1944 in Germany

Events in the year 1944 in Germany.

Incumbents

National level

Head of State

• Adolf Hitler (the Führer) (Nazi Party)

Chancellor

• Adolf Hitler (Nazi Party)

Events

• 4 January — WWII: The Battle of Monte Cassino begins.
• 20 January — WWII: The Royal Air Force drops 2,300 tons of bombs on Berlin.
• 27 January — WWII: The 2-year Siege of Leningrad is lifted.
• 29 January — WWII: The Battle of Cisterna takes place.
• 15 February — WWII – Battle of Monte Cassino: The monastery atop Monte Cassino is destroyed by Allied bombing.
• 20 February — WWII: The "Big Week" begins with American bomber raids on German aircraft manufacturing centers.
• 26 February — Shooting begins on the Nazi propaganda film, "The Fuehrer Gives a Village to the Jews" in Theresienstadt.
• 15 March — WWII: Battle of Monte Cassino: Allied aircraft bomb German-held monastery and stage an assault.
• 17 March — WWII: The Nazis execute almost 400 prisoners, Soviet citizens and anti-fascist Romanians at Rîbniţa.
• 19 March — WWII: German forces Operation occupy Hungary.
• 23 March — WWII: Members of the Italian Resistance attack Nazis marching in Via Rasella, killing 33.
• 9 May — WWII: In the Ukrainian city of Sevastopol, Soviet troops completely drive out German forces, who had been ordered by Hitler to “fight to the last man.”^[1]
• 12 May — WWII: Soviet troops finalize the liberation of the Crimea.
• 18 May — WWII: Battle of Monte Cassino: The Germans evacuate Monte Cassino and Allied forces take the stronghold after a struggle that claimed 20,000 lives.
• June — German V-2 rockets on test from Peenemünde become the first man-made objects to enter space.
• 4 June — WWII: A hunter-killer group of the United States Navy captures the German submarine U-505, marking the first time a U.S. Navy vessel has captured an enemy vessel at sea since the 19th century.
• 5 June — WWII: More than 1,000 British bombers drop 5,000 tons of bombs on German gun batteries on the Normandy coast in preparation for D-Day.
• 5 June — The German navy's Enigma messages are decoded almost in real time.
• 6 June — WWII – Battle of Normandy: Operation Overlord, commonly known as D-Day, commences with the landing of 155,000 Allied troops on the beaches of Normandy in France. The Allied soldiers quickly break through the Atlantic Wall and push inland, in the largest amphibious military operation in history. This operation helps liberate France from Germany, and also weakens the Nazi hold on Europe.
• 10 June — WWII: 642 men, women and children are killed in the Oradour-sur-Glane Massacre in France.
• 13 June — WWII: Germany launches a V1 Flying Bomb attack on England.
• 22 June — WWII: Operation Bagration: A general attack by Soviet forces clears the German forces from Belarus, resulting in the destruction of German Army Group Centre, possibly the greatest defeat of the Wehrmacht during WWII.
• 29 June — The Holocaust – The deportation of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz and other Nazi concentration camps begins.
• 3 July — WWII: Soviet troops liberate Minsk.
• 10 July — WWII: Soviet troops begin operations to occupy the Baltic countries.
• 31 July — WWII: Vilnius is liberated.
• 20 July — WWII: Adolf Hitler survives an assassination attempt by Claus von Stauffenberg.
• 1 August — WWII: The Warsaw Uprising begins.
• 2 August — WWII: Turkey ends diplomatic and economic relations with Germany.
• 4 August — The Holocaust: A tip from a Dutch informer leads the Gestapo to a sealed-off area in an Amsterdam warehouse, where they find Jewish diarist Anne Frank and her family.
• 5 August — The Holocaust: Polish insurgents liberate a German labor camp in Warsaw, freeing 348 Jewish prisoners.
• 19 August — WWII: An insurrection starts in Paris.
• 20 August — WWII: American forces successfully defeat Nazi forces at Chambois, closing the Falaise Gap.
• 20 August — WWII: 168 captured allied airmen, including Phil Lamason, accused of being "terror fliers" by the Gestapo, arrive at Buchenwald concentration camp.
• 24 August — WWII: Liberation of Paris: The Allies enter Paris, successfully completing Operation Overlord.
• 25 August — WWII: German surrender of Paris: General Dietrich von Choltitz surrenders Paris to the Allies in defiance of Hitler’s orders to destroy it.
• 25 August — WWII: Maillé massacre: Massacre of 129 civilians (70% women and children) by the Gestapo at Maillé, Indre-et-Loire.
• 25 August — WWII: Hungary decides to continue the war together with Germany.
• 3 September — WWII: The Allies liberate Brussels.
• 4 September — WWII: Finland breaks off relations with Germany.
• 8 September — WWII: London is hit by a V2 rocket for the first time.
• 2 October — The Holocaust: Nazi troops end the Warsaw Uprising.
• 10 October — The Holocaust/Porajmos: 800 Gypsy children are systematically murdered at the Auschwitz death camp.
• 14 October — WWII: German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel commits suicide rather than face execution for allegedly conspiring against Adolf Hitler.
• 18 October — WWII: The Volkssturm is founded on Hitler's orders.
• 20 October — WWII: Belgrade is liberated by Yugoslav Partisans and the Red Army.
• 21 October — WWII: Aachen,the first German city to fall, is captured by American troops.
• 25 October — WWII: The Red Army liberates Kirkenes, the first town in Norway to be liberated.
• 16 December — WWII: Germany begins the Ardennes offensive, later known as Battle of the Bulge.
• 17 December — WWII: German troops carry out the Malmedy massacre.
• 19 December — The entire territory of Estonia is taken by the Red Army.
• 26 December — WWII: American troops repulse German forces at Bastogne.
• 31 December — WWII: Hungary declares war on Germany.

Births

Deaths

References