Narciso Abeyta

Narciso Platero Abeyta or Ha So Deh (1918–1998) was a Navajo painter and silversmith known for his colorful paintings depicting Navajo life. His work is in the permanent collection of museums including the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian.
Early life and education.
Abeyta was born in 1918. He is named after his father, Narciso. His mother was Pablita. He started drawing when he was eleven. He attended the Santa Fe Indian School, starting in 1939. Dorothy Dunn was his teacher. Abeyta was a Golden Gloves boxer. He served in World War II (US Army) as a code talker. After he returned from service, he was unable to work for ten years due to his experiences at war. Eventually, he attended the University of New Mexico. He trained under Raymond Jonson.
Mid-life and career.
Abeyta was primarily a painter. His paintings document Navajo life, and use brush stroke techniques that are reminiscent of Navajo rugs. He had two known commissions for work as a muralist; a 1934 mural for a social science classroom in Santa Fe, New Mexico and in 1939 for Maisel's Indian Trading Post in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He demonstrated painting at the 1939 San Francisco World's Fair
Abeyta married Sylvia Ann, a Quaker ceramics artist. They had seven children, including artists Tony Abeyta and Pablita Abeyta. The family lived in Gallup, New Mexico.
Later life and legacy.
Abeyta died in 1998 from a cerebral hemorrhage. His work is held in the collections of the National Gallery of Art, National Museum of the American Indian, and the Museum of New Mexico.


Losses during the Battle of the Atlantic

The following is a table of Allied shipping losses in the Battle of the Atlantic during World War II. All shipping losses are in Gross Registered Tonnage (GRT).
Total losses by U-boats: 14,668,785


Convoy SC 94

Convoy SC 94 was the 94th of the numbered series of World War II Slow Convoys of merchant ships from Sydney, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, to Liverpool. The ships departed Sydney on 31 July 1942 and were met by Mid-Ocean Escort Force Group C-1.
Background.
As western Atlantic coastal convoys brought an end to the Second Happy Time, Admiral Karl Dönitz, the "Befehlshaber der U-Boote" (commander in chief of U-boats), shifted focus to the mid-Atlantic to avoid aircraft patrols. Although convoy routing was less predictable in the mid-ocean, Dönitz anticipated that the increased numbers of U-boats being produced would be able to effectively search the area with the advantage of intelligence gained through "B-Dienst" decryption of British Naval Cypher Number 3. However, only 20 percent of the 180 trans-Atlantic convoys sailing from the end of July 1942 until the end of April 1943 lost ships to U-boat attack.
Battle.
Discovery on 5 August.
 reported the convoy on 5 August and torpedoed the Dutch freighter "Spar".
Attack of 6 August.
"Assiniboine"s Type 286 radar spotted in a heavy fog on 6 August. The destroyer closed on the contact and briefly spotted the submarine twice before losing her in the fog. The submarine reappeared crossing the destroyer's bow at a range of , and both ships opened fire. The range was too close for "Assiniboine"s guns to engage, but her .50-calibre machine guns shot up the submarine's deck and conning tower. This kept the Germans from manning their deck gun, but the flak gun was already manned and firing. It punched holes through the destroyer's plating that set some petrol tanks on the deck afire and disabled 'A' gun. The destroyer was unable to ram "U-210" until the rear 4.7-inch gun hit the conning tower, killing the entire bridge crew and the .50-caliber machine guns were able to silence the flak gun. This caused Lieutenant Sorber, the senior surviving officer, to order the submarine to dive, but this meant that she had to hold a straight course while doing so. "Assiniboine" was able to take advantage of this and rammed "U-210" abaft the conning tower whilst she was diving. This caused the electric motors to fail, damaged her propellers and led to water entering the submarine, as a result of which Sorber ordered the ballast tanks to be blown and the submarine to be abandoned. The destroyer rammed her again when "U-210" resurfaced, dropped a pattern of depth charges set to detonate at shallow depth and hit her one more time with a 4.7-inch shell before the submarine finally sank.
Attack of 8 August.
 torpedoed the British freighter "Anneberg" and American freighter "Kaimoku" on the afternoon of 8 August while torpedoed the British freighters "Kelso" and "Trehata" and Greek freighter "Mount Kassion". Three undamaged ships were abandoned in the resulting panic. One of them, the British freighter "Radchurch", was later torpedoed by "U-176". The "Shakespeare"-class destroyer leader and the Polish destroyer arrived to reinforce the escort, while "Dianthus" left the convoy to repair damage incurred while ramming and sinking "U-379".
Attack of 10 August.
 torpedoed the Greek freighter "Condylis" in daylight on 10 August while torpedoed the British freighters "Cape Race", "Empire Reindeer" and "Oregon". The remainder of the convoy reached Liverpool on 13 August.
Ships in the convoy.
Allied merchant ships.
A total of 35 merchant vessels joined the convoy, either in Sydney or later in the voyage.
Convoy escorts.
A series of armed military ships escorted the convoy at various times during its journey.


List of Japanese aircraft in use during the Second Sino-Japanese War

This is a list of Japanese Aircraft in use during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Allied nicknames are in quotes (").


Lloyd Oliver

Lloyd Oliver (April 23, 1923 – March 16, 2011) was an American veteran of the United States Marine Corps and one of the original 29 members of the Navajo Code Talkers during World War II, and the brother of fellow Code Talker Willard Varnell Oliver.
Oliver served from 1942 to 1945, eventually attaining the rank of corporal.
Oliver was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.


