July 1944

July

• 01

  • The death of Tanya SavichevaOn 1 July 1944 fourteen-year-old Tanya Savicheva, who had recorded her family's deaths in besieged Leningrad, died in hospital at Shatki near Gorky.
• 02

  • Flying bombs over LondonIn early July 1944 V-1s fell on London and south-east England day and night. An evacuation began as the defences sought an answer to the flying bombs.
• 03

  • Key eventThe liberation of MinskOn 3 July 1944 Soviet troops entered ruined Minsk. East of the city some 100,000 soldiers of the German Fourth Army were trapped in a pocket.
  • The Battle of the HedgerowsOn 3 July 1944 the US First Army attacked through the Normandy hedgerows towards La Haye-du-Puits and Saint-Lô. Every kilometre cost hundreds of casualties.
  • The capture of SienaOn 3 July 1944 soldiers of the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division of the French Expeditionary Corps entered Siena, which the Germans had abandoned overnight.
• 07

  • Operation Ostra BramaOn 7 July 1944 Home Army units attacked Wilno to take it before the Red Army. The same day the spearheads of the 3rd Belorussian Front reached the city.
  • The last attack on SaipanOn 6 July 1944 General Saitō ordered a final attack. Before dawn on 7 July at least 3,000 Japanese struck the Americans on the Tanapag plain.
• 09

  • The capture of CaenOn 9 July 1944 British and Canadian troops in Operation Charnwood took ruined northern Caen up to the Orne – a city that was meant to fall on D-Day.
  • The end of the fighting on SaipanOn 9 July 1944 Admiral Turner declared Saipan secured. Almost the whole Japanese garrison was dead; in the north hundreds of civilians took their own lives.
• 10

  • The Battle of the Driniumor RiverOn the night of 10–11 July 1944 the starving Japanese 18th Army struck across the Driniumor at the Americans near Aitape, New Guinea, and broke their line.
  • B-29 raids from ChinaOn the night of 7–8 July 1944 B-29s from airfields near Chengdu bombed Kyushu again. Tokyo was not a target – B-29s first appeared over it in November 1944.
• 11

  • Roosevelt's fourth candidacyOn 11 July 1944 Roosevelt wrote to Hannegan that he would accept a fourth-term nomination, though his doctors had known of his heart disease since March.
• 13

  • The capture of WilnoOn 13 July 1944 the Red Army, supported by Home Army units, took Wilno. Days later the NKVD arrested the Wilno Home Army command and disarmed its soldiers.
  • The Lwów–Sandomierz offensive beginsOn 13 July 1944 Marshal Konev's 1st Ukrainian Front advanced on Rawa Ruska and Lwów, opening the offensive that drove the Germans out of Eastern Galicia.
• 16

  • Brazilians in ItalyOn 16 July 1944 the first echelon of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force reached Naples – 5,000 men from the only South American country to fight in Europe.
• 17

  • Rommel woundedOn 17 July 1944 Allied fighters strafed Field Marshal Rommel's car in Normandy. With a fractured skull he was taken to hospital and never returned to the front.
• 18

  • The fall of the Tōjō cabinetOn 18 July 1944, after the fall of Saipan, General Hideki Tōjō's cabinet resigned. On 22 July a government under Kuniaki Koiso and Mitsumasa Yonai was formed.
  • The capture of Saint-LôOn 18 July 1944 the US 29th Infantry Division entered ruined Saint-Lô, cleared on 19 July – the start line for the Operation Cobra breakthrough of 25 July.
• 19

  • The capture of LivornoOn 19 July 1944 troops of the US 34th Infantry Division entered Livorno. The Germans had pulled out overnight, leaving a wrecked and mined port.
• 20

  • Key eventThe 20 July plotOn 20 July 1944 Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg set off a bomb at the Wolf's Lair. Hitler survived, and the coup in Berlin collapsed that same night.
• 21

  • Key eventThe landing on GuamOn 21 July 1944 US Marines landed on Guam on both sides of the Orote Peninsula. The island had been under Japanese occupation since December 1941.
• 22

  • The withdrawal to the Tannenberg LineAfter the defeat of Army Group Centre, Hitler agreed around 22 July 1944 to pull Army Detachment Narwa back from the Narva to the Sinimäed hills.
• 23

  • The Lwów uprisingOn 23 July 1944 the Home Army and the Red Army fought the Germans in Lwów. The city fell on 27 July; days later the NKVD arrested the Home Army commanders.
• 24

  • The landing on TinianOn 24 July 1944 US Marines landed on the narrow beaches of northern Tinian, having deceived the defenders with a feint landing off Tinian Town.
  • Key eventOperation CobraOn 24 July 1944 bombs from Operation Cobra's first raid fell on Americans near Saint-Lô. On 25 July First Army attacked; on 28 July it took Coutances.
  • The fall of NarvaOn 24 July 1944 the Leningrad Front attacked Narva. It was repulsed at Auvere, but the Germans fell back to the Tannenberg Line; on 26 July it took the ruins.
  • Key eventThe liberation of MajdanekDuring the fighting for Lublin, Soviet soldiers entered the abandoned camp at Majdanek. Its gas chambers and crematorium were left almost intact.
• 25

  • Operation Most IIIOn 25-26 July 1944 a British Dakota landed near Tarnów and flew out V-2 rocket parts captured by the Home Army, along with Polish politicians.
• 26

  • The first jets in combatOn 26 July 1944 Leutnant Alfred Schreiber's Me 262 attacked a British Mosquito over Bavaria. On 28 July rocket-powered Me 163s of JG 400 went into action.
• 27

  • The Battle of the Tannenberg LineFrom 26 July to 10 August 1944 the Leningrad Front assaulted the Sinimäed hills. The climax came on 29 July; the defenders held the line until September.
• 28

  • The capture of BrześćOn 28 July 1944 the 1st Belorussian Front took Brześć on the Bug. German divisions encircled near the city were shattered; their remnants escaped west.