December 1st, 1942 (TUESDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: Goxhill, Lincolnshire: The USAAF 78th Fighter Group arrive. They are assigned to VIII Fighter Command, Eighth Air Force.
Westminster: Britain will become one of the world's first "welfare states" if proposals published today for post-war social security are implemented when peace returns. Under a comprehensive scheme prepared by Sir William Beveridge, the Liberal economist, the entire adult population would be brought into a compulsory insurance scheme covering sickness, unemployment, old age and benefit for families.
It was said in Whitehall tonight that the coalition government sees the scheme as a key element in post-war reconstruction and will give it earnest consideration. The Beveridge report envisages state provision effectively from the cradle to the grave - including free medical care for everybody.
Its proposals are based on the poll-tax principle of flat-rate weekly contributions of 4/3 for men workers and 3/6 for women, with an employer's contribution of 3/3 for men and 2/6 for women. Benefits would include a national health service, £2 a week retirement pensions and unemployment pay, and £20 death grants.
London: Sydney Silverman, a Labour MP, reports that over two million Polish Jews have been exterminated by the Nazis.
NORTH AFRICA: General Spaatz becomes the commanding general of the USAAF Twelfth Air Force in North Africa.
ALGERIA: With the support of the American and British governments, Admiral Jean-Francois Darlan assumes authority as the Chief of State in French North Africa.
TUNISIA: The Axis forces forestall an offensive, intended for 2 December, counterattacking strongly toward Tebourba with tanks and infantry supported by aircraft. Blade Force falls back with heavy tank losses. Combat Command B, U.S. 1st Armored Division, is attached to the British 78th Division to help hold the Tebourba area and moves forward to the vicinity of Tebourba. The concentration of the 78th Division, the first full division of the V Corps, British First Army, on the Tunisian front, is now complete.
The USAAF Twelfth Air Force begins a regular pattern of attacks against El Aouina Airfield, 3.5 miles (5,5 kilometres) north of Tunis. Six DB-7 Bostons and later 13 B-17 Flying Fortresses, bomb the airfield with P-38 Lightnings escorting both forces. Later, nine DB-7s and six RAF Bisley light bombers bomb the airfield. In the afternoon, 15 B-26 Marauders destroy about 15 Luftwaffe aircraft on the ground. In the Djedeida area, P-38s on a sweep attack tanks northwest of the town.
ETHIOPIA: Addis Ababa: The country declares war on Germany, Italy and Japan.
INDIA: The airlift from India to China is removed from the authority of Lieutenant General Joseph Stilwell, Commander-in-Chief U.S .China-Burma-India Theater of Operations, Chief of Staff to Chinese Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek, and Commander-in-Chief Northern Combat Area Command (NCAC), and made part of the USAAF Air Transport Command's India-China Wing. .
BURMA: The Japanese, having rested and refitted, start back into the battle line Tengchung-Myitkyina- Kamaing-Kalewa-Akyab.
Portuguese Timor:
Whilst
on a routine mission to take relief personnel to the Timor garrison, minesweeper
HMAS Armidale is attacked and sunk by IJ aircraft at 10S 128E. 30 survivors on
two boats are recovered by HMAS Kilgourlie and an RAAF flying boat. HMS (Alex
Gordon)(108)
Commodore Pope, the naval C-in-C in Darwin has not understood what has happened to the three ships he sent to Timor yesterday. He orders HMAS Kalgoorlie to sail out in support of her two sister ships. Kuru finds the other two ships in the morning and transfers her passengers to HMAS Castlemaine; Castlemaine is then ordered to a position some 120 miles south of Betano Bay to look for two RAAF Beaufighter aircrew who were in the water after crash landing. Kuru and HMAS Armidale set course for Betano Bay. At around midday both ships reported air attack and requested fighter cover; at this stage the ships were not in company and had lost sight of each other. Over the next six hours Kuru reported attacks by up to 44 enemy aircraft, and that she was the target of up to 200 bombs. She suffers some engine damage and reports to Pope her intention to return to Darwin: Pope insists that the operation go ahead. At around 8pm however, he received reports of two Japanese cruisers in the area and orders the abandonment of the operation. At 8.30 these ships are attacked by Hudson aircraft of the RAAF. But by this time Armidale presents no target for anyone. She had been lying on the bed of the Timor Sea for five hours.
She did not however die without a fight.
Lieu-Commander Richards commander of Armidale, knew he was in trouble, alone
and less than 30 minutes from a major enemy air base with 10 hours of daylight
left. He sent a signal to pope at around 3pm ""Enemy bombing. No fighters
arrived", then followed up with another signal "Nine bombers, four fighters.