Battle of Dupplin Moor

The Battle of Dupplin Moor was fought between supporters of King David II of Scotland, the son of King Robert Bruce, and English-backed invaders supporting Edward Balliol, son of King John I of Scotland on 11 August 1332. It took place a little to the south west of Perth, Scotland, when a Scottish force commanded by Donald, Earl of Mar, estimated to have been stronger than 15,000 and possibly as many as 40,000 men, attacked a largely English force of 1,500 commanded by Balliol and Henry Beaumont, Earl of Buchan. This was the first major battle of the Second War of Scottish Independence.
The First War of Scottish Independence between England and Scotland ended in 1328 with the Treaty of Northampton, recognising Bruce as king of Scotland, but the treaty was widely resented in England. King Edward III of England was happy to cause trouble for his northern neighbour and tacitly supported an attempt to place Balliol on the Scottish throne. Balliol and a small force landed in Fife and marched on Perth, the Scottish capital. A Scottish army at least ten times stronger occupied a defensive position on the far side of the River Earn. The invaders crossed the river at night via an unguarded ford and took up a strong defensive position.
In the morning the Scots raced to attack the English, disorganising their own formations. Unable to break the line of English men-at-arms, the Scots became trapped in a valley with fresh forces arriving from the rear pressing them forward and giving them no room to manoeuvre, or even to use their weapons. English longbowmen fired into both Scottish flanks. Many Scots died of suffocation or were trampled underfoot. Eventually they broke and the English men-at-arms mounted and pursued the fugitives until nightfall. Perth fell, the remaining Scottish forces dispersed and Balliol was crowned King of Scotland.
Background.
The First War of Scottish Independence between England and Scotland began in March 1296, when Edward I of England () stormed and sacked the Scottish border town of Berwick-upon-Tweed as a prelude to his invasion of Scotland. After the 30 years of warfare which followed, the newly crowned 14-year-old King Edward III was nearly captured in the English disaster at Stanhope Park. This brought his regents, Isabella of France and Roger Mortimer, to the negotiating table. They agreed to the Treaty of Northampton with Robert Bruce () in 1328, recognising Bruce as king of Scotland. The treaty was widely resented in England and commonly known as the , "the cowards' peace". Some Scottish nobles, refusing to swear fealty to Bruce, were disinherited and left Scotland to join forces with Edward Balliol, son of King John I of Scotland (), who had been captured by the English in 1296 and abdicated.
Robert Bruce died in 1329 and his heir was 5-year-old David II (). In 1331, under the leadership of Edward Balliol and Henry Beaumont, Earl of Buchan, the disinherited Scottish nobles gathered in Yorkshire and plotted an invasion of Scotland. Edward III was aware of the scheme and officially forbade it, in March 1332 writing to his northern officials that anyone planning an invasion of Scotland was to be arrested. The reality was different, and Edward III was happy to cause trouble for his northern neighbour. He insisted Balliol not invade Scotland overland from England but turned a blind eye to his forces sailing for Scotland from Yorkshire ports on 31 July 1332. The Scots were aware of the situation and were waiting for Balliol. David II's regent was an experienced old soldier, Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, who was appointed to the role of guardian of Scotland. He had prepared for Balliol and Beaumont, but he died ten days before they sailed.
Prelude.
Balliol's force was small, only 1,500 men: 500 men-at-arms and 1,000 infantry, the latter mostly longbowmen. He anticipated being joined by many Scots once he had landed. While they were underway, the Scots selected Donald, Earl of Mar, as the new guardian. Mar was an experienced campaigner and a close blood relative to David. He divided the large Scottish army: Mar commanded the part north of the Firth of Forth, while Patrick, Earl of March, commanded those to the south. Balliol had been in communication with Mar and hoped he would come over to his side with many of his troops. Knowing Mar to be commanding the troops on the northern shore of the firth, Balliol landed there, at Wester Kinghorn (present day Burntisland), on 6 August 1332.
While the invaders were still disembarking they were confronted by a large Scottish force commanded by Duncan, Earl of Fife, and Robert Bruce (an illegitimate son of King Robert the Bruce). The Scots attacked the part of the English force on the beach, but were driven off after a hard-pressed assault by the fire of the English longbowmen and by their supporting infantry before Balliol and Beaumont's men-at-arms could get ashore.
Scottish accounts of the time dismiss their losses as trivial, while one English source gives 90 Scots killed, two give 900, and a fourth 1,000. One chronicle, the "Brut", reports that Fife was "full of shame" at being defeated by such a small force. There is no record of the casualties suffered by Balliol's men. Mar withdrew his main force to the capital, Perth, amalgamated the survivors of Kinghorn and sent out a general call for reinforcements. Buoyed by their victory, Balliol and Beaumont's force completed their disembarkation and marched to Dunfermline, where they foraged, looted a Scottish armoury and then headed for Perth.
Battle.
English approach.
The Scottish army under Mar took up a position on the north bank of the River Earn, south of Perth, and broke down the bridge. The Scots were enormously stronger than the English. Chronicles of the time give strengths of 20,000, 30,000 orin seven cases40,000. The historian Clifford Rogers guesses they numbered something more than 15,000. Nearly all of the Scots were infantry. The English arrived on the south bank of the Earn on 10 August. They were in a difficult position: in enemy territory, facing an army of more than ten times their number in a good defensive position across a river and aware that the second Scottish army, under March, was moving towards them. The Scots were content to rest in their defensive positions, while planning to send a portion of their army on a wide outflanking manoeuvre the next day. Any attempt by the English to force the river would clearly have been foredoomed. The English may have been hoping Mar would desert to their cause, but he gave no indication of doing so. The two forces faced each other across the river for the rest of the day.
The Scots were so confident of victory that some started their celebrations that evening, according to a contemporary source "playing, drinking and making merry" late into the night. A guard was set by the broken bridge, but otherwise no precautions were taken against any action by the English. Realising they had no hope if they either retreated or remained where they were, the entire English force forded the river at an unguarded spot. Advancing in the dark, at about midnight they stumbled upon a Scottish camp and attacked it. Those Scots who were not killed or captured fled. The English believed they had overcome the main Scottish force, but were disabused at dawn when they saw the Scots advancing against them in two large bodies. This revelation demoralised the English, but according to the chronicles they were given heart by a stirring speech from one of their leaders.
The English arrayed themselves for battle on foot, except for 40 German mercenary knights who fought mounted. The other men-at-arms formed up in three tightly packed ranks with a fourth rank of pike-equipped ordinary infantry. The longbowmen were divided and assigned to each side of this central group. They were positioned where a valley narrowed as it entered hilly terrain. The infantry occupied the centre of this valley where it was about wide with the archers on higher and rougher terrain on each side, possibly echeloned forward. The horses of the men-at-arms were kept to the rear.
Scottish attack.
The Scots were still supremely confident and formed up in two large groups or battles - also referred to as schiltrons. These were tightly packed, deep, pike-armed formations. Mar suggested that the English be given the opportunity to surrender, so that they could have been ransomedwhich would have raised a large sum. On seeing the English across the Earne, Bruce, who was in command of the leading schiltron, and who was aware, at least in part, of Mar's correspondence with Balliol, publicly claimed that this unopposed crossing was due to treachery by Mar. Mar denounced this as a lie and declared he would prove his loyalty by being the first to strike a blow against the English. Bruce claimed this honour for himself and the two Scottish schiltrons proceeded to race each other to come to grips with the English.
Bruce's schiltron, being already in the lead, won the race. But its headlong charge disorganised it and left the slower men behind. When it contacted the English only 800 men were still with Bruce, but they struck with such force that they drove the infantry in the English centre back nearly . The English did not break, but turned their shoulders to the Scots, braced themselves and halted the Scottish onrush. The Scots in their haste had allowed themselves to be channelled by the terrain and all of them attacked the English men-at-arms in the centre, ignoring the longbowmen on the valley sides. Pushing back the English centre had the paradoxical effect of exposing their flanks to these bowmen. The rest of Bruce's schiltron followed him into the valley, pressing their comrades in front of them forward against the English so strongly that the front ranks of neither force were able to use their weapons.
The Scots were either largely without helmets, or wore helmets without visors (face guards), for contemporaries noted that the English archers "blinded and wounded the faces" of those in the leading schiltron. Harassed by this fire, the Scots on the flanks pressed closer to their main body, further compressing it and hampering the freedom of movement of its members. Mar's schiltron, which was also rushing towards the English, became disorganised due to its haste and was similarly channelled by the steep valley sides. They charged into the rear of Bruce's formation, causing chaos. The struggle continued from a little past dawn until after noon. In the centre of the Scottish mass the result was literally suffocating; men were pressed too tightly together to be able to breathe and any who lost their footing were trampled to death. Contemporary accounts speak of more than a thousand Scots being smothered without coming into contact with the English. One claimed that "more were slain by the Scots themselves than by the English. For ... every one fallen there fell a second, and then a third fell, and those who were behind pressing forward and hastening to the fight, the whole army became a heap of the slain."
The English, being in a looser and less deep formation, had room to use their weapons more effectively, once they had withstood the initial onslaught. The survivors of Bruce's schiltron attempted to extricate themselves, adding to the confusion and making easy targets for the English men-at-arms. The chronicles record the English infantry having to climb over heaps of dead Scots in order to be able to strike at those still living. All the while the longbowmen maintained their fire into the Scottish flanks. Eventually the Scottish resistance collapsed and they routed. Several of the surviving Scottish nobles made their escape on horseback; the rest of the Scots fled on foot. The English men-at-arms mounted their own horses and pursued the Scots, hacking them down until sunset. The English then occupied Perth and set to work on improving its fortifications, against the anticipated arrival of March's army.
Casualties.
Precise figures for the English dead are available: they lost 35 men-at-arms: 2 knights and 33 squires. Several accounts stress that not a single English archer was killed. The losses among the Scots are less certain, but all accounts agree they were very heavy. Mar and Bruce died on the field; as did 2 other earls, 14 barons, 160 knights and a large number of less notable men. Of the contemporary accounts which estimate the number of Scottish dead, two English chronicles give more than 15,000. Two Scottish accounts variously record 2,000 or 3,000 dead, while a third specifies 3,000 "nobles" and "of other men an untold number". Most accounts refer to the Scottish dead lying in great heaps, some taller than a spear's length. The only high-ranking Scottish survivor was the Earl of Fife, who was captured and changed sides.
Aftermath.
A week after the battle, March arrived outside Perth, having added the remnants of Mar's army to his own force. There was little he could do. Given that Balliol had defeated Mar in open battle, it would have been folly for March to assault him in a fortified town. Balliol had captured plentiful supplies of food in Perth and the ships which had landed his army defeated the Scottish navy, enabling food and reinforcements to be shipped in. In any event, before long the Scottish host had exhausted its own supplies, stripped the surrounding countryside of food and disbursed.
Balliol was crowned King of Scotland at Sconethe traditional place of coronation for Scottish monarchson 24 September 1332. Within two months Balliol granted Edward III Scottish estates to a value of £2,000, which included "the town, castle and county of Berwick". Balliol's support within Scotland was limited and within six months it had collapsed. He was ambushed by supporters of David II at the Battle of Annan a few months after his coronation. Balliol fled to England half-dressed and riding bareback. He appealed to Edward III for assistance. Edward III dropped all pretence of neutrality, recognised Balliol as king of Scotland and made ready for war. After the defeat of the Scots at the Battle of Halidon Hill in July 1333 Balliol was reinstated on the Scottish throne. He was deposed again in 1334, restored again in 1335 and finally deposed in 1336, by those loyal to David II. The Second War of Scottish Independence which had started with Balliol's invasion finally ended in 1357.
In his classic study, "A History of War in the Middle Ages", Sir Charles Oman says: "The Battle of Dupplin formed a turning point in the history of the Scottish wars. For the future the English always adopted the order of battle which Balliol and Beaumont had discovered."
Location.
Historic Environment Scotland has identified a site on Gaskmoor, which it suggests corresponds with the accounts in the chronicles. This is on the Dupplin plateau, south east of Dupplin Loch, and south west of Perth. It points out that if correctand concludes that this choice of terrain "is evidence of the tactical brilliance of the [English], who were battle-hardened veterans." Historic Environment Scotland added the battlefield to the Inventory of Historic Battlefields in Scotland on 21 March 2011.


