coast on Sheringham shoal near Cromer, England, United Kingdom. The freighter was carrying 1,350 tons of cement from London to Grangemouth, Scotland, United Kingdom. The captain, 17 of the crew, along with 2 passengers, were lost. Only 3 survivors were picked up. ww2dbase [England | HM]
• The 5,055-ton Norwegian motor steamer Teneriffa sank in the Bristol Channel, after having been machine gunned and bombed by German aircraft. At 1405 hours, two enemy aircraft machine gunned the ship's decks, coming in for four passes and the ship got three direct bomb hits on her starboard side, where deck plates and several plates in her side were blown out. The first explosion was in No. 2 hatch, the second in the engine room and the third in No. 3 hatch. She had left Newport, Monmouthshire, Wales, United Kingdom, for Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, also in Wales, with a cargo of 2,400 tons of china clay and about 100 tons of general cargo that same morning in order to join a westbound Atlantic convoy for St. Johns, Newfoundland. All 36 crew survived the attack. ww2dbase [Wales | HM]

26 Feb 1941 Interactive Map