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• PB2Y Coronado flying boat took its first flight. ww2dbase [PB2Y Coronado | CPC]

• At the Sancha Fangsheng Temple and the nearby orphanage in Nanjing, China, Japanese troops massacred 400 to 500 civilians. At a dock on the Yangtze River, Japanese troops massacred over 3,000 prisoners of war, civilian workers of the power plant, and other civilians. German businessman John Rabe, who was in the Chinese capital of Nanjing, noted the diary entry on this date "In one of the houses in the narrow street behind my garden wall, a woman was raped, and then wounded in the neck with a bayonet. I managed to get an ambulance so we can take her to Kulou Hospital.... You hear nothing but rape. If husbands or brothers intervene, they're shot. What you hear and see on all sides is the brutality and bestiality of the Japanese soldiers." ww2dbase [Battle of Nanjing and the Rape of Nanjing | Nanjing | CPC]
• Iwane Matsui entered Nanjing, China with a military parade. ww2dbase [Iwane Matsui | Nanjing | CPC]

• The keel of Ermland was laid down by F. Schichau in Danzig. ww2dbase [Ermland | CPC]

17 Dec 1937 Interactive Map