Battle of Sunda Strait

The Battle of Sunda Strait was a naval battle which occurred during World War II in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java, and Sumatra. On the night of 28 February 1 March 1942, the Australian light cruiser and the American heavy cruiser faced a major Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) task force. After a fierce battle lasting several hours, both Allied ships were sunk. Five Japanese ships were sunk, three of them by friendly fire.
Background.
In late February 1942, Japanese amphibious forces were preparing to invade Java, in the Dutch East Indies. On 27 February, the main American-British-Dutch-Australian Command (ABDACOM) naval force, under Admiral Karel Doorman–a Dutch officer–steamed northeast from Surabaya to intercept an Imperial Japanese navy invasion fleet. This part of the ABDA force consisted of two heavy cruisers, including under the command of Captain Albert H. Rooks, three light cruisers, including under Captain Hector Waller, and nine destroyers. Only six out of nine of USS "Houston"s heavy guns were operational because her aft gun turret had been knocked out in an earlier Japanese air raid. The force engaged the Japanese force in the Battle of the Java Sea. The Allied ships were all sunk or dispersed. "Houston" and "Perth" both retreated to Tanjung Priok, Java, the main port of Batavia, Dutch East Indies, where they arrived at 13:30 on 28 February.
Prelude.
In the early evening on 28 February, "Houston", "Perth" and the Dutch destroyer received orders to depart Tanjung Priok and head through Sunda Strait to Tjilatjap, on the south coast of Java. Waller, who had seniority, was de facto commander of this force. The only ships they expected to encounter were Australian corvettes on patrol, in and around the strait itself. While "Houston" and "Perth" left at 19:00, "Evertsen" was not ready and followed the cruisers two hours later.
By chance, just after 22:00, a Japanese invasion convoy bound for West Java including the entire Sixteenth Army, under Lieutenant General Hitoshi Imamura, in over 50 transport ships was entering Bantam Bay, near the north-west tip of Java. The Japanese troop transports were escorted by the 5th Destroyer Flotilla, led by Rear Admiral Kenzaburo Hara, and the 7th Cruiser Division, under Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita. Light cruiser (with Admiral Hara aboard), with the destroyers , , , , , , , and were closest to the convoy. Flanking the bay to the north were the heavy cruisers and , accompanied by the destroyer .
Slightly further north, though not involved in the action, was the aircraft carrier , with the heavy cruisers and (with Admiral Kurita aboard), along with the seaplane tender , and the destroyers and .
Some time around 23:15, the Allied ships were sighted by the patrolling "Fubuki", which followed them surreptitiously. At 23:06, when they were about halfway across the mouth of Bantam Bay, "Perth" sighted a ship about ahead, near Saint Nicolaas Point. It was thought at first that the ship was an Australian corvette, but when challenged, she made an unintelligible reply, with a lamp which was the wrong color, fired her nine Long Lance (Type 93) torpedoes from about and then turned away, making smoke. The ship was soon identified as a Japanese destroyer (probably "Harukaze"). Waller reported the contact and ordered his forward turrets to open fire.
Main action.
During a ferocious night action, the Allied cruisers were surrounded. Following severe damage from torpedo and shell impacts, "Perth" and "Houston" were abandoned after midnight and sank.
About four Japanese transports and a minesweeper were sunk by friendly torpedoes that had missed their target. (Two of these transports were later refloated.) One of the Japanese transports sunk was "Ryujo Maru", carrying Lieutenant General Imamura, who had to jump overboard. He was later rescued by the crew of a small boat and taken ashore.
Destroyer action.
Meanwhile, as "Evertsen" was trying to catch up with "Houston" and "Perth", her crew spotted the tracers and intense shellfire of the main action. Her captain ordered a course northwest towards Pulau Mundu island, off the west coast of Sumatra, then hugged the Sumatran coast as "Evertsen" turned south to head through Sunda Strait.
However, "Evertsen" was spotted by "Murakumo" and "Shirakumo", looking for more escaping Allied ships. Both immediately illuminated "Evertsen" with their searchlights and took her under fire. "Evertsen" attempted to evade by turning west, but after turning southward again, the Dutch destroyer again encountered the Japanese destroyers. "Evertsen" was hit repeatedly, but temporarily disengaged under a smokescreen. By then, however, "Evertsen"s stern was on fire. Still taking Japanese fire, the captain ordered his crew to ground "Evertsen" on a coastal reef. Firing all her torpedoes, the remaining crew escaped ashore before the fire reached the aft magazine, causing an explosion that blew off most of the stern.
Aftermath.
Officially the Allied personnel killed during the battle included 696 members of the crew of "Houston" and 375 from "Perth", including the captains of both vessels, Rooks and Waller. The survivors were picked up by Japanese vessels and taken prisoner, included 368 from "Houston" and 307 from "Perth". Rooks was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions. The majority of "Evertsen"s crew was taken prisoner on 9–10 March 1942 and were held by the Japanese for three and a half years.
The crew of the Japanese cruiser "Mikuma" suffered six killed and 11 wounded, as a result of damage caused by "Houston". A direct shell hit to the bridge of the destroyer "Shirayuki" killed one crew member and wounded 11; "Harukaze" suffered hits to her bridge, engine room and rudder, killing three and wounding more than 15 others.


323d Combat Crew Training Wing


Y Force

Y Force was the South East Asia Command designation given to Chinese National Revolutionary Army forces that re-entered Burma from Yunnan in 1944 as one of the Allies fighting in Burma Campaign of World War II. It consisted of 175,000 troops divided into 15 divisions.
1942.
When the Japanese-Thai invaded Burma (in the first half of 1942), the Chinese Expeditionary Force in Burma, along with the other Allies forces, were forced to retreat back along their lines of communications. Most of the Chinese retreated into China but two divisions (38th and 22nd, plus fragments of three others) retreated into India where they were placed under the command of the American General Joseph Stilwell.
1943/1944 campaign.
After being re-equipped and retrained the Chinese divisions designated X Force formed the majority of front line forces available to Stilwell when he advanced into Northern Burma in October 1943. His intention was to capture Northern Burma and reopen land communications with China via a new spur to the Burma Road called the Ledo Road.
In support of Stilwell's offensive, in the second half of April 1944, Y Force mounted an attack on the Yunnan front. Nearly 75,000 troops crossed the Salween river on a front. Soon some fifteen Chinese divisions of 175,000 men, under General Wei Lihuang, were attacking the Japanese 56th Division. The Japanese forces in the North were now then fighting on two fronts in northern Burma.
By the end of May the Yunnan offensive, though hampered by the monsoon rains and lack of air support, succeeded in annihilating the garrison of Tengchung and eventually reached as far as Lungling. Strong Japanese reinforcements then counter-attacked and halted the Chinese advance.
During the monsoon season there was a pause in major offensive actions and the fighting did not resume in earnest until later in 1944.
1944/1945 campaign.
The Japanese Thirty-third Army, led by Lieutenant General Masaki Honda, defended Northern Burma against attacks from both Northern India and the Chinese province of Yunnan. The Japanese 18th Division faced the American and Chinese forces advancing south from Myitkyina and Mogaung which the British had secured in 1944, and the Japanese 56th Division faced the large Chinese Yunnan armies led by Wei Lihuang.
Although Thirty-third Army had been forced to relinquish most of the reinforcements it had received the previous year, the operations of the American-led Northern Combat Area Command under Lieutenant General Daniel Isom Sultan were limited from late 1944 onwards as many of its troops were withdrawn by air to face Japanese attacks in China. In Operation Grubworm, the Chinese 14th and 22nd Divisions were flown via Myitkyina to defend the airfields around Kunming, vital to the airlift of aid to China, nicknamed The Hump. Nevertheless, the command resumed its advance.
On the right flank of the command, the British 36th Division, advanced south down the "Railway Valley" from Mogaung to Indaw. It made contact with the Indian 19th Division near Indaw on 10 December 1944, and Fourteenth Army and NCAC now had a continuous front.
On Sultan's left, the Chinese New First Army (Chinese 30th Division and Chinese 38th Division) advanced from Myitkyina to Bhamo. The Japanese resisted for several weeks, but Bhamo fell on 15 December. The Chinese New Sixth Army (Chinese 50th Division) infiltrated through the difficult terrain between these two wings to threaten the Japanese lines of communication.
The New First Army made contact with Wei Lihuang's armies advancing from Yunnan near Hsipaw on 21 January 1945, and the Ledo road could finally be completed. The first truck convoy from India arrived in Kunming on 4 February, but by this point in the war the value of the Ledo road was uncertain, as it would not now affect the overall military situation in China.
To the annoyance of the British and Americans, Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek ordered Sultan to halt his advance at Lashio, which was captured on 7 March. The British and Americans generally refused to understand that Chiang had to balance the needs of China as a whole against fighting the Japanese in a British colony. The Japanese had already withdrawn most of their divisions from the northern front, to face Fourteenth Army in central Burma. On 12 March, Thirty-third Army HQ was also dispatched there, leaving only the 56th Division to hold the northern front. This division was also withdrawn in late March and early April.
From 1 April, NCAC's operations stopped, and its units returned to China. The British 36th Division moved to Mandalay, which had been captured in March, and was subsequently withdrawn to India. A US-led guerrilla force, OSS Detachment 101, took over the military responsibilities of NCAC, while British civil affairs and other units such as the Civil Affairs Service (Burma) stepped in to take over its other responsibilities. Northern Burma was partitioned into Line-of-Communication areas by the military authorities.


