World War II Database

• Home
• » Events
• » WW2 Timeline
• » 18 Sep 1942

• Orders from Heinrich Himmler: The SS was to have full judicial control over Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Jewish, and Roma prisoners; all prisoners of the German justice system capable of work were to be transferred to concentration camps for forced labor; food rations for Jews in Germany were to be reduced. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• Monsignor Montini, future Pope Paul VI, sent a letter to Pope Pius XII, noting that "the massacres of the Jews reach frightening proportions and forms". ww2dbase [Main Article | Event | CPC]
• Soviet troops launched an offensive from the Voronezh Front in Russia. ww2dbase [TH]
• 4,180 men of US 7th Marine Regiment arrived at Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. The American beachhead strength was now at 22,500 men. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• The US Marine Corps 1st Parachute Battalion departed for Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides. ww2dbase [CPC]
• British 29th Infantry Brigade landed at Tamatave, Madagascar. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• The US Second Air Force started to phase out the training of B-17 and B-24 bomber aircrews in order to concentrate on the training of B-29 Superfortress crews for the proposed, China-based, Twentieth Air Force. ww2dbase [AC]

• German submarine U-175 sank Canadian ship Norfolk 25 miles off British Guyana at 0152 hours; 6 were killed, 13 survived. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• The Olaf Fostenes, a 2,994-ton Norwegian motor merchant, was on a voyage alone from Liverpool, England, United Kingdom to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada in ballast when torpedoed by German submarine U-380 (Kapitänleutnant Josef Röther) at 0921 hours. Master Valvatne, all of the 32 crew members, and three gunners abandoned ship in two lifeboats and were questioned by the Germans who asked for the master but they were told that he had been lost. The survivors set sail for Newfoundland and would be located by an aircraft on 26 Sep 1942. The Olaf Fostenes and her two sister ships were modern fruit transports known for their high speed. ww2dbase [Main Article | HM]

• Tenryu departed Rabaul, New Britain. ww2dbase [Main Article | Tabular Record of Movement | CPC]
• US B-17 Flying Fortress bombers attacked Rabaul, New Britain, causing little damage. ww2dbase [CPC]

• Japanese troops began retreating back along the Kokoda Track across the Owen Stanley Range in Australian Papua. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]

• Theresienstadt Concentration Camp in occupied Czechoslovakia surpassed its maximum capacity; 58,491 prisoners now resided in the camp. ww2dbase [Main Article | Facility | CPC]

• Nachi arrived at Ominato Guard District, Mutsu, Aomori Prefecture, Japan. ww2dbase [Main Article | Tabular Record of Movement | CPC]

• Kamoi arrived at Mili, Marshall Islands. ww2dbase [Main Article | Tabular Record of Movement | CPC]

• USS S-44 suffered an accidental hydrogen fire in her forward battery compartment. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]

• Soviet 1st Guards Army and 24th Army attacked German VIII Army Corps at Kotluban 40 kilometers north of Stalingrad, Russia; German Stuka dive bombers hampered the attack by destroying 41 of the 106 Soviet tanks committed, while escorting Bf 109 fighters destroyed 77 Soviet aircraft in the immediate area. In the city, heavy house-to-house fighting continued. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]
• 12 German He 111 torpedo bombers attacked Allied convoy PQ-18 at the entrance of the Kola Inlet, Russia, sinking US ship Kentucky (all aboard survived) at the cost of 3 aircraft shot down. ww2dbase [Main Article | CPC]

18 Sep 1942 Interactive Map