Portal:War/Did you know/Archive

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

< Portal:War | Did you know

edit

Did you know...

Entries are listed by the month during which they were archived here.

May 2008

...that Captain (later Air Vice Marshal) William H. Anderson (pictured) and his observer, Lieutenant J.R. Bell, accounted for No. 3 Squadron AFC's first confirmed kill in World War I?
...that the construction of the Çanakkale Martyrs' Memorial, commemorating over 250,000 Turkish soldiers who participated in the Battle of Gallipoli in WWI, was completed with nationwide financial contributions?
...that the Battle of Dombås was a German attempt during the 1940 Norwegian Campaign at using Fallschirmjägers to cut rail and road links in central Norway?
...that after losing the Battle of Toba-Fushimi in Japan's 1868 Boshin War, Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu took refuge on the USS Iroquois rather than spend the night in Osaka Castle??

January 2008

...that the British General John Reid (pictured), second in command in Henry Bouquet's expedition against the western and Ohio Indians, was also a proficient flute-player and a musical composer?
...that the strategic bombing campaign used in the 1990 Operation Instant Thunder served as a model for subsequent American military conflicts?
...that Admiral Clarence S. Williams, commander in chief of the U.S. Asiatic Fleet, directed a 1926 military intervention to protect foreign nationals in Shanghai at the start of the Chinese Civil War?
...that in an upcoming presentation ceremony at the White House, the late Navy SEAL Michael P. Murphy will become the first person awarded the Medal of Honor for actions in the current War in Afghanistan?
...that there is space for an additional 15,000 names to be added to the British Armed Forces Memorial?
...that Georges René Le Peley de Pléville's son was released by the British Admiralty after his capture because his peg-legged father had saved a British frigate?
...that Napoleon recalled Étienne Eustache Bruix, who had been sacked for being a noble, to continue his distinguished naval career?

October 2007

...that during World War II, United States Army officer Colonel Louis Gonzaga Mendez, Jr. (pictured) parachuted behind enemy lines to lead an attack that captured the town of Pretot, France leading the main Plaza of the town to be named "Place Colonel Mendez"?
...that Admiral Harry D. Felt, a fervent anti-communist who planned for the use of tactical nuclear weapons during the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis opposed American military intervention in Vietnam?
...that Flight Lieutenant Wallace McIntosh was recognised as the most successful air gunner in RAF Bomber Command during the Second World War, having shot down 8 German aircraft, including three during one mission?
...that during the First Battle of Ypres, Edward Bulfin organized an impromptu formation of six battalions, later known as "Bulfin's force," that was instrumental in stopping the German advance?

August 2007

...that Major Oscar F. Perdomo (pictured) downed five Japanese aircraft in a single day and thereby became the United States' last "Ace of a day" of World War II?
...that the Commander-in-Chief's Guard was a unit of the Continental Army that protected George Washington during the American Revolutionary War?
...that before World War II, the Polish Army prioritized defence planning in case of Soviet attack over a plan against German invasion until the late 1930s?
...that the USS Sandpiper, originally built as a minesweeping ship, was redesignated a seaplane tender?

June 2007

...that Adolfo Holley (pictured) was the first Minister of War and Navy of the victorious revolutionary congressional junta in the Chilean Civil War?
...that the LST-1-class tank landing ship USS Benzie County was featured in a World War II-era Camel cigarettes advertisement?
...that Le Quang Tung, the Catholic head of South Vietnam's special forces had his CIA funding threatened because he concentrated on repressing Buddhists and raiding temples instead of fighting communists?
...that the units of the Red Army and the Afghan army fought the Battles of Zhawar in 1985-86 to destroy a mujahideen supply base near the Pakistani border?
...that Dumitru Dămăceanu was a Romanian Army officer prominent in the royal coup of 1944, and later was a signatory to the Paris Peace Treaties of 1947?

April 2007

...that "Antietam" is misspelled on the facade of the Civil War Memorial (pictured) in DeKalb County, Illinois?
...that U-F2 was a French submarine that was taken as a prize by the Germans in 1940 from a dockyard, and was later converted for German usage?
...that of the 95 Auk class minesweepers used in World War II only one was sunk by an enemy submarine and only 11 were lost in total?
...that Air Marshal Sir Richard Gordon Wakeford flew Catalina flying boats in the Second World War, and was involved in the last sinking of a German U-boat on 8 May 1945?

March 2007

...that the Abukuma, a veteran of the Pearl Harbor raid, was sunk in 1944 when her own Long Lance torpedoes exploded in the torpedo room?
...that the Union forces in the American Civil War won the Battle of Simmon's Bluff without inflicting casualties?
...that the Heinkel He 50, designed for the Imperial Japanese Navy in 1931, was used operationally by Germany almost until the end of World War II?