Operation Matterhorn

Operation Matterhorn was a military operation of the United States Army Air Forces in World War II for the strategic bombing of Japanese forces by B-29 Superfortresses based in India and China. Targets included Japan itself, and Japanese bases in China and South East Asia. The name comes from the Matterhorn, a mountain traditionally considered particularly difficult to climb.
Plan.
The idea of basing the Superfortresses in China first surfaced at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943. While planners assessed this option, the Anglo-American Combined Chiefs of Staff, meeting in Quebec in August, authorized a central Pacific drive that included the seizure of the Mariana Islands. Not only were the Marianas closer to Tokyo, but once in Allied hands they could be supplied and defended more easily than other sites. In September, Combined Chiefs of Staff planners concluded that B-29s in China, isolated from resupply except by inclusion in the Hump airlift, would be plagued by logistical problems. However, President Franklin D. Roosevelt decided in favor of the China bases because he was impatient to bomb Japan and wished to bolster the Chinese war effort. At the Sextant Conference in Cairo at the end of the year, he promised Chiang Kai-shek that the very heavy bombers would be coming to his country. General Henry H. Arnold supported that decision as a temporary expedient, but still preferred strategic missions against Japan from the Marianas, once bases there were available. The operation was originally called "Drake", with the use of long-range B-24s as well as B-29s.
Operation Matterhorn was developed by Brig. Gen. Kenneth B. Wolfe in October 1943 for implementation by the XX Bomber Command. Wolfe drew from an initial plan termed "Setting Sun" based on an outline drawn by President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the Casablanca Conference and from a counter-plan offered by Gen. Joseph Stilwell called "Twilight". (The primary difference between the two was that Chennault proposed that the B-29s be permanently based in India and forward-based in China.) The forward airbases in China would be self-sustaining, supplied out of India by flying materiel over the Hump using B-29s, a fleet of C-109 fuel tankers, 20 C-87 transports, and three C-46 bomber support squadrons. Under Setting Sun, the forward bases were to be in Guangxi in southern China, but because of intense Japanese pressure against the forces commanded by Stilwell and Gen. Claire Chennault, the Matterhorn plan moved the bases farther inland to Chengdu.
General Arnold approved the plan on October 12 and presented it to the U.S. Joint Chiefs after convincing President Roosevelt, through Gen. George C. Marshall as an intermediary, that no other strategic bombing of Japan was possible until the capture of the Mariana Islands, which was not yet scheduled. Roosevelt was unhappy with the projected starting date of June 1, 1944, having promised Chiang Kai-shek that the campaign would begin January 1, 1944, but he agreed on condition that the campaign be continued for a year.
The key development for the bombing of Japan was the B-29, which had an operational range of ; almost 90% of the bombs dropped on the home islands of Japan were delivered by this type of bomber.
Campaign.
Advance Army Air Forces echelons arrived in India in December 1943 to organize the building of airfields in India and China. Thousands of Indians labored to construct four permanent bases in eastern India around Kharagpur. As well as construction or modification of airfields in Bengal, a fuel pipeline to Calcutta and expansion of the port there was proposed. Meanwhile, to the northeast, across the Himalayan mountains, about 350,000 Chinese workers toiled to build four staging bases in western China near Chengtu (where Chennault had already developed airfields) and new airfields near Kunming.
The original plan envisioned two combat wings of 150 bombers each, but in April 1944 the second of those wings had not been sufficiently organized, equipped, or trained, and XX Bomber Command was reduced to a single bomb wing, fatally crippling its ability to sustain itself by airlift. By April 1944, the four B-29 groups of the 58th Bombardment Wing were available in Asia, and eight operating bases had become operational.
To avoid the risk that B-29s might be wasted on the battlefields when they would be much more useful against the Japanese home islands, the Joint Chiefs approved the establishment in April 1944 of the Twentieth Air Force, setting the stage for Operation Matterhorn.
Acting as executive agent for the Joint Chiefs, Arnold named himself the Twentieth's commander, and the AAF Air Staff as also the Air Staff of the Twentieth Air Force. Brig. Gen. Haywood S. Hansell served as chief of staff and "de facto" commander of the Twentieth after Arnold suffered a heart attack in May. Centralized control of the Superfortresses from Washington marked the recognition of the B-29 as a strategic weapon that transcended theaters and services. That same month, the first Superfortresses arrived in India, having flown across the Atlantic Ocean using the South Atlantic Transport route from Morrison Field, Florida to Natal, Brazil then across to North Africa, then to Arabia, and Persia. Accompanying them was Major General Kenneth B. Wolfe, the designated commander of the XX Bomber Command, which had been reassigned from the Second Air Force as the operational component of the Twentieth Air Force. Although a brilliant officer in research and development, with an excellent knowledge of the B-29, Wolfe had no upper echelon command or operational experience and was thus an unfortunate choice to command the first B-29 operations. The 58th Bomb Wing headquarters also arrived in India during the spring of 1944.
A committee of operations analysts who advised the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Twentieth Air Force on targets recommended Superfortress attacks on coke ovens and steel factories in Manchuria and Kyūshū. Shutting down these key industries would severely cripple the enemy's war effort. Also on the target list were important enemy harbor facilities and aircraft factories. Wolfe launched the first B–29 Superfortress combat mission on June 5, 1944, against Japanese railroad facilities at Bangkok, Thailand, about away. Of the 98 bombers that took off from India, 77 hit their targets, dropping 368 tons of bombs. Encouraged by the results, XX Bomber Command prepared for the first raids against Japan.
Ten days later, sixty-eight Superfortresses took off at night from staging bases at Chengtu to bomb the Imperial Iron and Steel Works at Yawata on Kyūshū, more than away. The June 15, 1944, mission – the first raid on the Japanese home islands since the Doolittle raid of April 1942 – marked the beginning of the strategic bombardment campaign against Japan. Like the Doolittle attack, it achieved little physical destruction. Only forty-seven of the sixty-eight B–29s airborne hit the target area; four aborted with mechanical problems, four crashed, six jettisoned their bombs because of mechanical difficulties, and others bombed secondary targets or targets of opportunity. Only one B–29 was lost to enemy aircraft over the target, while another was strafed and destroyed by Japanese aircraft after making an emergency landing at Neihsiang.
The second full-scale strike did not occur until July 7, 1944. By then, Arnold, impatient with Wolfe's progress, had replaced him temporarily with Brigadier General LaVern G. Saunders, until Major General Curtis E. LeMay could arrive from Europe to assume permanent command. Unfortunately, the three-week delay between the first and second missions reflected serious problems that prevented a sustained strategic bombing campaign from China against Japan. Each B–29 mission consumed tremendous quantities of fuel and bombs, which had to be shuttled from India to the China bases over the Himalayas, the world's highest mountain range. For every Superfortress combat mission, the command flew an average of six B–29 round-trip cargo missions over the Hump, using both tactical aircraft and B-29s modified as fuel tankers. When it was immediately apparent that the operation would never be self-sustaining, the Air Transport Command was called upon to support Matterhorn with allocations on its Hump airlift, taken from the allocations to the Fourteenth Air Force already in China. In September 1944 70 C-109s were added to the effort, flown by surplus B-29 crews, but XX Bomber Command, fearful of diversions to other agencies, resisted all attempts to have them operated by ATC. Its transport procedures contradicted those of ATC, however, limiting its efficiency, and beginning in November 1944 its B-29s were withdrawn from the airlift and the C-109s transferred to ATC. With plans already developed to shut down B-29 forward basing in China at the end of January 1945, ATC took over the logistical supply of the bases in China, too late to provide the volume required to stockpile materiel. In the end, 42,000 tons of cargo were delivered over the Hump to XX Bomber Command between April 1944 and January 1945, nearly two-thirds of it by ATC.
Range presented another problem. Tokyo, in eastern Honshū, lay more than from the Chinese staging bases, out of reach of the B–29s. Kyūshū, in southwestern Japan, was the only one of the major home islands within the combat radius of the Superfortress. Targets in South East Asia also involved lengthy flights, with the Operation Boomerang raid which was conducted against Palembang on 10/11 August requiring a round trip of .
The very heavy bomber still suffered mechanical problems that grounded some aircraft and forced others to turn back before dropping their bombs. Even those B–29s that reached the target area often had difficulty in hitting the objective, partly because of extensive cloud cover or high winds. Larger formations could have helped compensate for inaccurate bombing, but Saunders did not have enough B–29s to dispatch large formations. Also, the Twentieth Air Force periodically diverted the Superfortresses from strategic targets to support theater commanders in Southeast Asia and the southwestern Pacific. For these reasons, the XX Bomber Command and the B–29s largely failed to fulfill their strategic promise.
On August 20, LeMay arrived to breathe new energy into the XX Bomber Command. The former Eighth Air Force group and wing commander had achieved remarkable success with strategic bombing operations in Europe, testing new concepts such as stagger formations, the combat box, and straight-and-level bombing runs. The youngest two-star general in the Army Air Forces had also revised tactics, tightened and expanded formations, and enhanced training for greater bombing precision. He inaugurated a lead-crew training school so that formations could learn to drop as a unit on cue from the aircraft designated as the lead ship.
During his first two months at XX Bomber Command, LeMay had little more success than Wolfe or Saunders. The command continued to average only about one sortie a month per aircraft against Japan's home islands. When Douglas MacArthur invaded the Philippines in October 1944, LeMay diverted his B-29s from bombing Japanese steel facilities to striking enemy aircraft factories and bases in Formosa, Kyūshū, and Manchuria.
Meanwhile, LeMay gained the support of Communist leader Mao Zedong, who controlled parts of northern China. Willing to help against a common enemy, Mao agreed to assist downed American airmen and to locate in northern China a weather station that would provide better forecasts for the XX Bomber Command's raids on the Japanese in Manchuria and Kyūshū. Hoping to gain American recognition of his own regime, Mao suggested that the Americans set up B–29 bases in northern China like those in Chiang Kai-shek's area of control in southern China. LeMay declined, however, because he found it difficult enough to supply the airfields at Chengtu.
"Ichi-Go" and the first "fire raid".
The former European theater bomber commander continued to experiment with new technologies and tactics and soon imported to China the incendiary weapons being used by the British against Germany. In late 1944, a Japanese offensive (codenamed Operation Ichi-Go) in China probed toward the B–29 and Air Transport Command bases around Chengdu and Kunming. To slow the enemy advance, Maj. Gen. Claire L. Chennault of the Fourteenth Air Force asked for raids on Japanese supplies at Hankow, and the Joint Chiefs directed LeMay to hit the city with firebombs. On December 18, LeMay launched the fire raid, sending eighty-four B–29s in at medium altitude with five hundred tons of incendiary bombs. The attack left Hankow burning for three days, proving the effectiveness of incendiary weapons against the predominantly wooden architecture of the Far East.
By late 1944, American bombers were raiding Japan from the recently captured Marianas, making operations from the vulnerable and logistically impractical China bases unnecessary. In January 1945, the XX Bomber Command abandoned its bases in China and concentrated 58th Bomb Wing resources in India. The transfer signaled the end of Matterhorn. During the same month, LeMay moved to the Marianas, leaving command of the XX Bomber Command in India to Brig. Gen. Roger M. Ramey. Between January and March, Ramey's B–29s assisted Mountbatten in the South-East Asian theatre, supporting British and Indian ground forces in Burma by targeting rail and port facilities in Indochina, Thailand, and Burma. More distant targets included refineries and airfields in Singapore, Malaya, as well as Palembang and other locations in the Netherlands East Indies. The 58th, the only operational wing of the XX Bomber Command, remained in India until the end of March 1945, when it moved to the Marianas to join the XXI Bomber Command.
XX Bomber Command stopped being an operational command at the end of March 1945 when the 58th Bomb Wing moved from India to the Marianas and control of the wing passed to the XXI Bomber Command.
Assessment.
The American Bomber Summary Survey states that "Approximately 800 tons of bombs were dropped by China-based B-29s on Japanese home island targets from June 1944 to January 1945. These raids were of insufficient weight and accuracy to produce significant results." XX Bomber Command had failed to achieve the strategic objectives that the planners had intended for Operation Matterhorn, largely because of logistical problems, the bomber's mechanical difficulties, the vulnerability of Chinese staging bases (see Operation Ichi-Go), and the extreme range required to reach key Japanese cities. Although the B–29s achieved some success when diverted to support Chiang Kai-shek's forces in China, MacArthur's offensives in the Philippines, and Mountbatten's efforts in the Burma Campaign, they generally accomplished little more than the B-17 Flying Fortresses and B-24 Liberators assigned to the Fourteenth, Fifth, Thirteenth, and Tenth Air Forces.
Chennault considered the Twentieth Air Force a liability and thought that its supplies of fuel and bombs could have been more profitably used by his Fourteenth Air Force. The XX Bomber Command consumed almost 15 percent of the Hump airlift tonnage per month during Matterhorn. Lt. Gen. Albert C. Wedemeyer, who replaced Lt. Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell as American senior commander in the China theater, agreed with Chennault. The two were happy to see the B–29s leave China and India. Yet, despite those objections, Matterhorn did benefit the Allied effort. Using the China bases bolstered Chinese morale and, more important, it allowed the strategic bombing of Japan to begin six months before bases were available in the Marianas. The Matterhorn raids against the Japanese home islands also demonstrated the B–29's effectiveness against Japanese fighters and anti-aircraft artillery. Operations from the Marianas would profit from the streamlined organization and improved tactics developed on the Asian mainland.
Command structure.
General Arnold retained personal command of the Twentieth Air Force – to avoid diversion of assets from the B-29 effort against Japan, particularly by Admiral Nimitz, who was given command authority over all efforts in the Central Pacific – with Brigadier General Haywood S. Hansell as chief of staff (and later commander of XXI Bomber Command). Tentative plans called for an operational force of 48 B-29 groups, numbering between 1,000 and 1,500 B-29s, to be deployed in four bomber commands (the XX BC of 4 groups in India-China, the XXI BC of 16 groups in the Marianas, the XXII BC of 24 groups in the Philippines and Okinawa, and the XXIII BC of 4 groups in the Aleutians).
Original plans for XX Bomber Command to employ two combat wings in China (the 58th and 73rd Combat Bomb Wings) were changed on 2 March 1944 when limited numbers of operational B-29s resulted in only the 58th CBW assigned. There, after poor bombing results, and as developing operations deemed the original complex organization unnecessary, it was deemed a redundant level of command and its four groups moved to Guam in April 1945 as part of XXI Bomber Command.
The bases in China were part of the China Burma India Theater of World War II for administrative purposes. The commander of the XX Bomber Command had no control over stations, bases, units, and personnel not directly assigned to him, and none over shipping and other logistic support essential to the operation. However the Commander-in-Chief of the XX Bomber Command reported directly to the JCS in Washington and was not under SEAC operational control like the rest of the personnel in the CBI.
The British planning to deploy their new Very Long Range Bomber Force (of about 22 squadrons) to the Far East for final operations against the Japanese, proposed that Twentieth Air Force be controlled by the Combined Chiefs, as had the air forces in Europe, but when the Americans rejected the proposal (because the forces involved were overwhelmingly American), the British dropped the issue.
Operational Command Structure.
General Henry "Hap" Arnold named himself the commander of the Twentieth Air Force. Brigadier General Haywood S. Hansell became Twentieth Air Force chief of staff. The subordinate commanders of XX Bomber Command were:


Invasion of the Kuril Islands

The Invasion of the Kuril Islands ( "Kuril Islands Landing Operation") was the World War II Soviet military operation to capture the Kuril Islands from Japan in 1945. The invasion was part of the Soviet–Japanese War, and was decided on when plans to land on Hokkaido were abandoned. The successful military operations of the Red Army at Mudanjiang and during the Invasion of South Sakhalin created the necessary prerequisites for invasion of the Kuril Islands.
Battle.
The operation took place between August 18 and September 1. The attack was made by the 87th Rifle Corps (Guards Lieutenant General A. S. Ksenofontov) of the 16th Army (Lieutenant General L. G. Cheremisov) from the 2nd Far Eastern Front, and elements of the Kamchatka Defense Area (Major General Alexey Gnechko commanding). Ships and transportation were drawn from the Petropavlovsk military base (Captain Dmitry Grigorievich Ponomarev). The 128th Aviation Division also provided support.
The islands were occupied by the Japanese 91st Infantry Division (Shiashkotan, Paramushir, Shumshu, and Onekotan), 42nd Division (Shimushiro), 41st Independent Regiment (Matua Island), 129th Independent Brigade (Urup Island), and 89th Infantry Division (Iturup and Kunashiri). The Japanese commander was Lieutenant General Tsutsumi Fusaki.
Initial reconnaissance was undertaken on 18 August by a detachment of the 113th Separate Rifle Brigade (Captain-Lieutenant G. I. Brunshtein), carried by two mine trawlers (ТЩ-589 and ТЩ-590) to Rubetzu Bay on Iturup island. The landings on Iturup were continued by the 355th Rifle Division, which also landed on the smaller island of Urup.
On August 23, the 20,000-strong Japanese garrisons on the islands were ordered to surrender as part of the general surrender of Japan. However, some of the garrison forces ignored this order and continued to resist Soviet occupation.
From 22 to 28 August, troops of the Kamchatka Defense Area occupied the Kuril Islands from Urup north.
On 1 September, elements of the 87th Rifle Corps were landed by torpedo boats, mine trawlers and transports (departing from Otomari) on Kunashir and Shikotan in the southern Kuril Islands. This was an assault landing against Japanese resistance. On 4 September, 87th Rifle Corps occupied five smaller islands (Sibotzu, Taraku-Shima, Uri-Shima, Akiuri, and Suiseto).
After September 4, Soviet forces occupied the rest of the Kuril Islands without further resistance.
The islands remained part of Russia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, however their true legal status remains in question as part of the Kuril Islands dispute between Russia, Japan, and other parties.


