March 3rd, 1944 (FRIDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: Destroyer HMS Undaunted commissioned.
SWITZERLAND: Zurich: News has reached Switzerland that some 6 million workers are on strike today in a vast area of northern Italy, stretching from Tuscany and Emilia to the borders with France, Switzerland, Austria and Yugoslavia. Armaments factories of crucial importance to the Wehrmacht - Breda and Marelli, the Pirelli Italiana rubber and cable works and the Isotta Fraschini aero-engine manufacturers - have been brought to a standstill.
Notices posted by the strikers around the city of Milan demand an end to the deportations of Italian forced labour to Germany, and improvement in living conditions in Italy and the repeal of the military service law. The underground communist newspaper Unita Proletaria published in Rome, has recently exposed Fascist plans to deport one million more workers. Wages for these forced labourers are minimal and the working conditions are so barbaric as to prove fatal for some.
Railway workers, too, have supported the stoppages. No trains have reached Switzerland from Milan since Wednesday night. In an attempt to terrorize the strikers into returning to work the Fascist press publishes accounts of punishments of anti-fascists. Two partisans in Milan have been shot dead immediately on arrest.
BURMA: Air Commando Combat Mission N0 15 3:10 Flight time (daytime flight) From Hailakandi to Kyaithin, Burma. Attempted to bomb storage depots and dumps. Fairly good results but no definite damage could be noted. Fires started in several buildings.
Combat Mission N0 16 3:15 Flight time (night flight) Night formation over Japanese lines. Dropped one thousand pound general purpose bombs at intervals. Object was to get their attention and make them a bit jittery. (Chuck Baisden)
ADMIRALTY ISLANDS: US forces repel a major Japanese attack on Los Negros, inflicting severe casualties.
NEW CALEDONIA: The Cannon Companies of the infantry regiments of the Americal Division join the Division from the continental United States. (Yves J. Bellanger)
PACIFIC OCEAN: SHIRAKAMI IJN, Japanese Minelayer, Sunk south of the Kuriles in a collision with army transport Nachiran Maru. (James Paterson)
USN Submarine Operations in the PACIFIC:
0100: USS GURNARD (SS-254) sinks a civilian cargo ship at 05-53 N, 111-12 E.
2200: USS PINTADO (SS-387) sinks the destroyer AKIKAZE at 16-48 N, 117-17 E, NW of Manila. (Skip Guidry)
U.S.A.: Washington: Roosevelt says that the Italian fleet is to be distributed equally between Britain, the US and the USSR.
The motion picture "The Picture of Dorian Gray" is released. Directed by Albert Lewin, this horror movie based on an Oscar Wilde novel stars Hurd Hatfield, George Sanders, Donna Reed, Angela Lansbury and Peter Lawford. The film is narrated by Cedric Hardwicke.
Escort carrier USS Cape Esperance launched.
Minesweeper USS Scout commissioned.