28 February 1942

BELGIUM: Six RAF Bomber Command Blenheims, with a fighter escort, bomb the port area of Antwerp without loss.

POLAND: 10,000 Jews from Lodz were gassed at Chelmo this week, while 4,618 Jews have died of starvation in the Warsaw ghetto.

INDIAN OCEAN: British Overseas Airways Corp. (BOAC) Short S-23 C-Class Empire Boat, msn S-842, registered G-AETZ and named “Circe” is shot down by Japanese fighters while it is en route from Tjilatjap, Java, and Broome, Western Australia.

BURMA: British Imperial forces fall back on Pegu from Payagyi and Waw in anticipation of a general withdrawal. Japanese are only 50 miles (80 kilometres) north of Rangoon.

JAPAN: Admiral YAMAMOTO Isoroku, Commander of the Combined Fleet, issues Navy Directive No. 60, which states that the Japanese Navy is to consider Soviet ships as “absolutely neutral.”

NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES: Sumatra: Major-General Gordon Bennett, the commander of the 8th Australian Division on Singapore, has sailed from the clutches of the Japanese - and into a bitter controversy.

When the situation on Singapore was desperate, Bennett handed command of his division to his artillery commander, and, without consulting his superior, Lieutenant-General Percival, boarded one of the hundreds of small boats leaving the colony. Bennett is accused of abandoning his troops while other commanders went into captivity with their men. The most senior officer to escape, he is among 3,000 troops and civilians being looked after by locals on Sumatra.

The light cruisers HMS Danae and Dragon and HMAS Hobart which have been operating from Batavia, Java, sail shortly after midnight accompanied by a Dutch destroyer to sweep north from Batavia with orders, if contact with the Japanese Western Invasion Force were not made by 0430 hours, to abandon the search and proceed to Trincomalee, Ceylon, via the Sunda Strait. The sweep was really no more than a demonstration, since to keep the small and hopelessly outnumbered force in the west Java Sea would have been suicidal. No enemy was encountered by the time laid down, and the force withdrew as ordered and finally arrived at Colombo, Ceylon, on the 5 March.
     The heavy cruiser USS Houston (CA-30), with her No. 3 turret disabled and low on ammunition, and the light cruiser HMAS Perth, survivors of last nights’ Battle of the Java Sea, arrive back in Batavia, at 1400 hours. After refuelling, they depart at 1930 hours intending to pass through the Sunda Strait to Tjilatjap, Java. Unknown to the Allies, part of the Japanese Western Invasion Force was being landed in Bantam Bay, 40 miles (64 kilometres) west of Batavia. Shortly after 2300 hours, the two ships, rounding a headland, accidentally encounter the Japanese transport force and escorting ships (Rear Admiral TAKEO Takagi) in Banten Bay, Java, and engage.
     The heavy cruiser HMS Exeter, whose boiler rooms had been damaged yesterday, makes repairs at Surabaya, Java, and, accompanied by destroyers HMS Encounter and USS Pope (DD-225), sails in the evening for Ceylon. Soon after leaving Surabaya, the three ships are spotted by Japanese aircraft.
      Of all the Allied ships which took part in the Battle of the Java Sea only four American destroyers survived, USS Alden (DD-211), John D. Ford (DD-228), Paul Jones (DD-230) and John D. Edwards (DD-216), which had been detached to Surabaya and ordered to rearm in Australia. They sailed under cover of darkness on the night of the 28th, passed through Bali Strait and made a short contact with a force of three Japanese destroyers patrolling in the southern leg of Bali Island. The American ships returned fire after the Japanese ships engaged. At the end they increased the speed to 27 knots and arrived in Fremantle, Western Australia, on 4 March without any further incident.
     At 2330 hours, the transports carrying the Japanese 16th Army anchor in Bantam Bay and prepare to land the Japanese Army troops.

Near Christmas Island, the USS Whipple (DD-217) with the USS Edsel (DD-219) begin transferring USS Langley crew members [rescued 2 days before] to the oiler USS Pecos (AO-6), and completing the task by 0800. While one destroyer transferred personnel, the other circled and maintained an antisubmarine screen. When the job of transferring survivors from the lost seaplane tender had been completed, the two destroyers parted company with the oiler.

Changing course in anticipation of orders to retire from Java, Whipple prepared to send a message relative to these orders when the destroyer's chief radioman heard a cell for help over the radio from Pecos, then under attack by Japanese bombers near Christmas Island. Whipple sped to the scene to render assistance if possible.