...that Yakov Kreizer (pictured) was the first Soviet general awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union title during World War II?

February 2007

...that German sailor Max Reichpietsch, who served on the battleship SMS Friedrich der Große, was executed by firing squad in 1917 for anti-war agitation in the German Navy?

...that in the Battle of Zhovti Vody (pictured) the army of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth faced 1:10 odds for 18 days before its final defeat by the Cossack-Tatar alliance?
...that the 1952 attack on the Sui-ho Dam knocked out electrical power to North Korea for two weeks during the Korean War?
...that Corporal Mark Wright will be posthumously awarded the George Cross for entering an unmarked minefield in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, attempting to save other injured soldiers?

December 2006

...that, although Kievan Rus was heavily defeated in the Rus'-Byzantine War (1043), hostilities ended with the marriage of Vsevolod I of Kiev to Constantine IX's daughter?
... that Harrison Thyng was one of only six US Air Force pilots to be recognized as an ace in two wars?

...that during the Rus'-Byzantine War in 907 Oleg of Novgorod reportedly circumvented the chaining of the Bosporus by putting his ships on wheels and sailing them overland (pictured) to Constantinople?
...that American World War II Army Captain Bobbie E. Brown was awarded the Medal of Honor for running 100 yards up a hill through machine-gun fire to place a bomb in a German pillbox in the Battle of Crucifix Hill?
...that in the Battle of Seattle, the native attackers' only common language was Chinook jargon, so the settlers were able to hear and understand the attackers' shouted orders?
...that the cry For your freedom and ours, one of the unofficial mottos of Poland, has been popularized by Polish soldiers, exiled from the partitioned Poland, who fought in various independence movements all over the world?
...that the Polish capture of Wilno in 1919 set the stage for the future Polish-Soviet and Polish-Lithuanian Wars?
...that Samuel A. Goldblith was able to publish a paper for the journal Science after World War II on malnutrition suffered at POW camps in the Philippines and Japan observed during the war while he was a POW in those camps?

November 2006

...that the Liverpool Irish was the popular name for a battalion of the British King's Regiment raised by Liverpool's large Irish community in 1860?
...that Walter Stauffer McIlhenny, president of McIlhenny Company (1949-1985), maker of Tabasco sauce, was awarded the Navy Cross for his heroic actions in 1942 during the Battle of Guadalcanal?

...that in order to demonstrate the versatility of the Holman Projector (pictured), a British anti-aircraft mortar, a trial was staged in front of Prime Minister Winston Churchill using a number of beer bottles as ammunition?
...that the T-43 tank was devised as a replacement to the Soviet T-34 medium tank, but was scrapped in favour of simply improving the armament of the T-34?

October 2006

...that during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, an unknown Pakistani B-57 bomber pilot was codenamed 8-Pass Charlie by his impressed Indian adversaries at Adampur airbase for his daring routine of making eight passes during each of his air raids over the alerted airbase?
...that inventor Walter Christie was working on plans for a flying tank?
...that, as a result of the Russo-Polish War (1654-1667), the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth ceded the cities of Kiev, Chernigov, and Smolensk to Russia?

...that Corporal Ernest Albert Corey (pictured) is the only soldier to have been awarded the Military Medal on four occasions?

September 2006

...that the Lone Pine that marked the battlefield for which the Battle of Lone Pine is named, and whose pine cones have been planted at memorials for ANZAC soldiers killed during the whole of the Gallipoli Campaign, did not itself survive the battle?
...that the National Protection War led to the death of Yuan Shikai, which led to the beginning of the Warlord Era in China?
...that Col. Józef Zeydlitz served in the Polish Army for 65 years and took part in six wars, yet did not receive a single military award?

...that Alexander I of Russia acclaimed Peter Wittgenstein as the "Saviour of Saint Petersburg" for his victory at Klyastitsy (pictured)?
...that, in his novel War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy described the Battle of Tarutino as little more than a chain of accidents and coincidences?
...that in August 2006, Brigadier General Angela Salinas became the first Hispanic female general officer in United States Marine Corps history?

August 2006

...that Unterseeboot 25 (also known as U-25) was one of the only two Type IA ocean going submarines produced by the German Kriegsmarine?
...that General Valerian Madatov was called the Russian Joachim Murat by Field Marshal Hans Karl von Diebitsch during the Russian occupation of Paris in 1814?

