WWII

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He Survived Pearl Harbor: 'Guys Were Running Out of the Fire'

Lou Conter, last survivor of USS Arizona attack, dies at 102

(Newser) - Lou Conter, the last living survivor of the USS Arizona battleship that exploded and sank during the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, has died. He was 102. Conter passed away on Monday at his home in Grass Valley, California, following congestive heart failure, daughter Louann Daley said, per the AP...

At New Orleans Museum, AI Lets You Talk to WWII Vets

Participants sat for as many as 1K questions each

(Newser) - Olin Pickens sat in his wheelchair facing a life-sized image of himself on a screen, asking it questions about being taken prisoner by German soldiers during World War II. After a pause, his video-recorded twin recalled being given "sauerkraut soup" by his captors before a grueling march. "That...

Secret WWII 'Ghost Army' Finally Getting Its Due

US outfit that tricked Hitler will receive Congress' highest honor this week

(Newser) - A once-secret Army unit tasked with the unusual mission of tricking Adolf Hitler about the size of enemy troops will receive Congress' highest honor this week. The "Ghost Army"—more formally known as the Army's 23rd Headquarters Special Troops—will receive the Congressional Gold Medal on Thursday,...

Famous WWII Pic Once More a 'Political Lightning Rod'

Memo said Eisenstaedt's V-J Day pic 'The Kiss' would be pulled from VA venues; VA chief says no

(Newser) - The Veterans Affairs secretary has reversed a department memo that aimed to ban VA displays of the iconic "V-J Day in Times Square" photograph of a Navy sailor kissing a woman he didn't know on the streets of New York at the end of World War II. Secretary...

Her D-Day Forecast 'Saved God Knows How Many Lives'

Ireland's Maureen Sweeney warned of impending storm, so 1944 Normandy invasion was postponed

(Newser) - We're used to commemorating June 6, 1944, as D-Day, the day when Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy in France, helping to shift the path of World War II and defeat the Nazis. That fateful day actually came close to happening on June 5, but thanks to Maureen...

Bronze Nazi Eagle Won't Become a Dove After All

Uruguay's president's Friday announcement was undone on Sunday

(Newser) - A bronze eagle that was cast by the Nazis won't become a dove after all. The 6-foot-tall eagle, which holds a swastika in its talons, formerly adorned a battleship used by the Nazis called the Admiral Graf Spee. The BBC reports the Graf Spee managed to take down eight...

Son of Auschwitz Hero Wants Compensation
He Volunteered
to Go to Auschwitz
Nov 15, 2022 9:55 AM CST

He Volunteered to Go to Auschwitz

Witold Pilecki was executed by Poland after the war, and his son is now seeking compensation

(Newser) - The son of World War II Auschwitz death camp hero Witold Pilecki is seeking millions in compensation from the Polish government for his father's post-war arrest and 1948 execution by the country's communist authorities of the time. The case opened last week before a Warsaw court and the...

Alarming Report in Mo.: 'I Wouldn't Want My Child in This School'
Alarming Discovery
at Mo. School 'Takes
Your Breath From You'
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Oct 22, 2022 4:15 PM CDT

Alarming Discovery at Mo. School 'Takes Your Breath From You'

Radioactive waste found at Jana Elementary, in St. Louis suburb where WWII nukes were made

(Newser) - There's significant radioactive contamination at an elementary school in suburban St. Louis where nuclear weapons were produced during World War II, according to a new report by environmental investigation consultants. The report by Boston Chemical Data Corp. confirmed fears about contamination at Jana Elementary School, in the Hazelwood School...

Poland Wants Huge War Reparations From Germany

Government to seek $1.3T, but Germany says the matter is long closed

(Newser) - Poland will seek the equivalent of some $1.3 trillion in reparations from Germany for the Nazis' World War II invasion and occupation of the country. Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of the ruling Law and Justice party, announced the huge claim at the release of a long-awaited report on the cost...

Caroline Kennedy Meets Kids of Islanders Who Rescued JFK
They Delivered
JFK's Distress
Note on a Coconut.
Now, Thanks
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Aug 13, 2022 5:10 PM CDT

They Delivered JFK's Distress Note on a Coconut. Now, Thanks

US Ambassador Caroline Kennedy meets with kids of Solomon Islanders who saved her dad in WWII

(Newser) - In August 1943, during World War II, a 26-year-old John F. Kennedy and his crew were shipwrecked in the Solomon Islands after a Japanese destroyer rammed into their patrol boat during the Battle of Guadalcanal. On Monday, his daughter, Caroline Kennedy, now a US ambassador to Australia, met with and...

