Events Date 1945 April | History by KabAstro

Battle of Okinawa

Apr 1 Battle of Okinawa: US ground forces invade Okinawa during World War II in the largest amphibious assault of the Pacific theatre

Apr 1 World War II: Canadian troops free the Dutch cities of Doetinchem, Enschede, Borculo and Eibergen
Apr 1 World War II: The Ruhr Pocket of German forces are encircled by the US Ninth Army and US First Army, eventually leading to the capture of 317,000 German troops
Apr 2 Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Brazil are established
Apr 3 World War II: Dutch city of Hengelo freed from Nazi control by the Canadian Army
Apr 4 The Holocaust: US forces liberate the Ohrdruf concentration camp in Germany, the first such camp to be liberated by the US Army
Apr 4 World War II: Soviet forces liberate Hungary from German occupation, establishing their own communist satellite state. This was celebrated as Liberation Day until 1989.
Apr 4 World War II: US Army occupies Bielefeld in north-eastern Germany
Apr 5 World War II: Dutch city of Almelo is freed by the Second Canadian Corps
Apr 6 Battle of Okinawa: Giant Japanese battleship Yamato heads to Okinawa with orders to beach herself and be destroyed defending the island
Apr 6 The Holocaust: Nazis begin evacuating prisoners from Buchenwald concentration camp
Apr 6 World War II: Dutch city of Coevorden freed from German occupation by Canadian forces
Apr 7 Battle of Okinawa: Massive kamikaze attack of around 110 Japanese aircraft damages three US battleships off Okinawa island
Apr 7 Battle of Okinawa: US planes intercept Japanese fleet heading for Okinawa on a suicide mission, super battleship Yamato and four destroyers are sunk
Apr 7 Kuniaki Koiso resigns as Prime Minister of Japan after the US invasion of Okinawa; he is replaced by Kantaro Suzuki
Apr 7 Sonderkommando Elbe, special Luftwaffe units designed to destroy Allied planes by ramming them mid-air, are sent on their first and only mission of World War II
Apr 8 1945 NFL Draft: Charley Trippi from University of Georgia first pick by Chicago Cardinals
Apr 8 Dutch Nazi occupiers executed, Nazi general Christiansen flees Netherlands
Apr 9 Battleship Admiral Scheer sunk by RAF bombing in Kiel
Apr 9 Liberty ship at Bari Italy carrying aerial bombs explodes, kills 360
Apr 9 NFL requires players to wear long stockings
Apr 9 World War II: The Battle of Königsberg, East Prussia, ends.
Apr 10 Canadian troops conquer Deventer
Apr 10 General Blaskowitz becomes nazi leader of "Fort Holland"
Apr 10 German troops attack Ijsselbrug
Apr 10 NFL's Boston Yanks & Brooklyn Tigers merge
Apr 10 US troops land on Tsugen Shima Okinawa
Apr 10 William Schuman & Antony Tudor's ballet premieres in NYC
Apr 11 Allied troops liberate Basket-Compascuum

US Forces Liberate Buchenwald

Apr 11 Four soldiers in the Sixth Armored Division of the US Third Army liberate the Nazi concentration camp Buchenwald, freeing thousands including Elie Wiesel

Elie Wiesel: From concentration camp survivor to Nobel Prize winner

Apr 11 SS burns & shoots 1,100 at Gardelegen
Apr 11 US captures Tsugen Shima
Apr 11 US troops conquers Mulheim, Oberhausen, Bochum, Unna, Essen
Apr 12 Canadian troops liberate Nazi concentration camp Westerbork, Netherlands

Metamorphosen

Apr 12 Richard Strauss completes his "Metamorphosen"

Death of FDR

Apr 12 US President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies in office and Vice President Harry Truman is sworn in as 33rd US President

The famous unfinished portrait of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt, started by Elizabeth Shoumatoff on the day of his death

Apr 12 WWII: British Royal Navy captures German U-boat U-1024 in the Irish; it sinks while being towed the next day
Apr 13 Canadian soldier Léo Major single-handedly liberates Dutch town of Zwolle by fooling Germans into thinking a raid had begun
Apr 13 WWII: Canadian army liberates Teuge & Assen, Netherlands, from Nazis
Apr 13 WWII: Russian Red Army occupies Vienna, Austria
Apr 13 WWII: US Marines conquer Minna Shima off Okinawa, Japan
Apr 14 American planes bomb Tokyo & damage the Imperial Palace
Apr 14 US Marines attack Yae-Take, the tallest mountain on Okinawa's Motobu Peninsula
Apr 14 World War II: US 7th Army & allies forces capture Nuremberg & Stuttgart in Germany

