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• British Army Major Herbert Le Patourel won the Victoria Cross for single-handedly taking an enemy position near Tunis in which he was seriously wounded. ww2dbase [AC]
• US Air Transport Command began flying "the Hump" into China. ww2dbase [Burma Road and the Hump | CPC]
• General Hitoshi Imamura arrived in Rabaul, New Britain to take command of the Japanese South Pacific Area and the Seventeenth Army. ww2dbase [Hitoshi Imamura | CPC]

• The US merchant ship SS Coamo was sunk by German submarine U-604 off Bermuda while on route to New York from Gibraltar. The ship was detached from the convoy she started in and was never heard from again. A total of 186 lives were lost in what was the greatest loss aboard any US flag merchant vessel during WW2. ww2dbase [AC]

• Submarine USS Spearfish departed Brisbane, Australia, on her sixth war patrol bound for the Bismarck Islands. ww2dbase [Spearfish | Brisbane | DS]

• Georgios Tsolakoglou was removed as the Prime Minister of the German puppet Hellenic State. ww2dbase [Georgios Tsolakoglou | CPC]
• Konstantinos Logothetopoulos was made the Prime Minister of the Hellenic State. ww2dbase [Konstantinos Logothetopoulos | Athens | CPC]

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

• Battleship USS Indiana, cruiser USS Columbia, and destroyers USS Saufley, and USS DeHaven arrived at Nouméa, New Caledonia. ww2dbase [Saufley | Nouméa | DS]

• USS Honolulu arrived at Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides. ww2dbase [Honolulu | Segond Channel, Espiritu Santo | DS]

• Two transports arrived at Auschwitz Concentration Camp on this date. The first transport from Westerbork Concentration Camp in the Netherlands arrived with 826 Jews; 77 of them were registered into the camp, and the remaining 749 were gassed. The second transport from Grodno ghetto arrived with 1,000 Jews; 178 men and 60 women were registered into the camp, and the remaining 762 were gassed. ww2dbase [Discovery of Concentration Camps and the Holocaust | Auschwitz Concentration Camp | Oswiecim | CPC]

• British 2nd Parachute Battalion engaged elements of 3rd Battalion of German 5th Parachute Regiment at El Fedja, Tunisia. ww2dbase [Advance into Tunisia | CPC]

• Enrico Fermi's atomic reactor Chicago Pile-1 at the University of Chicago, Illinois, United States initiated the world's first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction. ww2dbase [Operation Trinity and Manhattan Project | Chicago, Illinois | CPC]
• USS Harder was commissioned into service with Commander Samuel Dealey in command. ww2dbase [Harder | CPC]
• Auxiliary Aircraft Carrier USS Card departed Puget Sound, Washington bound for San Diego, California. ww2dbase [Puget Sound Navy Yard | Card | Puget Sound, Washington | DS]
• Ira Hayes joined Company B, 3rd Parachute Battalion, Divisional Special Troops, 3rd Marine Division, at Camp Elliott, Linda Vista, California, United States. ww2dbase [Ira Hayes | Linda Vista, California | CPC]

2 Dec 1942 Interactive Map