US Marines are seen here taking up positions near the unfinished swimming pool during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on the 7th of December, 1941.
The attack finally succeeded in drawing the United States into the Second World War.
Tag Archives: 1941
On this day: Australians under siege in North Africa
This photograph, dated the 13th of August, 1941 shows Australian troops on the frontline in North Africa in the Second World War.
Some 14 000 Australian troops spent 241 days under attack from combined Nazi and Italian forces in the Siege of Tobruk, Libya. Control of the harbour town was crucial to Allied interests in the region.
The Australians involved became known as the Rats of Tobruk.
On this day: Wounded soldiers in Norway.
27th December 1941: Wounded soldiers are transferred onto a landing craft in Vaagso (the island of Vågsøy), Norway. The country was under Nazi occupation at the time.
The photograph was taken during the one-day Operation Archery, a combined British and Norwegian raid against German forces that resulted in an Allied victory over the Nazis.
The Norwegian commander of the raid, Martin Linge, was killed in action during the operation.
On this day: Coventry in Ruins
The English city of Coventry suffered numerous Nazi bombing attacks in the blitz of 1940, but the worst came in November.
The city was bombarded from the 14th to the 15th, killing hundreds of people and injuring many hundreds more.
These photographs were taken on the 16th, showing many buildings ruined, and the recently built Owen Owen department store – the exterior still stands, but the inside was destroyed.
Coventry Cathedral was largely ruined, and still stands as a shell today. The new cathedral was built next door, and opened in 1962.
Hundreds more people were killed in German bombings the following year.
On this day: Italian Prisoners of War
6th January 1941: A column of Italian soldiers, captured after their defeat by combined Australian and British forces, are marched to an army base after the Battle of Bardia in Libya.
Bardia was the first battle planned and commanded by Australians in the Second World War. Italy was aligned with Nazi Germany in the war.
Wartime Christmas
English children evacuated during The Blitz eat their Christmas dinner in 1941 in a home for evacuees in Henley-on-Thames, a town along the River Thames in Oxfordshire.
On this day: a heavy loss for Britain in the war
A retouched version, and the original image.
10th December 1941: Britain suffered heavy losses off the coast of Malaya at the midway point of the Second World War. Japanese torpedoes took out both HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse, delivering a heavy blow to British morale.
The photograph was taken from a Japanese aeroplane.
The retouched image can be found in the collection of the Imperial War Museum.
An early Christmas in Australia
Children pose with Santa Claus in New South Wales, Australia on the 10th of November, 1941. Australia had been at war for more than two years.
On this day: British women prepare for invasion
23rd October 1941: Women of Britain’s Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) operate a rangefinder during anti-aircraft training on the beach of Weybourne in Norfolk, England.
Weybourne was considered to be at serious risk of invasion during the Second World War, and the region was prepared accordingly.
The ATS was formed in 1938, and existed until 1949, when it was incorporated into the Women’s Royal Army Corps.
On this day: the Australian Women’s Army Service was formed
Instructions in the use of the Owen gun. Belmont, Queensland. X
The Australian Women’s Army Service, created to release more men into forward positions in the military during the Second World War, was formed on the 13th of August, 1941.
Sergeant Pritchard (right), the only Japanese translator in the Australian Army. X
The AWAS was preceded by the Women’s Australian National Service in 1940, where women proved they were capable of performing traditionally male roles.
The Minister for the Australian Army, the Honourable F.M. Forde, with AWAS members in Western Australia in 1943.
24 026 women were enlisted over the course of the war, and several hundred served in New Guinea.
The AWAS was disbanded in 1947.
In Times Gone By... 
