1922 (SATURDAY)
UNITED STATES: Commander Kenneth Whiting, piloting a Naval Aircraft Factory PT torpedo seaplane, makes the first catapult launching from the aircraft carrier USS Langley (CV-1), while she was at anchor in the York River, Virginia.
1935 (MONDAY)
ITALY: The trade sanctions against Italy imposed by the League of Nations Assembly go into effect and includes embargoes on arms, credit, and raw materials (not petroleum), as well as a prohibition of imports from Italy. A number of countries issue reservations on these sanctions, which provide a series of loopholes for the Italians. In response, the Italian government ends all economic relations with the sanctioning powers and imposes a system of rigid control on food and fuel to meet the emergency. Despite the economic sanctions, the Italians continue their offensive in Ethiopia. Acute tensions emerge between the Italian and British governments in response to the war in East Africa. During the winter of 1935-1936, the British conclude agreements with France, Greece, Spain, Turkey, and Yugoslavia which provide for mutual support in the event a war erupts as a result of League of Nations action. The British collect a large naval force at Malta to control the Mediterranean, bu t have to withdraw the force to Alexandria, Egypt, due to exposure to potential Italian air attack.
1936 (WEDNESDAY)
SPAIN: The German and Italian governments officially recognize General Francisco Franco's government as the new regime in Spain. The British and French governments continue to maintain their embargo on military supplies to the Republican government and attempt to organize the other powers to embrace a policy of non-intervention in the Spanish Civil War for fear that the war will escalate into a general European conflict. Twenty-seven nations, including Germany and Italy, agree to participate in a non-intervention committee in London. They draw up a supervision scheme, but the plan proves ineffective as powers who wish to participate in the fighting ignore the agreement. The Italian government slowly expands their public support for the Franco government and sends approximately 75,000 troops to Spain.
1938 (FRIDAY)
GERMANY: The government recalls its Ambassador from Washington in retaliation for the U.S. recalling its ambassador on 14 November. .
JAPAN: The government officially repudiate the Open Door policy in its response to the U.S. note of 6 November. The Japanese declare that the Open Door is "inapplicable" to the new conditions in East Asia and to the conditions of "today and tomorrow."
November 18th, 1939 (SATURDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: The IRA is blamed for four bombs in Piccadilly, London.The Luftwaffe starts dropping magnetic mines into British coastal waters.
Destroyers HMS Blencartha and Brocklesby laid down.
NORTH SEA: A Dutch passenger liner today became the latest civilian ship to fall victim to German mines. The 8,309-ton 'Simon Bolivar' sank with about 400 passengers and crew aboard. It is estimated that 86 people, many of them women and children, have lost their lives.
People were playing games on deck when a terrific explosion hit the Simon Bolivar under the bridge. Captain Voorspuiy was killed instantly. The liner's oil pipes burst and the ship listed heavily, making it difficult to lower the boats. Many passengers swarmed down the ropes or jumped over the side.
A Sister of Charity nun was rescued clinging to a piece of driftwood. One British passenger, Sydney Preece of Maidenhead, put his three year old daughter in a wooden box and swam with it through the oil-covered icy water for nearly an hour.
Many of the survivors were landed at an east coast port. An air-raid warning immediately after sent them hurrying for the air-raid shelters. There were heartrending stories of children whose parents had drowned, and one West Indian lost his own wife and two children but managed to rescue a white child aged three.
Dutch public opinion is outraged because the mine was in a major traffic lane. International law as well as common humanity, requires that any such mine-laying must be notified. The Dutch believe that the mines are a deadly new magnetic type. This view was supported today by a Danish skipper, Captain Knudsen, giving evidence in Copenhagen about the sinking of his ship, 'Canada', off the Humber on 4 November. The Germans, who claim that their U-boats sank 115 ships in the first two months of the war, are clearly putting a further massive effort into the war at sea. The total British tonnage lost so far is small, only around 300,000 out of nearly 18 million tons. No one knows how many mines are already laid.
FRANCE: Corvette FS La Bastiaise laid down.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA: Martial law is declared in Prague.
ATLANTIC OCEAN:
U-18 sank SS Wigmore.
U-19 sank SS Carica Milica.
U-22 sank SS Parkhill.