Throughout the afternoon, as the destroyer closed the oiler, all hands on board prepared knotted lines and cargo nets for use in picking up survivors. Whipple went to general quarters at 1922 when she sighted several small lights off both bows. Whipple slowly closed and began picking up survivors of Pecos. After interrupting the proceedings to conduct an unsuccessful attack on a submarine lurking in the area, she returned to the task and continued the search until she had received 231 men from the oiler. (Ron Babuka)

U.S.A.: "Moonlight Cocktail" by Glenn Miller and his Orchestra with vocals by Ray Eberle and The Modernaires reaches Number 1 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart in the U.S. This song, which debuted on the charts one week earlier, was charted for 15 weeks, was Number 1 for 10 weeks and was ranked Number 2 for the year 1942.

Washington: President Roosevelt approves the reorganization of the War Department. (Marc James Small)

Certain duties of former Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation transferred to Coast Guard temporarily by Executive Order 9083. Made permanent July 16, 1946.

U.S. Maritime Service transferred to Coast Guard from War Shipping Administration.

CARIBBEAN SEA: At 1117, the unescorted and unarmed Texaco tanker Oregon was attacked by U-156 with the deck gun about 150 miles NE of Mona Passage or 170 miles (274 kilometres) northwest of San Juan, Puerto Rico while steaming completely blacked out on a zigzag course at 10 knots. The first shell hit the starboard side in the quarters of the master and the second destroyed the radio shack. After disabling the radio the U-boat circled the tanker and fired shells at point blank range into the waterline during 75 minutes. Fire broke out on the bridge and the stern and a boiler exploded but the cargo never caught fire. The tanker sank by the stern about four hours after the initial attack. The eight officers and 28 crewmen abandoned ship in one lifeboat and one raft. They abandoned ship on the starboard side while the U-boat fired shells into the port side. The master, two officers and three crewmen died during the attack. The 26 survivors in the lifeboat made landfall near Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic on 4 March. The Gulfpenn picked up the four survivors on the raft five and a half days after the attack. Some survivors reported that two U-boats shelled the vessel and that some men were machine gunned when they tried to lower the port boats. A man who jumped overboard reported that a U-boat attempted to run him over. There are no proofs for this reports, but fact is that only one U-boat attacked and the men lost were apparently killed in the initial shelling of the bridge and radio shack. (Jack McKillop, Dave Shirlaw and Keith Allen)

ATLANTIC OCEAN: At 1057, destroyer USS Jacob Jones (DD-130) was hit by two torpedoes fired by U-578, while proceeding completely blacked out at 15 knots, operating about 38 miles (61 kilometres) east-northeast of Ocean City, Maryland. The first torpedo struck on the port side just aft of the bridge and ignited a magazine. The explosion completely destroyed the bridge, the chartroom and the officer's and petty officer's quarters. As the ship stopped, unable to send a distress signal, the second torpedo struck on the port side about 40 feet forward of the stern and carried away the after part of the ship above the keel plates and shafts and destroyed the after crew quarters. The ship remained afloat for 45 minutes, allowing about 30 survivors to abandon ship on four or five rafts. But as the stern sank, the unsecured depth charges exploded, killing several survivors on a nearby raft. Some hours later, an US Army observation plane sighted the life rafts and reported their position to Eagle Boat USS PE-56 on inshore patrol. The Eagle Boat was forced to abandon her search after three hours, due to strong winds and rising seas. She had picked up 12 survivors, but one of them died enroute Cape May. The search for survivors continued for two days, but was fruitless. (James Paterson, Dave Shirlaw and Jack McKillop)

SS Bayou sunk by U-129 at 08.08N, 55.14W. The only survivor was rescued on 5 Mar at 07°36N, 58°05W.

At 0844, the unescorted Leif was hit by two torpedoes from U-653 east of Cape Hatteras. The forward section broke away and sank immediately, followed by the rest of the ship 11 minutes later. The crew abandoned ship in two lifeboats, one containing six survivors and the other 18. First they had rain, hail showers and strong winds, but as soon as the weather permitted four men (including the master) moved to the boat with less men in it. In the afternoon the boats were separated. The master and nine survivors were picked up from the first boat in the morning on 2 March by the Swedish steam tanker Sveadrott about 185 miles west of Bermuda and landed at Key West four days later. The other lifeboat with 14 survivors was never seen again.