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• Pilots of US Navy squadron VF-66, flying FR Fireball piston-jet mix-powered fighters, flew qualifying missions from USS Ranger; two aircraft were damaged while landing. ww2dbase [FR Fireball | CPC]
• USS Sennet attacked a Japanese destroyer off Japan; all six torpedoes missed. ww2dbase [Sennet | CPC]
• HMS Cumberland continued bombardments on airfields at Port Blair and Car, Nicobar Islands. ww2dbase [Cumberland | DS]
• USS Hawkbill damaged Japanese minelayer Hatsutaka, which was grounded to prevent sinking. ww2dbase [Hawkbill | CPC]
• The Mexican Expeditionary Air Force arrived in the Philippine Islands. ww2dbase [Philippines Campaign, Phase 2 | CPC]
• German concentration camp authorities ordered the execution of Kurt Schuschnigg. ww2dbase [CPC]

• Indian 50th Parachute Regiment was dropped near Rangoon, Burma as the spearhead to Operation Dracula. Meanwhile, determined to preempt Operation Dracula in the conquest of Rangoon, William Slim carelessly attempted to enter the city himself by air; his aircraft was damaged by Japanese anti-aircraft fire and the American pilot, Captain Robert Fullerton, sustained injuries in his leg so severe that it had to be amputated later. ww2dbase [Battle of Rangoon | Rangoon | CPC]

• Submarine I-369 arrived at Truk, Caroline Islands. This would be the last submarine-transport to arrive at Truk in the Pacific War. ww2dbase [I-369 | Truk | CPC]

• Japanese troops began to withdraw from southern China. ww2dbase [CPC]

• Allied forces captured German Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt in Bad Tölz, Germany. ww2dbase [Gerd von Rundstedt | Bad Tölz, München-Oberbayern | CPC]
• Artur Axmann departed from Adolf Hitler's bunker in Berlin, Germany. ww2dbase [Artur Axmann | Berlin | CPC]
• Soviet SMERSH agents arrested Reichssicherhetsdienst (RSD) Gruppe commander Oberführer Johann Rattenhuber in Berlin, Germany. ww2dbase [Berlin | CPC]
• German pilot Willi Kriessmann ferried an Ar 234 jet bomber to German Luftwaffe bomber group Kampfgeschwader 76. ww2dbase [Ar 234 Blitz | CPC]
• Hans Krebs informed Vasily Chuikov of Adolf Hitler's suicide, thus Chuikov became the first Soviet general to learn of this news. ww2dbase [Vasily Chuikov | Berlin | CPC]
• Near Plön, Germany, Karl Dönitz took his new post in accordance with Adolf Hitler's will and immediately ordered the strongest resistance in the east, as tens of thousands of civilians struggled to stay ahead of oncoming Soviet forces. ww2dbase [Karl Dönitz | Plön, Schleswig-Holstein | TH]
• German 12.Armee retreated from Berlin, Germany to the Elbe River and attempted to begin negotiations with US troops. ww2dbase [Battle of Berlin | Berlin | TH]
• US Ninth and British Second Armies combined their bridgeheads across the Elbe River in northern Germany. ww2dbase [TH]
• The column of prisoners of war that SS-Feldgendarmerie personnel forced out of Marlag und Milag Nord prisoners of war camp in Westertimke, Germany on 2 Apr 1945 were liberated by the British 11th Armoured Division in Lübeck, Germany. ww2dbase [Marlag und Milag Nord | Lübeck, Schleswig-Holstein | HM]
• US Third Army arrived on the pre-war German-Austrian border. ww2dbase [TH]
• Joseph Goebbels and his wife committed suicide in the garden of the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany after poisoning their six children with cyanide. ww2dbase [Joseph Goebbels | Reich Chancellery | Berlin | CPC]
• Gorch Fock was scuttled in shallow waters off Rügen, Germany. ww2dbase [Gorch Fock | Rügen, Pommern | CPC]

• USS Dragonet arrived at Guam, Mariana Islands. ww2dbase [Dragonet | CPC]

• USS Ticonderoga arrived at Pearl Harbor, US Territory of Hawaii. ww2dbase [Ticonderoga | Pearl Harbor Navy Base and Ford Island Naval Air Station | Pearl Harbor, Oahu | DS]

• British Wing Commander James Nicholson, the only fighter pilot during the war to be awarded the Victoria Cross (during the Battle of Britain), was killed when the Liberator bomber in which he was flying as an observer suffered an engine fire and crashed into the sea off Calcutta, India. ww2dbase [AC]

• New Zealand troops captured Udina and linked up with Yugoslavian partisans near Trieste after the Yugoslavian forces beat the British 8th Army in capturing Trieste. ww2dbase [Udine, Friuli-Venezia Giulia | TH]
• The US 15th Air Force conducted its final bombing mission in Italy. Meanwhile, German troops in Italy surrendered in accordance with secret negotiations, followed by an announcement for the cessation of hostilities. ww2dbase [Operation Grapeshot and Operation Roast | TH]

• Vice Admiral Yoshiharu Kobayashi was made the commanding officer of Maizuru Naval Arsenal in Kyoto Prefecture, Japan. ww2dbase [Maizuru Naval Arsenal | Maizuru, Kyoto | CPC]

• US B-17 bombers dropped crates of K-rations over Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands. ww2dbase [Operations Manna, Chowhound, and Faust | Haarlemmermeer, Noord-Holland | CPC]

• On USS Bowfin's eighth war patrol, she spotted the 2,720-ton Passenger-Cargo ship Chowa Maru southeast of Hokkaido, Japan. Bowfin fired two torpedoes and Chowa Maru sank within 10 minutes with the loss of 41 crewmen. ww2dbase [Bowfin | DS]

• US Far East Air Force B-25 bombers attacked targets in the town of Kagi (now Chiayi) and the sugar refinery in Heito (now Pingtung or Pingdong), Taiwan. ww2dbase [Kagi, Tainan | CPC]

• USS Nashville departed Puget Sound, Washington, United States. ww2dbase [Nashville | Puget Sound, Washington | CPC]
• George Brett was reactivated from the US Army retired list. ww2dbase [George Brett | CPC]

1 May 1945 Interactive Map