WW II Historical Thread, Discussion, Pics, Videos

Miragedriver

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Operation Barbarossa:
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Miragedriver

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The next three post as of the German Occupation of Minsk during June , 1941,
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Armoured vehicles are running along Bogdanovich Street.

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Minsk Airport with abandoned fighters I-153 'Chaika'.


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Miragedriver

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Soviet military men convoyed by German soldiers, are cleaning up Leninskaya Street.

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German soldiers are going along the same street, which now looks cleaner.

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German photographers in the ruins.

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Soviet Soldier take prisoner

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Refugees returning to Minsk


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Miragedriver

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In the middle there is Hinrich Lohse who participated in foundation of concentration camps and in 1948 was sentenced to just 10 years in prison; was released in 1951 for health reasons and died in 1964.

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In the middle there is policeman Carl Zenner who in 1961 was sentenced to 15 years in prison for killing 6000 jews of Minsk.


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German Pilots celebrate Christmas.


The true horrors of war are minuet compared to the suffering that young children should never have to endure. Images like these bring me great anguish, since I have sons this age.
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Children watch as their neighborhood is bombed in Minsk, Belorussia. The bombing was part of Operation Barbarossa. June, 1941.

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Overcrowded transit camp near Smolensk, Russia, August 1941.


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Miragedriver

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Marine Pfc. Douglas Lightheart (right) cradles his .30 caliber M1919 Browning machine gun in his lap, while he and Marine Pfc. Gerald Thursby Sr. take a cigarette break, during mopping up operations on Peleliu on 14th September 1944.

A mystery that was decades in the making ended with just one glance.
The daughter of the World War II Marine took one look at her computer screen and recognized him.
"Oh, my God, that is my dad," said Becky Thursby Cardarella.

She knew right away that the man in the iconic black-and-white photo was her father, Marine Pfc. Gerald Paul Thursby Sr., crouching next to another Marine during the battle of Peleliu on Sept. 15, 1944.

Historians have been working to identify her father. All they had had to go on was a caption that identified the man in the photo as Pfc. Gerald Churchby of Akron.
But historians were stumped, because they could not find any Marine named Churchby who lived in Akron.
The other Marine was correctly identified as Pfc. Douglas Lightheart, who died in Michigan in 2006 at the age of 86.

The Akron Beacon Journal ran an article in August laying out the mystery and asking for help in finding Churchby.

Jason McDonald, the Web master for a World War II multimedia database, wanted to settle once and for all who was Churchby, whose photograph is now in the National Archives.

This week, three months after the story was published, McDonald said he was contacted by Michael Conrad, who had found the name "Gerald Thursby" on
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McDonald said he then was able to locate an obituary for Thursby's wife, Cleo, who died eight years ago.
That led to Gerald Thursby's obituary. He died of complications from pneumonia on July 19, 1999, in Dallas. The search ended this week with the Facebook find of his daughter, Becky Thursby Cardarella of Afton, Minn.
"If you saw other pictures of my dad, you would immediately see it was him," she said.

The photo shows a young Gerald Thursby, a Marine who happened to be photographed shortly after landing on Peleliu Island. He is holding a cigarette and an M1 Garand rifle across his lap.

"He was a very easygoing, loving man," said his 55-year-old daughter.

He and Cleo were married in 1946. They had six children, one of whom, Linda, died in childhood. They had twin sons, Don and Dan, born in 1960. Don Thursby lives in Wyoming, Mich., and Dan Thursby lives in Ferris, Texas.
The remaining children are Kitty Thursby Reese, who lives in Geneva, Ohio, and Gerald Thursby II, of Ferris, Texas.

After graduating from Coventry High School, the family says, Gerald joined the Marines in early 1942, less than a month after Pearl Harbor was attacked.

While he was at war, his mother, Minnie Thursby, died at the age of 51 of an asthma attack, said his sister, Barbara Mc-Kissick, 80, of Phoenix.

"Oh, my goodness, that is Jerry," she said this week as she looked at a computer image of the mystery photo. "That is my brother."
She said her brother never spoke of the war.

McDonald said it is terrific that the correct name of the Marine has been discovered.

He said he still hopes to compare a family photograph of Thursby to the Peleliu photo to verify that it is indeed Thursby.

But he said he's confident the mystery has been solved based on a review of the Marine's discharge papers.

"There are all sorts of Peleliu researchers who always wondered who it is," said McDonald, a middle school teacher in Brooklyn, N.Y.
He said he had gotten to the point where he had given up hopes of finding out the answer to the mystery.
"I figured we weren't going to find him," he said.

It appears the error started with the photographer, who misspelled Thursby's name after the photograph was taken.

Cardarella said her father's discharge papers say he served on Peleliu Island.

"It is amazing," she said, to see the photograph of her father that has been admired by others for nearly 70 years. "What is remarkable about the whole thing is I never even saw that photo (before)."

She said her father spoke little of the battle. "I think it was a memory that he wanted to forget," she said.



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Miragedriver

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A British Crusader tank passes a burning German Panzer IV tank during 'Operation Crusader'. Cyrenaica (the eastern province of Libya). Winter 1941.

