|
Convoy Pq 18
Convoy PQ 18 (2–21 September 1942) was an Arctic convoy of forty Allied freighters from Scotland and Iceland to Arkhangelsk in the Soviet Union during the Second World War. The convoy departed Loch Ewe, Scotland on 2 September 1942, rendezvoused with more ships and escorts at Iceland and arrived at Arkhangelsk on 21 September. An exceptionally large number of escorts were provided by the Royal Navy in Operation EV, including the first escort carrier to accompany an Arctic convoy. Detailed information on German intentions was provided by the code breakers at Bletchley Park and elsewhere, through Ultra signals decrypts and eavesdropping on ''Luftwaffe'' wireless communications. The German code-breakers read some British signals and the ''Luftwaffe'' used the lull in convoys after Convoy PQ 17 (27 June – 10 July) to prepare a maximum effort with the ''Kriegsmarine''. From 12 to 21 September Convoy PQ 18 was attacked by bombers, torpedo-bombers, U-boats and mines, which sank thi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arctic Convoys
The Arctic convoys of World War II were oceangoing convoys which sailed from the United Kingdom, Iceland, and North America to northern ports in the Soviet Union – primarily Arkhangelsk (Archangel) and Murmansk in Russia. There were 78 convoys between August 1941 and May 1945, sailing via several seas of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, with periods with no sailings during several months in 1942, and in the summers of 1943 and 1944. About 1,400 merchant ships delivered essential supplies to the Soviet Union under the Anglo-Soviet Agreement and US Lend-Lease program, escorted by ships of the Royal Navy, Royal Canadian Navy, and the U.S. Navy. Eighty-five merchant vessels and 16 Royal Navy warships (two cruisers, six destroyers, eight other escort ships) were lost. Nazi Germany's ''Kriegsmarine'' lost a number of vessels including one battleship, three destroyers, 30 U-boats, and many aircraft. The convoys demonstrated the Allies' commitment to helping the Soviet Union, prior to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Navy Armed Guard
The United States Navy Armed Guard was a force of United States Navy gunners and related personnel established during World War II to protect U.S. merchant shipping from enemy attack.World War II U.S. Navy Armed Guard and World War II U.S. Merchant Marine, 2007-2014 Project Liberty Ship, Project Liberty Ship, P.O. Box 25846 Highlandtown Station, Baltimore, M/ref> A shortage of escort vessels to provide unarmed merchant vessels with adequate protection shifted the burden to onboard crews to help counter the constant danger presented by Axis (World War II), Axis submarines, surface raiders, fighter aircraft and bombers. The NAG was headquartered in New Orleans, and had three training centers, at Norfolk, Virginia; San Diego, California; and Gulfport, Mississippi. At the end of the war, there were 144,857 men serving in the Navy Armed Guard on 6,200 ships.Armed Guard - Sea Lane Vigilantes, Project Liberty Ship, 201/ref> Unit composition The United States Navy Armed Guard ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curtiss P-40 Warhawk
The Curtiss P-40 Warhawk is an American single-engined, single-seat, all-metal fighter-bomber that first flew in 1938. The P-40 design was a modification of the previous Curtiss P-36 Hawk which reduced development time and enabled a rapid entry into production and operational service. The Warhawk was used by most Allies of World War II, Allied powers during World War II, and remained in frontline service until the end of the war. It was the third most-produced American fighter of World War II, after the North American P-51 Mustang and Republic P-47 Thunderbolt; by November 1944, when production of the P-40 ceased, 13,738 had been built,Murphy and McNiece 2009, p. 83. all at Curtiss-Wright Corporation's main production facilities in Buffalo, New York. P-40 Warhawk was the name the United States Army Air Corps gave the plane, and after June 1941, the USAAF adopted the name for all models, making it the official name in the US for all P-40s. The Commonwealth of Nations, British Com ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hawker Hurricane
The Hawker Hurricane is a British single-seat fighter aircraft of the 1930s–40s which was designed and predominantly built by Hawker Aircraft Ltd. for service with the Royal Air Force (RAF). It was overshadowed in the public consciousness by the Supermarine Spitfire during the Battle of Britain in 1940, but the Hurricane inflicted 60% of the losses sustained by the ''Luftwaffe'' in the campaign, and fought in all the major theatres of the Second World War. The Hurricane originated from discussions between RAF officials and aircraft designer Sir Sydney Camm about a proposed monoplane derivative of the Hawker Fury biplane in the early 1930s. Despite an institutional preference for biplanes and lack of interest by the Air Ministry, Hawker refined its monoplane proposal, incorporating several innovations which became critical to wartime fighter aircraft, including retractable landing gear and the more powerful Rolls-Royce Merlin engine. The Air Ministry ordered Hawker's ''Interce ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Valentine Tank
The Tank, Infantry, Mk III, Valentine was an infantry tank produced in the United Kingdom during World War II. More than 8,000 Valentines were produced in eleven marks, plus specialised variants, accounting for about a quarter of wartime British tank production. The variants included riveted and welded construction, petrol and diesel engines and increases in armament. It was supplied in large numbers to the USSR and built under licence in Canada. It was used by the British in the North African campaign. Developed by Vickers, it proved to be strong and reliable. Name There are several proposed explanations for the name ''Valentine''. According to the most popular one, the design was presented to the War Office on St Valentine's Day, 14 February 1940, although some sources say that the design was submitted on Valentine's Day 1938 or 10 February 1938. White notes that "incidentally" Valentine was the middle name of Sir John Carden, 6th Baronet, Sir John Carden, the man responsible ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Matilda II