Blue Division

The Blue Division (, ) was a unit of volunteers from Francoist Spain within the German Army ("Wehrmacht") on the Eastern Front during World War II. It was officially designated the Spanish Volunteer Division ("División Española de Voluntarios") by the Spanish Army and 250th Infantry Division ("250 Infanterie-Division") by the Germans.
Spain was ruled by an authoritarian regime under Francisco Franco installed in the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) with support from Nazi Germany. Franco chose to remain neutral in World War II but sympathised with the Axis powers. After lobbying by the Foreign Minister Ramón Serrano Suñer and senior figures within the Spanish Army, Franco agreed that Spanish people would be permitted to enlist privately in the German Army and agreed to provide tacit support. An infantry division was raised from Falangist and Army cadres and was sent for training in Germany. The unit fought on the Eastern Front and notably participated in the siege of Leningrad, but was withdrawn from the Front after Spanish pressure in October 1943 and was returned to Spain soon afterwards. Several thousand non-returners were incorporated into the 121st Infantry Division, the short-lived Blue Legion, and eventually into the Waffen-SS.
Background.
Francisco Franco took power at the head of a coalition of fascist, monarchist, and conservative political factions in the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) against the left-leaning Spanish government supported by communist and anarchist factions. More than 300,000 people were killed and lasting damage was done to the country's economy.
Franco had been supported by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy during the Civil War and Franco sympathised with many aspects of Nazi ideology, especially its anti-communism. Franco ensured that Spain was neutral at the start of World War II but seriously contemplated joining the conflict as a German ally in the aftermath of the Fall of France in 1940. He met Adolf Hitler on 23–24 October 1940 but was unable to gain promises that Spain would gain colonial territories from France in North Africa because Hitler feared delegitimising the new Vichy regime in France. Ultimately, Spain remained neutral.
Formation.
The German invasion of the Soviet Union led to renewed interest in participating in what Spanish officials saw as an "anti-communist crusade". Foreign Minister Ramón Serrano Suñer first proposed the idea of a Spanish contribution to Franco within hours of the invasion on 22 June 1941. Senior officers of the Spanish Army supported the proposal. Franco soon agreed to the proposal, directing that the Spanish Army should unofficially co-ordinate the formation of the unit. Although disappointed that Spain had not declared war on the Soviet Union, the German regime accepted the Spanish offer on 24 June 1941. Franco struggled to balance the demands of Spanish Army and Falangist factions, both of which attempted to influence the new unit, himself siding with the former.
Recruitment began on 27 June 1941 and 18,373 men had volunteered by 2 July 1941 from within the Spanish Army and Falangist movement. Fifty per cent of officers and NCOs were professional soldiers given leave from the Spanish Army, including many veterans of the Spanish Civil War. The division was made up mainly of Falangist volunteers and almost a fifth of early volunteers were students. General Agustín Muñoz Grandes was assigned to lead the volunteers. Because the soldiers could not use official Spanish Army uniforms, they adopted a symbolic uniform comprising the red berets of the Carlists, the khaki trousers of the Spanish Legion, and the blue shirts of the Falangists—hence the nickname "Blue Division." This uniform was used only while on leave in Spain; in the field, soldiers wore the German Army field grey uniform ("Feldgrau") with a shield on the upper right sleeve bearing the word "España" and the Spanish national colours.
Operational history.
Organization and training.
On July 13, 1941, the first train left Madrid for Grafenwöhr, Bavaria for a further five weeks of training. There they became the German Army's 250th Infantry Division and were initially divided into four infantry regiments, as in a standard Spanish division. To aid their integration into the German supply system, they soon adopted the standard German model of three regiments. One of the original regiments was dispersed amongst the others, which were then named after three of the Spanish cities that volunteers largely originated from—Madrid, Valencia and Seville. Each regiment had three battalions (of four companies each) and two weapons companies, supported by an artillery regiment of four battalions (of three batteries each). There were enough men left over to create an assault battalion, mainly submachine gun-armed. Later, due to casualties, this was disbanded. Aviator volunteers formed a Blue Squadron ("Escuadrillas Azules") which, using Messerschmitt Bf 109s and Focke-Wulf Fw 190s, claimed to have shot down 156 Soviet aircraft.
Eastern Front.
On 31 July, after taking the Hitler oath, the Blue Division was formally incorporated into the German Wehrmacht as the 250th Division. It was initially assigned to Army Group Center, the force advancing towards Moscow. The division was transported by train to Suwałki, Poland (August 28), from where it had to continue by foot on a march. It was scheduled to travel through Grodno (Belarus), Lida (Belarus), Vilnius (Lithuania), Molodechno (Belarus), Minsk (Belarus), and Orsha (Belarus) to Smolensk, and from there to the Moscow front. While marching towards the Smolensk front on September 26, the Spanish volunteers were rerouted from Vitebsk and reassigned to Army Group North (the force closing on Leningrad), becoming part of the German 16th Army. The Blue Division was first deployed on the Volkhov River front, with its headquarters in , on the outskirts of Novgorod. It was in charge of a section of the front north and south of Novgorod, along the banks of the Volkhov River and Lake Ilmen.
The division's soldiers used the iconostasis of the Church of Saint Theodore Stratelates on the Brook for firewood. The iconostases of the Orthodox Cathedral of Saint Sophia, Sts. Peter and Paul Church in Kozhevniki, and the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Mother of God in the Antoniev Monastery were taken to Germany at the end of 1943. According to the museum curator in the Church of the Transfiguration on Ilyina Street, the division used the high cupola as a machine-gun nest. As a result, much of the building was seriously damaged, including many of the medieval icons by Theophanes the Greek.
In August 1942, the Blue Division was transferred north to the southeastern flank of the siege of Leningrad, just south of the river Neva near Pushkin, Kolpino and Krasny Bor in the Izhora River area. After the collapse of the German southern front following the Battle of Stalingrad, more German troops were deployed southwards. By this time, General Emilio Esteban Infantes had taken command. The Blue Division faced a major Soviet attempt to break the siege of Leningrad in February 1943, when the Soviet 55th Army, reinvigorated after the victory at Stalingrad, attacked the Spanish positions at the Battle of Krasny Bor, near the main Moscow-Leningrad road. Despite very heavy casualties, the Spaniards were able to hold their ground against a Soviet force seven times larger and supported by tanks. The assault was contained and the siege of Leningrad was maintained for a further year. The division remained on the Leningrad front where it continued to suffer heavy casualties due to weather and to enemy action.
Disbandment and the Blue Legion.
Eventually, the Allies and conservative Spaniards (including many officials of the Catholic Church) began to press Franco for the withdrawal of troops from the quasi alliance with Germany. Franco initiated negotiations in the spring of 1943 and gave an order of withdrawal on October 10. Some Spanish volunteers refused to return. On November 3, 1943 the Spanish government ordered all troops to return to Spain. In the end, the total of "non-returners" was close to 3,000 men, mostly Falangists. Spaniards also joined other German units, mainly the Waffen-SS, and fresh volunteers slipped across the Spanish border near Lourdes in occupied France. The new pro-German Spanish units were collectively called the "Legión Azul" ("Blue Legion").
Spaniards initially remained part of the 121st Infantry Division, but even this meagre force was ordered to return home in March 1944, and was transported back to Spain on March 21. The rest of the volunteers were absorbed into German units. Platoons of Spaniards served in the 3rd Mountain Division and the 357th Infantry Division. One unit was sent to Latvia. Two companies joined the Brandenburger Regiment and German 121st Division in Nazi security warfare in Yugoslavia. The 101st Company ("Spanische-Freiwilligen Kompanie der SS 101", "Spanish Volunteer Company of the SS Number 101") of 140 men, made up of four rifle platoons and one staff platoon, was attached to 28th SS Volunteer Grenadier Division Wallonien.
The Blue Division was the only component of the German Army to be awarded a medal of their own, commissioned by Hitler in January 1944 after the Division had demonstrated its effectiveness in impeding the advance of the Red Army. Hitler referred to the division as "equal to the best German ones". During his table talks, he said: "...the Spaniards have never yielded an inch of ground. One can't imagine more fearless fellows. They scarcely take cover. They flout death. I know, in any case, that our men are always glad to have Spaniards as neighbours in their sector".
Through rotation, as many as 47,000 Spanish soldiers served on the Eastern Front. The casualties of the Blue Division and its successors included 4,954 men killed and 8,700 wounded. Another 372 members of the Blue Division, the Blue Legion, or volunteers of the "Spanische-Freiwilligen Kompanie der SS 101" were taken prisoner by the Red Army; 286 of these men remained in captivity until April 2, 1954, when they returned to Spain aboard the ship "Semiramis", supplied by the International Red Cross. In action against the Blue Division, the Red Army suffered 49,300 casualties.
Portuguese volunteers.
Like Spain, Portugal under the Salazar regime remained neutral during World War II and more openly sympathized with the Western Allies. There was however some popular sympathy for the anti-communist sentiment, and 150 Portuguese volunteers served unofficially within the Blue Division. However, most had roots in Spain or had already fought on the Francoist side in the Viriatos division during the Spanish Civil War. They were integrated within Spanish units and had no separate national presence.
War cemetery.