Absolutely no fighter support" Pope sent back the signal "Air attack is to be
accepted as ordinary, routine secondary warfare". This signal so puzzled his
superiors, when the loss of the ship was latter investigated, that is was
classified and not shown to the board of inquiry or the prime-minster; in fact
the whole matter was covered up which is a shame because it prevented a brave
man from receiving the Victoria Cross he deserved.
HMAS Armidale had been hit by two air launched Torpedoes and was listing
heavily and sinking; the captain had given the order to abandon ship. Ordinary
Seaman Teddy Sheean, from Latrobe Tasmania, a youngster still 27 day short of
his 19th birthday had abandoned his action station as a loader number on the
after Oerlikon and was helping to get the ship's motor-boat into the water when
Japanese planes streaked in at sea level, machine-gunning the ship and the
survivors in the water. He was himself unwounded and could have taken cover, or
gone over the side in an attempt to save himself. He did none of these things
instead he scrambled back to the Oerlikon gun abaft the funnel and strapped
himself in. The ship was sinking fast by this stage - He poured a stream of 20mm
into the enemy plane and sent one cart wheeling into the sea. A zero targeted him
with machine-gun fire and tore his chest and back wide open, still he continued
to fire sending another Zero off trailing smoke, and forcing the others away
from his shipmates in the water. As the water rose up around him; the men in the
water saw the desperate youngster wheel his gun from target to target. Then the
ship plunged down and the sea rose up past his shattered chest but still he kept
firing, then he disappeared from sight but the barrel of the gun remained firing
before it to disappeared. For a moment the sea was silent then as a Japanese
plane dove in, incredibly tracer fire from Sheean's gun arced up at it from
beneath the sea to meet the incoming plane.
Two officers and 38 Ratings were lost or missing along with the two Dutch officers and 59 troops. Some survivors were not picked up until eight days later. (William L. Howard)(188, 189, 190, 191)
NEW GUINEA: U.S. Lieutenant General Robert Eichelberger, Commanding General I Corps, flies to Dobodura, Papua New Guinea, and takes command of all troops in Buna area. The Australian 21st Brigade, 7th Division, after turning back from Giruwa three barge loads of Japanese attempting to reinforce Gona, attacks and captures Gona, forcing the Japanese back to Gona Mission for a final stand. Elsewhere, the Japanese show no signs of weakening and they exert heavy pressure against a roadblock (called "Huggins" after Capt Meredith M. Huggins) on the Soputa-Sanananda trail and withstands frontal and flanking attacks toward it. The Urbana Force (two battalions of the U.S. 126th and 128th Infantry Regiments, 32d Infantry Division) makes another futile attempt to reach Buna Village after artillery and mortar preparation with all available weapons. The Warren Force (based on U.S. 128th Infantry Regiment, 32d Infantry Division) continues attacks toward Cape Endaiadere on the right and New
Strip on the left with little success; the 1st Battalion of the 126th Infantry Regiment gets elements to the northeastern edge of New Strip. In the air, USAAF Fifth Air Force A-20 Havocs, B-25 Mitchells, B-26 Marauders and P-400 Airacobras attack the Buna area damaging a destroyer.
SOLOMON ISLANDS: The 8th Marine Regiment, 2d Marine Division, is withdrawn from forward positions west of Matanikau River, leaving Americal Division units to hold the western sector.
PACIFIC OCEAN: As a result of damage received in the Battle of Tassafaronga, heavy cruiser USS Northampton (CA-26) sinks about 35 nautical miles (66 kilometres) north-northwest of Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, in position 09.12S, 159.50E. Japanese destroyer HIJMS Takanami goes down off the north coast of Guadalcanal about 28 nautical miles (52 kilometres) north-northwest of Henderson Field, Guadalcanal, in position 09.18S, 159.56E.
TERRITORY OF ALASKA: ALEUTIAN ISLANDS: A USAAF Eleventh Air Forces B-24 Liberator flies reconnaissance over the Semichis and Attu Islands. Weather prevents any other flights.
U.S.A.: The U.S. government imposes gasoline quotas to conserve fuel. The armed forces overseas have fuel aplenty, but in the U.S., gasoline becomes costly and hard to get. People start using bicycles and their own two feet to get around.
At major league baseball meetings in Chicago, Illinois, travel restrictions are the order of the day. Owners decide to restrict travel to a three-trip schedule rather than the customary four. Spring training in 1943 will be limited to locations north of the Potomac or Ohio Rivers and east of the Mississippi River.ATLANTIC OCEAN: In the English Channel, the British antisubmarine warfare trawler HMS Jasper (T 14) is torpedoed and sunk by the German motor torpedo boat S-81.