Tapes Captured Eichmann Saying What No Nazi Said

Israeli filmmakers were given permission to use them in a documentary series

(Newser) - The men who prosecuted Adolf Eichmann in 1961 had a 700-page transcript of taped conversations between Eichmann and fellow Nazi exile/Dutch journalist Willem Sassen in Argentina a few years prior. The transcript wasn't allowed to be used in court, where Eichmann insisted he was merely following orders and carried...

Texas Explorer Finds the Deepest Shipwreck Ever

USS Samuel B. Roberts went down in WWII fighting Japanese warships in Philippine Sea

(Newser) - In its determined last stand in October 1944, the Sammy B took on the Japanese during a World War II battle that eventually sent it down to the ocean floor. The US Navy destroyer (official name: the USS Samuel B. Roberts) remained lost to humankind for nearly 80 more years—...

With a Big Archives Release, a Pope's Legacy Is at Stake

Current pontiff Francis orders online posting of 'Jewish' files from archives of WWII era's Pius XII

(Newser) - Pope Francis has ordered the online publication of 170 volumes of its so-called Jewish files from the recently opened Pope Pius XII archives, the Vatican announced Thursday, amid renewed debate about the legacy of its World War II-era pope. The documentation contains 2,700 files of requests for Vatican help...

Last of the "Band of Brothers" Dead at 99

Edward Shames and "Easy Company" helped inspire book and HBO series

(Newser) - Edward Shames, a World War II veteran who was the last surviving officer of “Easy Company,” which inspired the HBO miniseries and book “Band of Brothers,” has died, per the AP . He was 99. An obituary posted by the Holomon-Brown Funeral Home & Crematory said...

American Legend Is First Black Woman Given French Honor

Josephine Baker makes history nearly 50 years after her death

(Newser) - France is inducting Josephine Baker—Missouri-born cabaret dancer, French World War II spy and civil rights activist—into its Pantheon, the first Black woman honored in the final resting place of France’s most revered luminaries. On Tuesday, a coffin carrying soils from the US, France and Monaco—places where...

Survey Finds Awareness of Major Holocaust Fact Is Lacking

52% of UK respondents didn't know how many Jews were murdered

(Newser) - A survey released Wednesday found what organizers say is a lack of awareness in Britain about the Holocaust and a major episode in the country's rescue of Jews ahead of World War II, reports the AP . The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, a New York-based group that...

Scientists Work to Tie Uranium Cubes to Nazis

Hundreds were lost in the years following WWII

(Newser) - At the close of World War II, some 664 "Heisenberg cubes" belonging to the Nazis were dug up from a field near physicist Werner Heisenberg's secret subterranean lab and brought to the US. Kurt Diebner was at the same time also running a lab focused on trying to...

He Almost Fired on 3 Kids in WWII. Now, a Joyous Reunion

'My heart is bursting,' says American vet Martin Adler, 97

(Newser) - Martin Adler still has nightmares about his experience in World War II. But there are happy memories, too, like that day in October 1944 when he posed for a photo with three Italian children he'd nearly killed. Adler, then a 20-year-old private, had been searching the village of Monterenzio...

Man Who Kept Nazi-Era Tank in Basement Finds Out His Fate

It's a fine of $300K, plus a suspended 14-month prison sentence for German senior

(Newser) - In took 20 soldiers nearly nine hours to extract a Nazi-era military tank from an elderly German man's basement in 2015, just one of the many eyebrow-raising items found in his Heikendorf home. The man was also in possession of an anti-aircraft gun, a torpedo, machine guns and assault...

Palace Where Enigma Codes Were Cracked to Return to Life

The Nazis destroyed the Saski Palace in 1944

(Newser) - Poland is reviving plans to reconstruct a historic Warsaw palace where the German Enigma machine codes were first cracked in 1932 and that Nazi German occupying forces blew up in 1944. In a ceremony Wednesday at the site where the Saski Palace stood, President Andrzej Duda handed a law drafted...

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