1900 soldiers of the Blue Division are buried in the war cemetery in Veliky Novgorod.


First Air Force

The First Air Force (Air Forces Northern; 1 AF-AFNORTH) is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force Air Combat Command (ACC). It is headquartered at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida. Its primary mission is the air defense of the Contiguous United States (CONUS), United States Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.
It was one of the four original pre-World War II numbered air forces formed during the existence of the United States Army Air Corps. It was activated as the Northeast Air District on 18 December 1940, at Mitchel Field, Long Island, New York with a mission of air defense of the Northeastern United States and Great Lakes regions. Its primary mission was the organization and training of new combat units prior to their deployment overseas. It was active in 1941–42; 1942–58; 1966–69; and with minor name and function changes from 1985 to the present.
First Air Force is commanded by Lieutenant General Kirk S. Pierce. Its Command Chief Master Sergeant is Chief Master Sgt. Tony L. Whitehead.
It has the responsibility for ensuring the air sovereignty and air defense of the Contiguous United States (CONUS), United States Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. As the CONUS NORAD Region (CONR) for North American Aerospace Defense Command, CONR provides air defense in the form of airspace surveillance and airspace control. 1AF (AFNORTH) is also the designated air component for the United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM). USNORTHCOM's area of responsibility includes the continental United States, Canada, and Mexico, and its air, land and maritime approaches.
With the transfer of responsibility for continental air defense from the active duty component of the Air Force to the Air National Guard, 1 AF became the first numbered air force to be made up primarily of citizen airmen. Furthermore, 1AF now has operational control (OPCON) of the Civil Air Patrol.
History.
One of the four original numbered air forces, First Air Force was activated as the Northeast Air District of the GHQ Air Force on 18 December 1940, at Mitchel Field, Long Island, New York. It was redesignated First Air Force on 9 April 1941 with a mission for the defense of the Northeast and Great Lakes regions of the United States.
World War II.
During the initial months after the Pearl Harbor Attack, First Air Force organized what would eventually become the core of the Army Air Forces Antisubmarine Command (AAFSC), obtaining most of its forces from I Bomber Command to combat the German U-boat threat along the Atlantic Coast. AAFSC would eventually expand that mission to the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean until the antisubmarine mission was taken over completely by the Navy in mid-1943.
Beginning in May 1942, the mission of First Air Force became operational training of units and crews, and the replacement training of individuals for bombardment, fighter, and reconnaissance operations. It received graduates of Army Air Forces Training Command flight schools; navigator training; flexible gunnery schools and various technical schools, organized them into newly activated combat groups and squadrons, and provided operational unit training (OTU) and replacement training (RTU) to prepare groups and replacements for deployment overseas to combat theaters. The First Air Force became predominantly a fighter OTU and RTU organization. Most P-47 Thunderbolt fighter groups were trained by I Fighter Command, along with P-39/P-63 Airacobra groups; C-47 Skytrain and later C-46 Commando groups by I Troop Carrier Command. By 1944, most of the Operational Training of groups ended, with the command concentrating on the training of individual replacements using Army Air Force Base Units (AAFBU) as training organizations at the airfields controlled by First Air Force.
Air Defense Wings were also organized for the major metropolitan areas along the northeast coast, using training units attached to the Wings. By 1944 the likelihood of an air attack along the eastern seaboard was remote, and these air defense wings were reduced to paper units.
By 1944, the vast majority of the USAAF was engaged in combat operations in various parts of the world, such as the Eighth Air Force in Europe and the Twentieth Air Force in the Pacific. The training units located within the United States (known as the Zone of the Interior, or "ZI".) under First, Second, Third and Fourth Air Force were all were placed under the unified command of the Continental Air Forces (CAF) on 13 December 1944, with the Numbered Air Forces becoming subordinate commands of CAF.
Air Defense Command.
In March 1946, USAAF Chief General Carl Spaatz had undertaken a major re-organization of the postwar USAAF that had included the establishment of Major Commands (MAJCOM), who would report directly to HQ United States Army Air Forces. Continental Air Forces was inactivated, and First Air Force was assigned to the postwar Air Defense Command in March 1946 and subsequently to Continental Air Command (ConAC) in December 1948 being primarily concerned with air defense. First Air Force Headquarters was located at Fort Slocum, New York, from 1946 to 1949.
The command was originally assigned the region of the New England states, along with New York and New Jersey. With the inactivation of the ADC Eleventh Air Force on 1 July 1948 due to budget restrictions, command's region of responsibility was increased to include the upper Midwest states of Michigan and Ohio, along with the Mid-Atlantic region south to the North Carolina/Virginia Border.
In 1949 Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve units were placed under First Air Force command, with its active-duty units being reassigned to Eastern Air Defense Force (EADF) or to the 30th, 32d or 26th Air Divisions.
The command was inactivated on 23 June 1958 for budgetary reasons, its assigned units being placed under ConAC.
First Air Force was reactivated at Stewart Air Force Base, Newburgh, N.Y., on 20 January 1966 due to the inactivation of the ADC Air Defense Sectors. First Air Force assumed responsibility for the ADC 21st, 33d, 34th, 35th, and 36th Air Divisions, primarily located in the northeast and upper Midwest regions of the United States. It also was responsible for the air defense of Greenland, Iceland and parts of Canada. By July 1968, First Air Force had again assumed total responsibility for the air defense of the eastern seaboard, just as it had during World War II.
On 16 January 1968 Air Defense Command was re-designated Aerospace Defense Command (ADCOM) as part of a restructuring of USAF air defense forces. First Air Force's second period of service was short lived, however, and the command was again inactivated as the result of a major ADCOM reorganization on 31 December 1969 of the First, Fourth, Tenth Air Forces and several Air Divisions. This reorganization was the result of the need to eliminate intermediate levels of command in ADCOM driven by budget reductions and a perceived lessening of the need for continental air defense against attacking Soviet aircraft.
ADCOM reassigned the units under the inactivated First Air Force were reassigned primarily to the 20th, 21st or 23d Air Divisions.
Tactical Air Command.
As part of realignment of military assets. ADCOM was reorganized on 1 October 1979. The atmospheric defense resources (interceptors and warning radars) of ADCOM were reassigned to Tactical Air Command (TAC). With this move many Air National Guard units that had an air defense mission also came under the control of TAC, which established a component called Air Defense, Tactical Air Command (ADTAC), at the level of a numbered air force.
On 6 December 1985 HQ USAF reactivated First Air Force at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, and assigned it to Tactical Air Command (TAC), replacing ADTAC. First Air Force was given the mission to provide, train and equip combat ready air defence forces for the air defense of the North American continent.
Upon its reactivation, First Air Force was composed of units of the active Air Force and the Air National Guard. Because of its unique mission and its binational responsibilities, First Air Force works closely with the Canadian Forces. Canadian personnel are stationed at First Air Force Headquarters at Tyndall Air Force Base Florida, and at the various regional air defense sectors located throughout the United States.
Activation of the Continental NORAD Region on 1 October 1986, resulted in a new structure for North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). The continental U.S. region, along with Alaskan and Canadian regions provided the command and operational system for North American air defense.
The Air Defense Sectors were transferred by the Air Force to the National Guard Bureau and allotted to the Air National Guard on 1 October 1990. They were operationally gained by First Air Force, Tactical Air Command.
First Air Force was transferred to Air Combat Command along with the rest of TAC on 1 June 1992.
Air Combat Command.
In the years since its third activation, more of the responsibility for the defense of American air sovereignty has primarily shifted to the Air National Guard. Also, reorganization of the command structure of the U.S. Air Force saw the assignment of air defense to Tactical Air Command and later, its successor, Air Combat Command.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the role of the Air National Guard in the defense of North America increased. As this role changed, discussions between the active Air Force and the Air National Guard commenced concerning roles and responsibilities.
As the Cold War began to wind down and budgetary constraints became realities, more and more of the missions previously carried out by active duty forces began to be transferred into the reserve components. By the 1990s, 90 percent of the air defense mission was being handled by the Air National Guard.
In October 1997, First Air Force became primarily composed of Air National Guard units charged with the air defense of the North American continent. Today, First Air Force consists primarily of members of the Air National Guard. Its headquarters is located at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida. It comprises 10 fighter wings and two air defense sectors for the East and Western regions of the country.
Units circa 2018.
First Air Force also has operational control of the Civil Air Patrol, at Maxwell AFB, AL (Regular Air Force & Air Force Reserve CAP-USAF component). Administrative control of CAP remains with Air University.
Additionally, First Air Force provides operational control of alert Air National Guard air defense fighter units:
Non-flying units


