Yesterday      Tomorrow

August 19th, 1940 (MONDAY)

UNITED KINGDOM: 

Churchill is again on the radio, broadcasting about the Battle of Britain. He praises the RAF fighter pilots in saying: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

RAF Bomber Command: 
4 Group (Whitley). Bombing - power station at Schornewitz.
51 Sqn. Ten aircraft. One returned early, nine bombed primary, one FTR. [Hitherto, it had not been possible to determine whether missing aircraft had actually reached a target and bombed, but the improvement in W/T procedure eliminated this.]

Battle of Britain:
RAF Fighter Command: Cloudy conditions limit operations. But at 15:15 Two Ju88s of KG51 scored hits with eight bombs on the Admiralty oil depot at Llanreith oil farm, Pembroke, instantly causing a huge conflagration which blazed for several days. Another Ju88 of III/KG 51 struck at Bibury grass airfield, killing an airman and damaging two Spitfires of 92 Squadron. Flt. Lt. T.S. Wade [later Hawker's Chief Test Pilot] and Plt. Off. J.A. Paterson gave chase and disposed of the raider in the Solent. Wade had to crash-land his Spitfire though. 

Intruders also raided East Anglia. 23 bombs fell on residential property in Chelmsford, killing two and injuring five. 

Other raids hit Dover Castle, Shoeburyness, Canterbury and Deal Royal Marine Infirmary.

Three cannon armed Spitfires of 19 Squadron destroyed a 7/KG 2 Co17Z off Essex. 

Final score for the day - three raiders destroyed, four RAF fighters lost.

The Home Guard is preparing stocks of Molotov cocktails.

At 0154, the British merchant ship Ampleforth (4,576 tons), a straggler from Convoy OA-199, was torpedoed and sunk by U-101 west of the Hebrides in position 56.10N, 10.40W. Nine crewmembers were lost. The master and 28 crewmembers were picked up by destroyer HMS Warwick and landed at Liverpool.

Destroyer HMS Oakley laid down.

Minesweeper HMS Rye launched.

Destroyers HMS Quilliam and Tickham laid down.

Corvettes HMS Abelia and Alisma laid down.

Corvettes HMS Hollyhock, Sunflower, Apostolis and Hyacinth launched.

Submarine HMS Urge launched

Destroyer HMS Liddledale launched.

GERMANY: U-104 is commissioned.

ITALY:
Rome: The Italian High Command announced:
In British Somaliland our troops have broken through the enemy's second line of defence, occupied La Faruk and crossed over. They pursued the enemy, who withdrew to his ships, and also bombed these. A British plane was shot down by Italian fighter planes. An enemy air raid on Kassala (East Africa) caused neither casualties nor damage. Another enemy air attack on Addis Ababa airfield resulted in 2 dead and 5 wounded; hits were also scored on two hangars that contained only antiquated equipment.

SOMALILAND: Berbera: A line of African troops clambered from the jetty onto dhows, as the Australian warship HMAS Hobart stood on the horizon. The British were evacuating Somaliland, the capital of which, Berbera fell today. For 16 days 6,000 Imperial troops fought nearly 30,000 Italians. Now mathematics has asserted itself over tactics and Mussolini has tasted his first victory. While the last of the rearguard, the Black Watch, embarked, Indian army engineers blew up the port's installations. Only the Somali Camel Corps stayed behind, some to go home, others to go into the bush to fight another day.
 

COMMONWEALTH OF THE PHILIPPINES: Quezon declares a “limited state of national emergency”.