The Infantry Tank Mark II, better known as the Matilda, is a British infantry tank of the Second World War.Jentz, p. 11. The design began as the A12 specification in 1936, as a gun-armed counterpart to the first British infantry tank, the machine gun armed, two-man A11 Infantry Tank Mark I. The Mark I was also known as Matilda, and the larger A12 was initially known as the Matilda II or Matilda senior. The Mark I was abandoned in 1940, and from then on the A12 was almost always known simply as "the Matilda". With its heavy armour, the Matilda II was an excellent infantry support tank but with somewhat limited speed and armament. It was the only British tank to serve from the start of the war to its end, although it is particularly associated with the North Africa Campaign. Only two were available for service by the outbreak of World War II in 1939. It was replaced in front-line service by the cheaper and lighter Infantry Tank Mk III Valentine from late 1941. Development his ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Convoy Commodore
Convoy commodore also known as commodore, convoys was the title of a civilian put in charge of the good order of the merchant ships in the British convoys used during World War II. Usually the convoy commodore was a retired naval officer or a senior merchant captain drawn from the Royal Naval Reserve. He was aboard one of the merchant ships. The convoy commodore was distinguished from the commander of the convoy's escort, always a naval officer. Description Convoy commodores were based at HMS ''Eaglet'', the Royal Navy's shore establishment at Liverpool. Commodores had a peripatetic role, sailing with each convoy as assigned in a suitable ship. This ship would be the convoy flagship, but remained under the command of its master, the commodore and his team merely taking passage. The commodores were accompanied by a small team of ratings, usually a yeoman and two or three signalers; these teams would stay together and work with the same commodore throughout the campaign, allow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, during the Second World War) and again from 1951 to 1955. For some 62 of the years between 1900 and 1964, he was a Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), member of parliament (MP) and represented a total of five Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, constituencies over that time. Ideologically an adherent to economic liberalism and imperialism, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party, which he led from 1940 to 1955. He was a member of the Liberal Party (UK), Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924. Of mixed English and American parentage, Churchill was born in Oxfordshire into the wealthy, aristocratic Spencer family. He joined the British Army in 1895 and saw action in British R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
USSR
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet Union, it dissolved in 1991. During its existence, it was the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country by area, extending across Time in Russia, eleven time zones and sharing Geography of the Soviet Union#Borders and neighbors, borders with twelve countries, and the List of countries and dependencies by population, third-most populous country. An overall successor to the Russian Empire, it was nominally organized as a federal union of Republics of the Soviet Union, national republics, the largest and most populous of which was the Russian SFSR. In practice, Government of the Soviet Union, its government and Economy of the Soviet Union, economy were Soviet-type economic planning, highly centralized. As a one-party state go ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and several of its European Axis allies starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during World War II. More than 3.8 million Axis troops invaded the western Soviet Union along a front, with the main goal of capturing territory up to a line between Arkhangelsk and Astrakhan, known as the A-A line. The attack became the largest and costliest military offensive in history, with around 10 million combatants taking part in the opening phase and over 8 million casualties by the end of the operation on 5 December 1941. It marked a major escalation of World War II, opened the Eastern Front—the largest and deadliest land war in history—and brought the Soviet Union into the Allied powers. The operation, code-named after the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa ("red beard"), put into action Nazi Germany's ideological goals of eradicating communism and conquering the western Soviet Union to repopulate it w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Operation Torch
Operation Torch (8–16 November 1942) was an Allies of World War II, Allied invasion of French North Africa during the Second World War. Torch was a compromise operation that met the British objective of securing victory in North Africa while allowing American armed forces the opportunity to begin their fight against Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy on a limited scale. The French colonies were aligned with Germany via Vichy France but the loyalties of the population were mixed. Reports indicated that they might support the Allies. The American General Dwight D. Eisenhower, supreme commander of the Allied forces in Mediterranean and Middle East theatre of World War II, Mediterranean theater of the war, approved plans for a three-pronged attack on Casablanca (Western), Oran (Centre) and Algiers (Eastern), then a rapid move on Tunis to catch Axis forces in North Africa from the west in conjunction with the British advance from Egypt. The Western Task Force encountered unexpected ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Northern Dvina
The Northern Dvina (, ; ) is a river in northern Russia flowing through Vologda Oblast and Arkhangelsk Oblast into the Dvina Bay of the White Sea. Along with the Pechora River to the east, it drains most of Northwest Russia into the Arctic Ocean. It should not be confused with the Western Dvina, with which it is not connected. The principal tributaries of the Northern Dvina are the Vychegda (right), the Vaga (left), and the Pinega (right). Etymology According to the Max Vasmer's ''Etymological Dictionary'', the name of the river has been taken from the Western Dvina. The toponym Dvina does not stem from a Uralic language; however, its origin is unclear. Possibly it is an Indo-European word which used to mean ''river'' or ''stream''. In the Komi language, the river is called Вы́нва / Výnva from ''vyn'' "power" and ''va'' "water, river" hence "powerful river". Physical geography River basin The length of the Northern Dvina is . Together with its major tributar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