Operation Crusader:
was a military operation by the British Eighth Army between 18 November–30 December 1941 during the Second World War. The operation relieved the 1941 Siege of Tobruk. The Eighth Army's initial plan to destroy the Axis armoured force before advancing its infantry came apart when, after a number of inconclusive engagements, the British 7th Armoured Division were heavily defeated by the Afrika Korps at Sidi Rezegh. Lieutenant General Erwin Rommel's subsequent advance of his armoured divisions to the Axis fortress positions on the Egyptian border, failed to find the main body of the Allied infantry, which had bypassed the fortresses and headed for Tobruk, so Rommel had to withdraw his armoured units to support the fighting at Tobruk. Despite achieving some tactical successes at Tobruk, the need to preserve his remaining forces prompted Rommel to withdraw his army to the defensive line at Gazala, west of Tobruk and then all the way back to El Agheila. It was the first victory over the German ground forces by British-led forces in the Second World War.

The Tank, Cruiser, Mk VI or A15 Crusader:
was one of the primary British cruiser tanks of the early part Second World War and perhaps the most important British tank of the North African Campaign.
The Crusader's mobility made it a favorite of British tank crews and once upgraded with the Ordnance QF 6 pounder main gun made it more than a match for the early Panzer III and Panzer IV tanks it faced in combat. Retained in service because of delays with its replacement, by late 1942 the lack of armament upgrade combined with the presence of Tiger I Tanks among the Afrika Korps and reliability problems due to the harsh desert conditions, led to the Crusader being replaced in the main line of battle by US-supplied M3 Grant and Sherman medium tanks. The next British cruiser to see combat would be the Cromwell heavy cruiser


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Miragedriver

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"Soviet artillerymen transporting a 76-mm divisional gun M1942 (ZiS-3) during the forced crossing of the Oder River, Germany, c. December, 1944."

The Vistula-Oder Offensive commenced on the 12th of January 1945 , so it's possible that this photo may represent an earlier training exercise or the date of the caption should be later.

Gun facts;
Weight combat: 1,116 kg(2,460 lbs) travel: 2,150 kg
(4,730 lbs)
Crew - 7 (the seventh crew member is just off camera, extreme left)
Caliber - 76.2 mm (3 in)
Rate of fire - up to 25 rounds per minute
Maximum firing range - 13.29 km (8.25 mi)

Photograph by Dmitri Baltermants. (During World War II, Baltermants covered the battle of Stalingrad, and the battles of the Red Army in Russia and Ukraine. He was twice wounded.)


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Miragedriver

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"An American Marine aiming his Garand M1 rifle, whilst perched on Japanese ammunition crates (empty ?) on the Island of Iwo Jima." c. February/March 1945

(Note the WW1-style M1917 trench knife tucked in behind his canteen.)

The Marine is Platoon Sgt. Rinaldo Martini (MCSN: 306732), of the 27th Marines, 5th Division. He received the Silver Star for service on Iwo Jima.

Silver Star Citation;
The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star to Sergeant Rinaldo Martini (MCSN: 306732), United States Marine Corps, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity while serving as a Machine Gun Section Leader of Company C, First Battalion, Twenty-seventh Marines, FIFTH Marine Division, during action against enemy Japanese forces on Iwo Jima, Volcano Islands, 19 February 1945. Acting on his own initiative when his company was halted in its advance by an enemy blockhouse, Sergeant Martini took his machine gun and worked his way forward to a shell hole in front of the hostile emplacement. Standing up and firing from his hip, he managed to pin down the Japanese occupants until a demolitions man could move forward and destroy it. His courageous devotion to duty was in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.


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Miragedriver

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Medics of the US. 5th Infantry Division examining GI clothing found with German-captured equipment after the liberation of the area, near Diekirch in Luxembourg on the 20th of January 1945.

They are (L to R) Pfc Howard G. Lepcofker, NY, T/4 Francis A. Dafeo, Philadelphia PA and Pfc Harold C. Graham, Cleveland, Ohio.

General Patton's US 5th Inf. Div., had crossed the frozen Sauer River on their way to liberate Diekirch from the Germans on the night of the 18th January 1945.


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Miragedriver

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Flying Officer Leonard Haines of No. 19 Squadron RAF sits by the cockpit of his Supermarine Spitfire Mk.Ia (QV-?) at Fowlmere, near Duxford. September 1940.

Leonard Archibald Haines, from Melcombe Regis in Dorset, joined the RAF on a short service commission in September 1937. He was with 19 Squadron at Duxford in early 1940. Over Dunkirk on 1st June he destroyed a Me109 and on a later patrol damaged a He111. On 19th August Haines shared a Me110, on 3rd September he destroyed a Me110, on the 5th a Me109, on the 11th a Me110, on the 15th two Me109's and a Me110 and on the 18th he shared a Ju88 and probably destroyed a Me109. He was awarded the DFC during (gazetted 8th October 1940).
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At the time, replacement pilots were put in the hands of more experienced pilots to, "...give them a sporting chance". David Cox, a sergeant pilot with 19 Squadron, was taken under the wing of Fl. Off. Haines. Sgt. Cox said later, "I can give credit to him for the fact that I stayed alive as long as I did. He used to say, just keep my tail wheel in front of you and stick to me. Don't worry about shooting things. If you can follow me, you'll learn to throw a Spitfire about, which is what I did". (
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Haines shared a Me109 on 5th November, shared a Me110 on the 15th and destroyed a Me109 on the 28th. He was posted away in late 1940 to be an instructor at 53 OTU at RAF Heston and was killed in a flying accident on 30th April 1941 whilst flying a Miles Master T8771 which spun into the ground at Hounslow Barracks, Middlesex. Cpl. Thomas F.G. Press, his passenger, was also killed.
At the time of his death, Len was an Acting Flt.Lt. aged 21 and Corporal Press was 36.

They are interred in the Heston and Isleworth (Hounslow) Cemetery. Middlesex.


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