World War II Database

• Home
• » Events
• » WW2 Timeline
• » 16 Aug 1944

• George Patton was promoted to the permanent rank of major general, bypassing the permanent rank of brigadier general. ww2dbase [George Patton | CPC]
• USS Croaker sank a Japanese patrol vessel with 1 of 3 torpedoes fired. ww2dbase [Croaker | CPC]
• French resistance fighters captured three German posts along the Swiss border. ww2dbase [The French Resistance | TH]
• At Bafour, France, British Lieutenant Tasker Watkins captured two German machine gun posts, eliminated an anti-tank gun, led in a defense of a German counterattack, and while the company attempted to return to Allied lines silenced another machine gun position by himself. He would later win the Victoria Cross. Later in life he served as a Lord Justice of Appeal and deputy Lord Chief Justice of the United Kingdom. ww2dbase [CPC]
• USS Finback, with the new commanding officer Lieutenant Commander Robert Russell Williams, Jr., departed Majuro, Marshall Islands for her tenth war patrol. ww2dbase [Finback | CPC]
• Allied aircraft sank French cruiser Dupleix. ww2dbase [Dupleix | CPC]
• U-23 began her sixteenth and final war patrol. ww2dbase [U-23 | CPC]

• Japanese troops entered northeastern Guangxi Province, China. ww2dbase [Operation Ichigo | Guangxi | CPC]

• The US coastal minesweeper YMSA-24 struck a mine and sank off Saint-Tropez, France. ww2dbase [Saint-Tropez, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur | AC]
• Jean de Lattre de Tassigny arrived in Provence, France. ww2dbase [Jean de Lattre de Tassigny | Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur | CPC]
• USS Marblehead bombarded Axis positions near Saint-Raphaël, France. ww2dbase [Marblehead | Invasion of Southern France | Saint-Raphaël, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur | CPC]

• The USAAF 306th Bomb Group flying from RAF Thurleigh launched a bombing raid against the synthetic oil facility at Böhlen, Germany. ww2dbase [Bombing of Hamburg, Dresden, and Other Cities | RAF Thurleigh | Böhlen | DS]

• USS Parche arrived at Pearl Harbor, US Territory of Hawaii, ending her second war patrol. ww2dbase [Parche | Pearl Harbor Navy Base and Ford Island Naval Air Station | Pearl Harbor, Oahu | CPC]
• Men and planes of Composite Squadron 79 (VC-79) came aboard Casablanca-class escort carrier USS Sargent Bay at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. ww2dbase [Sargent Bay | Pearl Harbor, Oahu | DS]

• The Naval Air Technical Arsenal at Yokosuka, Japan formally began the development of the aircraft that would later be known as the Ohka. ww2dbase [MXY7 Ohka | Yokosuka, Kanagawa | CPC]

• At Eniwetok, USS Honolulu received aboard SOC Seagull scout planes as replacements for her OS2U Kingfisher aircraft. ww2dbase [Honolulu | Eniwetok | DS]
• Destroyer USS Saufley and the convoy she was screening arrived at Eniwetok, Marshall Islands. ww2dbase [Saufley | Eniwetok | DS]

• After sundown, 18 Allied aircraft dropped supplies in the Kampinos Forest outside of Warsaw, Poland. 3 aircraft of No. 31 Squadron SAAF and 2 aircraft of No. 1586th (Polish Special Duties) Flight RAF were lost. ww2dbase [Warsaw Uprising | Warsaw | CPC]

• A V-1 flying bomb exploded in High Street of Walthamstow in east London, England, United Kingdom killing 17 and injuring 62. Nine more people were killed further south in Brockley. Deptford in south-east London received its 7th bomb which damaged houses that were already being repaired and killed 7. Officers and men of the squadrons based at RAF Dettling, north-east of Maidstone, Kent, southern England were not amused when a bomb was shot down and exploded not far from their control tower and sending three airmen to hospital. ww2dbase [V-Weapons Campaign | Vergeltungswaffe 1 | Detling, England | HM]

• USS St. Louis arrived at San Pedro, California and entered Terminal Island drydocks for battle damage repairs and general overhaul. ww2dbase [St. Louis | San Pedro, California | DS]

16 Aug 1944 Interactive Map