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• German SS-Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler contacted the Western Allies via Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte to negotiate for a peace agreement. ww2dbase [Heinrich Himmler | CPC]
• Soviet troops reached outskirts of Berlin, Germany. ww2dbase [Battle of Berlin | CPC]
• US submarine USS Besugo sank German submarine U-183 in the Java Sea; only one German sailor survived the sinking. ww2dbase [Besugo | CPC]
• US Navy PB4Y Privateer bombers launched Bat missiles against Japanese shipping off Balikpapen, Borneo; it was the first and only use of automatic homing missiles in WW2. ww2dbase [CPC]
• In Berlin, Germany, Adolf Hitler noted that, when Germany would have lost the war, Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring would be the better person to negotiate peace terms. Göring, who was in Berchtesgaden in southern Germany, was made aware of this fact. After consulting Hans Lammers and other senior government officials, Göring carefully noted that, according to Hitler's decree of 29 Jun 1941, Göring would take power over Germany if Hitler could not respond by midnight. This message would be distorted by Martin Bormann as a sign of Göring's thirst for power. Hitler originally ordered Göring to surrender all of his positions, but Bormann would convince Hitler to issue an arrest order. ww2dbase [Hermann Göring | TH]
• British bombers attacked Lübeck, Germany. ww2dbase [Bombing of Hamburg, Dresden, and Other Cities | CPC]
• George Marshall authorized Dwight Eisenhower to negotiate with the Germans in the Netherlands for a limited ceasefire in order to bring relief to the starving civilians. ww2dbase [Dwight Eisenhower | Operations Manna, Chowhound, and Faust | CPC]

• Commanding officer of Composite Squadron VC-19, LtCdr William South, flying a TBM Avenger from escort carrier USS Bogue in the mid-Atlantic reported a surfacing German submarine, the U-546. More airplanes and all 14 destroyer escorts in the barrier line, including USS Frederick C. Davis, were sent to hunt for the U-Boat. ww2dbase [Bogue | Conclusion of the Battle of the Atlantic | DS]

• The 150 officers and 3,000 men of the 1st Division of the Indian National Army, an anti-British resistance group aided by the Japanese, surrendered to the Allies at Pyu, Burma. Meanwhile, Lieutenant General Heitaro Kimura, despite having been given orders of defend Rangoon, Burma to the death, ignominiously abandoned the city without issuing any orders to the Burma Area army. ww2dbase [Battle of Rangoon | Pyu | CPC, AC]

• 120 miles off Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia, Canada, a rubberized silk balloon envelope from a Japanese Fu-Go radio tracking balloon was recovered from the ocean. ww2dbase [Fu-Go | Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia | DS]

• Prisoners of Sachsenhausen and Ravensbrück Concentration Camps in Germany began to be evacuated by German authorities; some Jews were massacred by SS guards this week as the last massacres of the war. ww2dbase [Discovery of Concentration Camps and the Holocaust | CPC]
• British Second Army reaches the Elbe River near Hamburg, Germany. ww2dbase [Hamburg | TH]
• After sundown, Albert Speer bid his final farewell to Adolf Hitler. He admitted to Hitler that he had sabotaged Hitler's scorched earth policies, and Hitler forgave him for disobeying the order. Speer toured the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany for the last time before leaving for Hamburg, Germany. ww2dbase [Reich Chancellery | Albert Speer | Berlin | CPC]
• Folke Bernadotte met Heinrich Himmler at the SS Hohenlychen sanatorium in Lychen, Germany for the last time. During this meeting, Bernadotte secured the release of some Scandinavian Jews, but refused to help seek a separate peace between Germany and the Western Allies. ww2dbase [Folke Bernadotte | Lychen, Mark Brandenburg | CPC]
• Theodor Morell departed Berlin, Germany by aircraft. ww2dbase [Theodor Morell | Berlin | CPC]
• Adolf Hitler appointed General of Artillery Helmuth Weidling as commander of the Berlin Defence Area. ww2dbase [Battle of Berlin | Helmuth Weidling | Berlin | AC]
• A group of non-Jewish Flossenbürg Concentration Camp prisoners arrived at Dachau Concentration Camp in Germany after a six-day march. On the same day, troops of the US 90th Infantry Division liberated the main camp of Flossenbürg, finding 1,527 prisoners still in the camp; about 300 of them would die despite receiving care from US Army medics. Meanwhile, several groups of prisoners who were marched out of Flossenbürg in the preceding days were found and liberated by US Army troops in the surrounding area. ww2dbase [Discovery of Concentration Camps and the Holocaust | Flossenbürg Concentration Camp | Flossenbürg, Bayreuth | CPC]

• US Fifth and British Eighth Armies reached the Po River north of Bologna, Italy. British Eighth Army captured Ferrara in the process, while the US Fifth Army captured La Spezia. Allied troops captured Bondeno, Italy. ww2dbase [Operation Grapeshot and Operation Roast | TH, CPC]
• In Italy, remnants German 148th Infantry Division began advancing from the Genoa area toward Parma. ww2dbase [Battles of Collecchio and Fornovo di Taro | Genova, Liguria | CPC]

23 Apr 1945 Interactive Map