September 18th, 1939 (MONDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: .: The US freighter SS Warrior which has been detained by the British for 11 days is allowed to sail after her cargo of phosphates is confiscated. Meanwhile, the US freighter SS Shickshinny seized 2 days ago is allowed to sail from Glasgow, Scotland to Mersey, England where her cargo, deemed contraband by British authorities, will be unloaded.
GERMANY: Berlin: A week after making his first broadcast to Britain, the ex-Mosleyite William Joyce is given a contract with German radio.Adrian Weale expands on Joyce's nationality:
William Brooke Joyce, aka Lord Haw-Haw, was born in 1906 at 1377 Herkimer Street, Brooklyn, New York, the son of Michael Joyce who, although born in County Mayo, had naturalised as a US Citizen in 1894. The family moved to Ireland in 1909 - when it was still completely part of the United Kingdom - and (because they were British loyalists) to England in 1921 in order to avoid living in the Free State. Consequently, from the legal point of view, William Joyce was a US Citizen until at least 1940, when he naturalised as a German and probably after this as well as he did not renounce his US Citizenship.
Marc James Small adds concerning this: In 1941 it was not a requirement of US law that a US citizen transferring allegiance to another nation renounce his US citizenship -- after all, the US had fought the Warof 1812 on precisely that point. This was changed in the early 1980's but, for all of it, Joyce was, by US and UK and German law, a German national when he was tried for "treason" against a Crown to which he had never owed allegiance.
POLAND: The Battle of the Bzura ends. The Germans take 170, 000 prisoners of war.
Members of the Polish cipher bureau, with vital knowledge of the German Enigma code, flee the country and head for Paris. Also fleeing (to Romania) are Marshal Rydz-Smigly, the Polish President, Ignacy Moscicki and other government leaders. The government leaders of Poland are interned upon their arrival in Romania.
German and Soviet forces meet at Brest-Litovsk.
DENMARK: Scandinavian prime and foreign ministers confer today and tomorrow at Copenhagen. They decide on cooperation enforcing their neutrality in the present conflict.
CANADA: Former Gov't service vessels commissioned into RCN service: HMCS Adversus, Alachasse, Cartier, French and Nitinat.
U.S.A: President Franklin D Roosevelt authorizes the US Coast Guard to enlist 2,000 additional sailors and to build 2 training stations.
Light cruiser USS Helena commissioned.
ATLANTIC OCEAN: The US freighter SS Eglantine is stopped by a German submarine. She is ordered not to use her radio and after sending the ship's papers to the U-boat, she is allowed to sail with the warning not to use the radio for 3 hours.
U-32 sank SS
Kensington Court
U-35 sank SS Arlita and SS Lord
Minto.