...that British Air Marshal Joubert de la Ferté (pictured) served as commander-in-chief of RAF Coastal Command on two separate occasions, before and during the Second World War?
...that the Battle of Wuhan was the largest ground battle of the Far East theatre of World War II?
...that David B. Barkley, who drowned in the Meuse River, France after completing a scouting mission behind enemy lines during World War I, was the U.S. Army's first Hispanic Medal of Honor recipient?
...that Marine Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Squadron 2 (VMU-2), a United States Marine Corps unmanned aerial vehicle squadron formed in June 1984, was the first Remotely Piloted Vehicle unit in the U.S. Armed Forces?
...that in the Battle of Węgierska Górka, four unfinished and undermanned Polish bunkers held out against an assault of an entire German division for two days and two nights?

...that Luís Alves de Lima e Silva (pictured) was a Brazilian military hero praised for his victories in the War of the Triple Alliance, and that his birthday is celebrated annually as Dia do Soldado?

July 2006

...that the Pernambucan Revolt was an 1817 conflict to establish independence for the current Brazilian state of Pernambuco from Portugal?
...that during the German occupation of Luxembourg in World War I, over 1% of the Luxembourgian population died fighting for France, even though Luxembourg remained officially neutral?
...that Henryk Iwański commanded one of the most daring actions of Armia Krajowa Polish resistance in WWII in support of the Warsaw Ghetto fighters?

...that the U.S.-built Lynx reconnaissance vehicle (pictured) was rejected in favor of the M114 by the U.S Army, but sold to the Royal Netherlands Army and the Canadian Forces?
...that the Battle of Beroia in Bulgaria resulted in the disappearance of the Pecheneg people as an independent force?
...that U.S. Marine Corps Medal of Honor recipient Jay R. Vargas, one of four brothers who were decorated war veterans, requested that his medal be engraved with his mother's name instead of his own?

...that Russian Hussar Alexander Bulatovich (pictured) was a military aide to Ethiopian ruler Menelek II, a hieromonk in Greece, and leader of a banned religious movement?
...that of 27 World War II U.S. Marines who saved others by throwing themselves onto exploding grenades, Pvt. Richard K. Sorenson was one of only three to survive?

June 2006

...that General Tadeusz Jordan-Rozwadowski was one of the architects of the Miracle at Vistula, the decisive battle of the Polish-Soviet War in 1920?
...that Joseph Wallace Oman, a future Governor of the United States Virgin Islands, was awarded a Navy Cross during World War I for commanding the seized German SS Vaterland (renamed the USS Leviathan), and delivering almost 120,000 troops to the war effort in Europe?
...that the 2nd Queen Victoria's Own Rajput Light Infantry, a regiment of the British Indian Army, uniquely possessed an Honorary Colour granted for service under General Lake in 1803 and employed an additional jemadar to carry it?

...that, during the two-month Second Battle of Smolensk, the Red Army broke through the German defense setup, recaptured Smolensk, and started to liberate occupied Belarus?
...that, during the Russo-Swedish War, 1656-1658, the Russians had to lift their siege of Riga after foreign officers of the Russian flotilla had defected to the other side?

May 2006

...that the Battle of Domstadtl during the Seven Years' War was the first big military success of Ernst Gideon von Laudon, which made Prussian King Frederick the Great finish the siege of Olmuetz and leave Moravia?
...that during the 1936 Siege of the Alcázar, around 1000 Spanish Nationalists in Toledo held a medieval castle for two months despite aerial and artillery bombardments and a sustained assault by 8000 Republican troops?

...that the Battle of Budapest was one of the bloodiest sieges of World War II?

April 2006

...that the City of London Yeomanry was a regiment of the British Territorial Army which served at various times as a cavalry, infantry, artillery, anti-aircraft, and armoured unit, and now forms a squadron of the Royal Corps of Signals?
...that during the course of the Crimean War, the British and French attempted three sieges of the town of Taganrog?
...that the Battle of Krasny Bor was a World War II battle in which neutral Spain assisted Germany with an all-volunteer infantry division?

...that the Spangenhelm (pictured) was the most popular war helmet in Europe and the Middle East during the early Middle Ages?

March 2006

...that the Siege of Compiègne was Joan of Arc's final military action?
...that the Women's Royal Australian Naval Service was a non-combat branch of the Royal Australian Navy that recruited women, in order to alleviate manpower shortages resulting from men being assigned to combat roles during World War II?
...that Vladimir Sukhomlinov, who was the Russian Minister of War at the outbreak of WWI, was relieved of duty amid accusations of espionage on behalf of Germany?
...that a Lombard warlord, Melus of Bari, was routed in 1018 at the site of the famous defeat of the Romans by Hannibal?
...that Maj. Henryk Sucharski, one of the commanders of the defence of Westerplatte during the Polish Defensive War of 1939, was allowed to keep his sabre in captvity?