Western Front command tenures (World War II)

This article is a tabular depiction of those generals who held command at the army group echelon or higher on the Western Front of World War II during 1944-1945, and is intended to serve as a reference that can be linked to by other World War II articles. Headquarters and commander names are linked for ease of reference.
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David Thatcher Memorial Highway


Charles Young (United States Army)

Charles Young (March 12, 1864January 8, 1922) was an American soldier. He was the third African-American graduate of the United States Military Academy, the first black U.S. national park superintendent, first black military attaché, first black man to achieve the rank of colonel in the United States Army, and highest-ranking black officer in the regular army until his death in 1922.
Early life and education.
Charles Young was born in 1864 into slavery to Gabriel Young and Arminta Bruen in Mays Lick, Kentucky, a small village near Maysville. However, his father escaped from slavery early in 1865, crossing the Ohio River to Ripley, Ohio, and enlisting in the 5th United States Colored Heavy Artillery Regiment near the end of the American Civil War. His service earned Gabriel and his wife their freedom, which was guaranteed by the 13th Amendment after the war. Arminta was already literate, which suggests she may have worked as a house slave before her freedom. The Young family settled in Ripley when Gabriel was discharged in 1866, deciding that opportunities there in Ohio were probably better there than in postwar Kentucky. Gabriel Young received a bonus by continuing to serve in the Army after the war, and he had enough to buy land and build a house.
Charles Young attended the all-white high school in Ripley, the only one there who was African-American. He graduated in 1880 at the top of his class. He then taught for several years in the new black high school opened in Ripley.
West Point.
In 1883, Young took the competitive examination for appointment as a cadet at United States Military Academy at West Point. He had the second highest score in his district, but the top candidate decided not to go and Young reported to West Point in 1884. There was then one other black cadet, John Hanks Alexander, who had entered in 1883 and graduated in 1887. Young and Alexander shared a room for three years at West Point. Although regularly discriminated against, Young did make several lifelong friends among his later classmates, but none among his initial class. He had to repeat his first year when he failed mathematics. He later failed an engineering class, but he passed it the second time when he was tutored during the summer by George Washington Goethals, the Army engineer who later directed construction of the Panama Canal and who as an assistant professor took an interest in Young. (It was not unusual for cadets to need tutoring in some subjects. Young's strength was in languages, and he learned to speak several.)
As one of the first African-Americans to attend and graduate from West Point, Charles Young faced challenges far beyond his white peers. He experienced extreme racial discrimination from classmates, faculty and upperclassmen. Hazing was not an unusual practice at the male dominated military academies. Charles Young, however, was subjected to a disproportionate amount of abuse because of his color.
There are many stories about Young's struggles at West Point. Upon arrival to West Point, Young was welcomed in as "The Load of Coal". Once, in the mess hall, a white cadet proclaimed that he would not take food from a platter that Young had already taken from. Young passed the white cadet the plate first, allowing him to take from it, then he himself took from the plate. Upperclassmen targeted and demerited Young 140 times, which would have been considered unusually high. Whereas Young's peers were referred to by their last names, Young was called “Mr. Young” as a kind of feigned deference. One of Young's greatest struggles at West Point was loneliness. A white classmate of Young's, Major General Charles D. Rhodes, later reported that it was a practice of Young to converse with some of the servants at West Point in German to maintain some human interaction.
Towards the end of his five-year stay at West Point, the merciless discrimination and taunts decreased. Because of his perseverance, some of Young's classmates began to see past the color of his skin. Despite this and by his own admission, Charles Young's time at West Point was fraught with difficulty.
Career.
Young graduated in 1889 (Cullum number 3330) with his commission as a second lieutenant, the third black man to do so at the time (after Henry Ossian Flipper and John Hanks Alexander, and the last one until Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. in 1936). He was first assigned to the Tenth U.S. Cavalry Regiment. Through a reassignment, he served first with the Ninth U.S. Cavalry Regiment, starting in Nebraska. His subsequent service of 28 years was chiefly with black troops—the Ninth U.S. Cavalry and the Tenth U.S. Cavalry, black troops nicknamed the "Buffalo Soldiers" since the Indian Wars. The armed services were racially segregated until 1948, when President Harry S. Truman initiated integration by executive order, which took some years to complete.
Marriage and family.
After getting established in his career, Young married Ada Mills on February 18, 1904 in Oakland, California. They had two children: Charles Noel, born in 1906 in Ohio, and Marie Aurelia, born in 1909 when Young and his family were stationed in the Philippines.
Military service.
Young began his service with the Ninth Cavalry in the American West: from 1889 to 1890 he served at Fort Robinson, Nebraska, and from 1890 to 1894 at Fort Duchesne, Utah.
In 1894, Lieutenant Young was assigned to Wilberforce College in Ohio, an historically black college (HBCU), to lead the new military sciences department, established under a special federal grant. A professor for four years, he was one of several outstanding men on staff, including W.E.B. Du Bois, who became his close friend.
When the Spanish–American War broke out, Young was promoted to the temporary rank of major of Volunteers on May 14, 1898. He commanded the 9th Ohio Infantry Regiment which was, in the terminology of the day, a "colored" (i.e. African-American) unit. Despite its name, the 9th Ohio was only battalion sized with four companies. The short war ended before Young and his men could be sent overseas. Young's command of this unit is significant because it was probably the first time in history an African-American commanded a sizable unit of the United States Army and one of the very few instances prior to the late 20th Century. He was mustered out of the volunteers on January 28, 1899, and reverted to his regular army rank of first lieutenant. He was promoted to captain in the 9th Cavalry Regiment on February 2, 1901.
National Park assignments.
In 1903, Young served as captain of a black company at the Presidio of San Francisco. He was then appointed acting superintendent of Sequoia and General Grant national parks, becoming the first black superintendent of a national park. (At that time the military supervised all national parks.) Because of limited funding, however, the Army assigned its soldiers for short-term assignments during the summers, which made it difficult for the officers to accomplish longer-term goals. Young supervised payroll accounts and directed the activities of rangers.
Young's greatest impact on the park was managing road construction, which helped improve the underdeveloped park and allow more visitors to enjoy it. Young's men accomplished more that summer than had been done under the three officers assigned to the park during the previous three summers. Captain Young's troops completed a wagon road to the Giant Forest, home of the world's largest trees, and a road to the base of the famous Moro Rock. By mid-August, the wagons of visitors could enter the mountaintop forest for the first time.
With the end of the brief summer construction season, Young was transferred on November 2, 1903, and reassigned as a troop commander of the Tenth Cavalry at the Presidio. In his final report on Sequoia Park to the Secretary of the Interior, he recommended that the government acquire privately held lands there, to secure more park area for future generations. This recommendation was noted in legislation when it was introduced in the United States House of Representatives.
Other military assignments.
With the Army's founding of the Military Intelligence Department, in 1904 it assigned Young as one of the first military attachés, serving in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. He was to collect intelligence on different groups in Haiti, to help identify forces that might destabilize the government. He served there for three years.
In 1908 Young was sent to the Philippines to join his Ninth Regiment and command a squadron of two troops. It was his second tour there. After his return to the United States, he served for two years at Fort D.A. Russell, Wyoming.
In 1912 Young was assigned as military attaché to Liberia, the first African-American to hold that post. For three years, he served as an expert adviser to the Liberian government and also took a direct role in supervising construction of the country's infrastructure. For his achievements, in 1916 the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) awarded Young the Spingarn Medal, given annually to the African American demonstrating the highest achievement and contributions.
In 1912 Young published "The Military Morale of Nations and Races," a remarkably prescient study of the cultural sources of military power. He argued against the prevailing theories of the fixity of racial character, using history and social science to demonstrate that even supposedly servile or un-military races (such as Negroes and Jews) displayed martial virtues when fighting for democratic societies. Thus the key to raising an effective mass army from among a polyglot American people was to link patriotic service with fulfillment of the democratic promise of equal rights and fair play for all. Young's book was dedicated to Theodore Roosevelt, and invoked the principles of Roosevelt's "New Nationalism".
During the 1916 Punitive Expedition by the United States into Mexico, then-Major Young commanded the 2nd Squadron of the 10th United States Cavalry. While leading a cavalry pistol charge against Pancho Villa's forces at Agua Caliente (1 April 1916), he routed the opposing forces without losing a single man.
Because of his exceptional leadership of the 10th Cavalry in the Mexican theater of war, Young was promoted to lieutenant colonel in September 1916. He was assigned as commander of Fort Huachuca, the base in Arizona of the Tenth Cavalry, nicknamed the "Buffalo Soldiers", until mid 1917. He was the first African American to achieve the rank of colonel in the US Army.
Forced retirement.
With the United States about to enter World War I, Young stood a good chance of being promoted to brigadier general. However, there was widespread resistance among white officers, especially those from the segregated South, who did not want to be outranked by an African American. A lieutenant who served under Young complained to the War Department, and Secretary of War Newton Baker replied that he should "either do his duty or resign." John Sharp Williams, senator from Mississippi, complained on the lieutenant's behalf to President Woodrow Wilson. The President overruled Baker's decision and had the lieutenant transferred. (In 1913, Southern-born Wilson had segregated federal offices and established discrimination in other ways).
Baker considered sending Young to Fort Des Moines, an officer training camp for African Americans. However, Baker realized that if Young were allowed to fight in Europe with black troops under his command, he would be eligible for promotion to brigadier general, and it would be impossible not to have white officers serving under him. The War Department instead removed Young from active duty, claiming it was due to his high blood pressure. Young was placed temporarily on the inactive list (with the rank of colonel) on June 22, 1917.
In May 1917 Young appealed to Theodore Roosevelt for support of his application for reinstatement. Roosevelt was then in the midst of his campaign to form a "volunteer division" for early service in France in World War I. Roosevelt appears to have planned to recruit at least one and perhaps two black regiments for the division, something he had not told President Wilson or Secretary of War Baker. He immediately wrote to Young offering him command of one of the prospective regiments, saying "there is not another man [besides yourself] who would be better fitted to command such a regiment." Roosevelt also promised Young "carte blanche" in appointing staff and line officers for the unit. However, Wilson refused Roosevelt permission to organize his volunteer division.
Young returned to Wilberforce University, where he was a professor of military science through most of 1918. On November 6, 1918, after he had traveled by horseback from Wilberforce, Ohio, to Washington, D.C. to prove his physical fitness, he was reinstated on active duty as a colonel. Baker did not rescind his order that Young be forcibly retired. In 1919, Young was reassigned as military attaché to Liberia.
Death.
While Young was on a reconnaissance mission in Nigeria in late 1921, he suddenly became debilitatingly ill. Young died of a kidney infection at the British hospital in Lagos on January 8, 1922. Because his death took place in a British hospital, his body was required to be buried in Lagos where it remained for an entire year. During that year, Young's wife and many notable African Americans at the time demanded that Young's body be brought back from Nigeria so that he could receive “a proper military burial.” More than a year after his death, Charles Young's body was finally exhumed and brought back to American soil. When his body finally made it to New York, he received a hero's welcome. There were large crowds of people there, all to pay honor to Young's long and accomplished military career. He was given a full military funeral and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Section 3 across the Potomac River from Washington, DC. He was the fourth soldier to receive a funeral in Arlington Memorial Amphitheater. He is buried with a large tombstone that states his name, military rank, and year of birth and death and other side simply says “Young.” He had become a public and respected figure because of his unique achievements in the Army, and his obituary was carried in "The New York Times".
Honors and legacy.
Honors.
Charles Young received honors through his life. One he was presented with was a citation in appreciation of his performance as Acting Superintendent of Sequoia National Park by The Visalia, California, Board of Trade. Later on in 1912, he was elected as an honorary member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity. He was the second honorary member to be elected to the fraternity. Finally, before his death in 1922, The NAACP awarded him the Spingarn Medal for his achievements in Liberia and the US Army in 1916. In February 2020, Governor Andy Beshear of Kentucky posthumously promoted Young to honorary Brigadier General in Kentucky; accounts contained no reference to the Kentucky National Guard.
Legacy.
Since his death, there have been multiple efforts to maintain Young's legacy in the United States. This started in 1922, immediately following his death when his obituary appeared in "The New York Times", demonstrating his national reputation and also his funeral being one of few held at the Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington National Cemetery, where he was buried in Section 3. During the 1925–26 school year, the Portland Colored School in Louisville, Kentucky was renamed the Charles Young School. This school, one of the earlier schools in the US serving African Americans, was open between 1873 and 1956. And at its close, the building was demolished and made into a city park bearing Young's name. In 2016 the park was rededicated Col. Charles D. Young Park. Seven years after his death, another school was named in his honor; Charles E. Young Elementary School was built along Benning Road in Washington, D.C. It was the first elementary school in Northeast D.C., and oriented to the city's black neighborhoods. However, it was closed in 2008. The building now houses Two Rivers Public Charter School. After these accomplishments, it wasn't until 1974 that the house where Young lived when teaching at Wilberforce University was designated a National Historic Landmark, in recognition of his historic importance. In 2001, Senator Mike DeWine introduced Senate Resolution 97, that “honors the bravery and dedication of the Buffalo Soldiers throughout United States and world history; honors one of the Buffalo Soldiers' most distinguished heroes, Colonel Charles Young, for his lifetime achievements; and recognizes the continuing legacy of the Buffalo Soldiers throughout the world.” To go along with Senate Resolution 97, President Barack Obama used the Antiquities Act to designate Young's house as the 401st unit of the National Park System, the Charles Young Buffalo Soldiers National Monument in 2013. Then, in 2018, California passed legislation to name California State Route 198 to Colonel Charles Young Memorial Highway. The State Route's east end is in Sequoia National Park where Young served as superintendent.
Literary legacy.
Along with the legacy from acknowledgements and awards, Young has also taken on a presence in African-American art and literature. One of the most notable instances of this is Countée Cullen's 1925 poem “In Memory of Colonel Charles Young.” The poem accurately predicts the legacy Colonel Charles Young would have for years to come. The poem uses imagery, including Charles Young's resting place in the cemetery where “above your grave the tom-toms throb/ and the hills are weird with light.” After Cullen describes a dark world that Young is emerged in, he ends with a hopeful message: “From your rich dust and slaughtered will/ A tree with tongues will grow.” Cullen is implying that he believed Young was the start of a movement; as of 2014, African Americans make up more than twenty percent of active-duty Army members.
Countée Cullen's poem is not the only literary or artistic representation of Young, though. Another case of Young's legacy in writing is from his close friend, W.E.B. Du Bois, who spoke at Young's eulogy. Du Bois claimed that “the life of Charles Young was a triumph of tragedy.” Charles Young is also represented in painting and other art. Notably, a painting by J.W. Shannon titled “Portrait of Cadet Charles Young,” in which the background gives Young a glowing bright background to make him look saintly. The painting currently belongs to The National Afro-American Museum and Cultural Center, located in Wilberforce, Ohio.
Popular culture depictions.
In the alternate history "Shadows of Annihilation" by S.M. Stirling, Young is depicted as a major general commanding the 32nd Infantry Division, a colored unit in United States Protectorate of México. Young is also featured in "The Great Abraham Lincoln Pocket Watch Conspiracy," where he serves as second-in-command to Major Archibald Butt during a secret mission into the Belgian Congo.
Military awards.
Colonel Young was awarded the following service medals: