Wednesday, Sep 17, 2025
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1939 - (about 2000 hours) German submarine U-29 torpedoes and sinks the British aircraft carrier HMS Courageous in the Bristol Channel, with the loss of 518 men.
1940 - Adolf Hitler gives orders to postpone indefinitely invasion plans of Great Britain. The invasion fleet and troops are ordered dispersed from the area.
1941 - Birth of William Grut in Sweden; penthathlete (Olympic-gold-1948).
1942 - Birth of Doris Brown; American 800m runner (Olympic-5th-1968).
1943 - Load of "ammunition in transit" explodes at Norfolk Naval Air Station.
1944 - British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery launches Operation Market Garden, with 14 divisions. Nearly 2000 American CG-4A and 700 British Horga and Hamilcar gliders are launched from southern England, carrying the British 2nd Army and the US 101st Airborne Division. They land along 60 miles of road in Holland, leading into Germany. The objective is to capture bridges at Grave, Nijmegen, and Arnhem over the Rhine river.
1945 - In Norway, a court sentences Vidkun Quisling to death for collaborating with Germans.
1947 - James Forrestal sworn in as first US secretary of defense.
1948 - Birth of John Ritter in Burbank, California, USA; actor (Jack - Three's Company, Hooperman).
1948 - In Jerusalem, Palestine, Count Folke Bernadotte, nephew of the Swedish King, is murdered by Jewish extremists while mediating peace between Palestinians and Jews.