Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 23, 1994 TAG: 9402220105
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
In recognition of the sacrifice of the region's veterans, we take the following look at a selection of World War II headlines from the South Pacific, Europe and the home front for the week of Sunday, Feb. 20, through Saturday, Feb. 26, 1944:
A $500,000 addition underway at the Radford Army Ammunition Plant would enable the plant to convert to a different type of production and require 700 additional workers, the office of war information reported. The plant had suffered from a decline in orders that had reduced its workforce from 9,200 to 6,200 between the previous March and November.
The Russians announced they had killed and captured 10,000 more Germans in the Korsun pocket of the Ukraine, making a total of 73,000 Germans killed and captured in the great Nazi Dnieper bend debacle.
Meeting a German attempt to drive them back into the sea, 5th Army troops and their British allies carpeted the ground before their Anzio beachhead with German dead. Fifth Army troops fell back in one sector but kept their lines intact and prevented a breakthrough.
In the Pacific, U.S. Marines captured Engebi Island with its important air base. Meanwhile, American warships bombarded Rabaul, New Britain and Kavieng, New Ireland, in the first naval actions of the war against the two largest Japanese naval centers in the southwest Pacific. Two American submarines, operating deep in Japanese waters, sank 13 Japanese merchant vessels.
A new Gallup poll revealed that a higher percentage of civilian voters wanted the Republicans to win the coming presidential election than at any other period since the 1940 election. Forty-nine percent said they wanted to see the Republicans win. In the 37 states outside of the solidly Democratic South, 52 percent wanted to see the GOP win.
One trip below decks of the righted battleship Oklahoma "will make a Christian out of you," a ranking naval officer said. The ship, which turned turtle within 13 minutes after being hit by a Japanese torpedo at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, should be sent back to the mainland uncleaned, he said. "It might make a better peace."
Allied command restored the use of Army radios to correspondents on the Anzio beachhead. The correspondents had not been permitted to use the radios for three days because the command said their reports were unduly pessimistic and had caused unjustified alarm among people back home.
Some in Congress challenged the plan of presidential adviser Bernard Baruch for postwar conversion of industry and manpower to civilian pursuits on the grounds that it would give too much power to the executive branch.
The A.K. Hudson family of Saltville was well-represented in the armed forces with five sons in the service. Their pictures appeared on the front of the state section of the Roanoke Times.
An allied force of 2,000 planes attacked Hitler's fighter plane factories deep in Germany in what was described as the largest and most hazardous operation of its kind ever undertaken.
Flight officer Ralph Peters of Roanoke County cheated death twice in Italy as the B-26 bomber on which he served was badly hit by German flak and crash-landed after making it back behind American lines.
Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria was dead at 88. She was the stepmother of Archduke Ferdinand, whose assassination on June 28, 1914, at Sarajevo triggered World War I.
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill promised more aerial bombing of Germany larger in scope than anything launched so far, but he was not optimistic about the war ending in 1944. Speaking to the House of Commons about the war for the first time in five months, he derided the view that Hitler was about to collapse.
President Roosevelt pleaded with Alban W. Barkley not to go through with his resignation as majority leader of the Senate because of his disagreement with the president over a tax bill. Barkley's resignation seemed to strengthen FDR's opponents in Congress. Sen. Ellison D. Smith of South Carolina, who had proposed anti-New Deal Sen. Harry Byrd of Virginia as an anti-Roosevelt candidate, called on "real" Democrats and Republicans to form a new party called the American Party to return the government to basic principles.
by CNB