February 2006

...that an aerosan (pictured) is a type of air-powered, armoured snowmobile, which was used for transport, reconnaissance, and raiding by the Red Army in the Winter War and the Second World War?
...that the Battles of Corbridge were important in deciding the fate of the Viking kingdom of York and the Anglo-Saxon earldom of Northumbria?
...that the F-34 tank gun was put into service in the T-34 tank by a conspiracy of its makers, and it was only after enthusiastic tank crews had praised its merits in letters from the front that Stalin gave official permission to start its manufacture?
...that Operation Anthropoid was the only successful attempt to assassinate a top Nazi leader during World War II?

...that the French Navy Le Napoléon (pictured), built in 1850, was the first steam battleship in history?

January 2006

...that John Crocker, a British corps commander in World War II, served as a both a private and a general in the British Army?
...that the fighter pilot Aleksandr Kazakov destroyed 32 German and Austro-Hungarian planes during WWI, while his formal tally of 17 is explained by the fact that only planes crashed in the Russian-held territory were officially counted?
...that the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS Galizien was a Ukrainian military formation in the German armed forces during the World War II and that it fought against the Red Army in Graz?
...that the defeat of the Welsh army in the Battle of Orewin Bridge effectively ended the independence of medieval Wales?
...that the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Persia was launched to secure oil for Britain and provide a route for Lend-Lease supplies desperately needed by the Soviet Union during World War II?
...that the Russian general Pyotr Kotlyarevsky routed Abbas Mirza's army, which was 10 times larger than his own, in the Battle of Aslanduz on October 31, 1812?
...that the Liverpool Scottish, a unit of the British Territorial Army, was raised in 1900 from Scotsmen living in Liverpool, England?

December 2005

...that the Battle of Santa Cruz de Rosales of the Mexican-American War occurred after the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo was already signed?
...that during World War II, the United States developed Who me?, a top secret stench weapon designed to humiliate German officers unobtrusively sprayed by members of the French Resistance?
...that the Battle of Gingindlovu showed for the first time that the British Army could defeat the Zulu tactics that had wiped them out at the famous Battle of Isandlwana?

...that Sergeant Charles Ewart of the Scots Greys, in a famous engagement at the Battle of Waterloo, captured the regimental eagle (pictured) of the 45e Régiment de Ligne?
...that the Japanese submarine I-8 was a World War II Imperial Japanese Navy submarine, famous for completing in 1943 a technology exchange mission between Japan and German occupation forces in France?

November 2005

...that on December 26 and 27, 1969 during the War of Attrition the elite special forces unit Sayeret Matkal kidnapped a whole Egyptian P-12 radar system in a mission called Operation Rooster 53?

...that the French Navy ship Redoutable (pictured) was built in 1876 and was the first warship in the world to use steel as the principal building material?
...that Saga Castle is one of the few medieval castles in Japan to be surrounded by a wall, instead of being built on one?
...that Commodore Josias Rowley's campaign to capture the Indian Ocean islands of Réunion and Mauritius in 1810 was the source material for the exploits of Jack Aubrey in Patrick O'Brian's novel The Mauritius Command?
...that the Imperial Japanese Navy's 1888 warship Kotaka is considered as the first effective design of a destroyer?
...that the battleship Satsuma of the Imperial Japanese Navy was the first ship in the world to be designed and laid down as an "all-big-gun" battleship, although the British HMS Dreadnought was eventually the first one to be completed in 1906?

October 2005

...that Nobuo Fujita (pictured) of the Imperial Japanese Navy conducted the only wartime bombing of the continental United States in 1942?
...that Operation Gibraltar was the name given to the failed plan by Pakistan to infiltrate Jammu and Kashmir, India and start a rebellion and that it eventually sparked the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965?
...that the Liverpool Blitz was a sustained bombing campaign on the city of Liverpool, United Kingdom, by the German Luftwaffe during the Second World War?
...that the defeat of Vijayanagara Empire at the Battle of Talikota in 1565 ended one of the last great Hindu kingdoms in South India?
...that the Battle of Asal Uttar fought between India and Pakistan was the largest tank battle in the history of the Indian subcontinent?
...that the Islamic Spaniard Judar Pasha led 4,000 Moroccans to victory against more than 40,000 Songhai troops at the Battle of Tondibi, putting an end to West Africa's Songhai Empire?
...that the Ever Victorious Army, consisting of Chinese imperial forces led by a European officer corps, was instrumental in putting down the Taiping Rebellion?

Portal:War/Did you know/Archive

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Did you know...

May 2008

January 2008

October 2007

August 2007

June 2007

April 2007

March 2007

February 2007

December 2006

November 2006

October 2006

September 2006

August 2006

July 2006

June 2006

May 2006

April 2006

March 2006

February 2006

January 2006

December 2005

November 2005

October 2005

Views

Navigation

Interaction

Search