WWII
As the light of a sickly green flare shot skyward, three Marines from the 11th Machine Gun Squad, H Company, 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment crouched in the hole awaiting the Japanese onslaught on Guadalcanal. Read more
WWII
The heavy cruiser USS Houston ventured into the Sunda Strait off the coast of Java on the dark night of February 28, 1942, and was never heard from again. Read more
WWII
Many accounts have been written about the peace mission flight of Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess and his parachute landing in a farm field in Scotland in May 1941 to discuss with the Duke of Hamilton a proposal to end hostilities. Read more
WWII
In the Academy Award-winning film Patton, the setting was all wrong when actor George C. Scott delivered General George S. Read more
WWII
In 1934 the British War office accepted a new aircraft design eventually designated the Hawker Hurricane Mark 1. Read more
WWII
Nineteen-year-old Private First Class Peter Gaidosh of East Rochester, NY, was enjoying that rarest of wartime treats—a hot breakfast of fresh eggs, coffee, and pancakes—on the front lines. Read more
WWII
After September 1, 1939, and Germany’s invasion of Poland, a trickle of so-called “death cards” began appearing in homes across the Third Reich. Read more
WWII
“One of the greatest heroes in American history never fired a bullet.” That is the tagline of Director Mel Gibson’s 2016 film, Hacksaw Ridge. Read more
WWII
One of the foremost German characters in the Battle of the Bulge was Obersturmbannführer (Lieutenant Colonel) Joachim Peiper, the notorious Waffen-SS commander of the strongest armored Kampfgruppe (KG) of the 1st SS Panzer Division, Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler (LSSAH). Read more
WWII
The officers huddled in a candlelit cellar in an abandoned farmhouse midway between the Oder River and Berlin. Read more
WWII
A great deal has been written about the Battle for Saipan, including the Battle of the Philippine Sea, remembered today as having included “The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot.” Read more
WWII
By Christmas 1941, Robert Hunt, torpedoman on the submarine USS Tambor, had witnessed the Japanese bombing of Wake Island, had slept in the Tambor’s forward torpedo room on the way back to Pearl with a bomb-induced leak bubbling in the corner, and had stood on his sub’s bow and seen the devastation of Battleship Row as debris in the oil-slicked harbor bumped against the hull. Read more
WWII
Stanley Johnston, a reporter for the Chicago Tribune accredited to the Navy as a correspondent, had made two forays into the South Pacific aboard the aircraft carrier Lexington. Read more
WWII
On the morning of June 6, 1944, the 2nd Ranger Battalion, commanded by Lt. Col. James Earl Rudder, began its ascent of a sheer 100-foot precipice called Pointe du Hoc. Read more
WWII
The pilots of Bombing Squadron 6 could not believe what they were seeing on the morning of June 4, 1942. Read more
WWII
On the chilly afternoon of Tuesday, December 26, 1944, a column of mud-caked Sherman tanks, halftracks, scout cars, and tank destroyers of the U.S. Read more
WWII
When it came to weapons production, the Imperial Japanese Army’s requirements often came in second to the needs of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Read more
WWII
Mired in combat during the Battle of Hürtgen Forest of Germany, an American soldier wrote in December 5, 1944: “The road to the front led straight and muddy brown between the billowing greenery of the broken topless firs, and in the jeeps that were coming back they were bringing the still living. Read more
WWII
When athletes become pawns of politicians, their skills being touted as proof of their country’s ideological superiority over others, seldom are events played out as the demagogues would have scripted. Read more
WWII
Standing on an ugly carbuncle of volcanic rock 500 feet above the Pacific Ocean, the Associated Press photographer swung a cumbersome news camera toward six men holding a pipe with a flag tied to it and pressed the shutter release. Read more