Burial of FDR

Apr 15 34th US President FDR buried in grounds of his Hyde Park home, New York state

Apr 15 British Army liberates Nazi concentration camp Bergen-Belsen

Communium Interpretes Dolorum

Apr 15 Pope Pius XII publishes encyclical "Communium Interpretes Dolorum"

Apr 16 49th Boston Marathon won by John A Kelley in 2:30:40.2; his second event victory

Raising a Flag over the Reichstag

Apr 16 Battle of Berlin: Red Army begins its attack on the capital of Nazi Germany

Soldiers Raqymzhan Qoshqarbaev and Georgij Bulatov raise the Soviet Union flag on the roof of the Reichstag building in Berlin

Apr 16 Battle of Okinawa: US troops land and seize the Ie Shima Airfield on Ie Shima island near Okinawa [1]
Apr 16 US troops enter Nuremberg, Germany
Apr 16 World War II: American troops liberate Colditz Castle, the high-security prisoner of war camp in Saxony, Germany [1]
Apr 16 World War II: Dutch town of Arnhem, site of failed Operation Market Garden, is freed by British and Canadian forces
Apr 16 World War II: German troops in Groningen, Netherlands surrender to Canadian and Dutch allied forces
Apr 17 8th Air Force bombs Dresden

Mussolini Flees to Milan

Apr 17 Benito Mussolini flees from Salò to Milan

Apr 17 German occupiers flood Wieringermeer, Netherlands
Apr 17 US troops land in central Mindanao, Philippines during Battle of Mindanao
Apr 18 1 armed outfielder, St Louis Brown Pete Gray, 1st game he goes 1 for 4
Apr 18 Clandestine Radio 1212, after broadcasting pro-nazi propaganda for months used their influence to trap 350,000 German army group B troops
Apr 18 Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Bolivia established
Apr 18 Epe freed (by corporal G van Aken)
Apr 19 Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Guatemala are established

Carousel

Apr 19 Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's musical "Carousel" opens at the Majestic Theatre, NYC; runs for 890 performances

Apr 19 US aircraft carrier Franklin heavy damaged in Japanese air raid
Apr 19 US offensive against Shuri-barrier on Okinawa
Apr 20 Cleveland Browns organization formed by Arthur "Mickey" McBride
Apr 20 Nazi German occupiers flood Beemster & Fencer
Apr 20 Soviet artillery begins shelling Berlin
Apr 20 US 7th army captured German city of Nuremberg
Apr 20 US forces conquer Motobu peninsula on Okinawa
Apr 21 Ivor Novello's "Perchance to Dream" premieres in London
Apr 21 WWII: Allied forces conquer Ie Shima, Okinawa in 5 days; 5,000 die
Apr 21 WWII: Allied troops occupy German nuclear laboratory in Haigerloch
Apr 21 WWII: Soviet army arrives at outskirts of Berlin, Germany
Apr 21 WWII: US 7th Army reaches Nuremberg, Germany

Battle of Berlin

Apr 22 Battle of Berlin: Upon being informed that a planned counter-attack never happened, Adolf Hitler flies into a rage, denounces the German Army and concedes World War II is lost

Apr 22 Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany is liberated by the Polish Army

Himmler's Secret Meeting

Apr 22 SS chief Heinrich Himmler secretly meets with Count Folke Bernadotte of Sweden, asking him to act as an intermediary for a surrender offer to the Western Allies. The Allies do not take the offer seriously.

Leading Nazi and Reichsführer of the SS Heinrich Himmler

Apr 22 Stanley Cup Final, Olympia Stadium, Detroit, MI: Toronto Maple Leafs beat Detroit Red Wings, 2-1 for a 4-3 series win; Leafs lead series 3-0, but Wings recover to 3-3 to force a decider
Apr 23 Concentration camp Flossenburg liberated
Apr 23 US troops in Italy cross river Po
Apr 24 Albert B "Happy" Chandler is named 2nd baseball commissioner

Rubberlegs

Apr 24 Miles Davis makes recording debut with the Herbie Fields Orchestra, backing singer "Rubberlegs" Wilson, at Savoy Records Studio, Newark, New Jersey

Apr 25 "Elbe Day" - US and Soviet forces meet at Torgau, Germany on the Elbe River during the invasion of Germany in World War II
Apr 25 45 countries convene UN Conference on Intl Organization in San Francisco
Apr 25 Allied air raid on Surabaja, Java
Apr 25 British troops reach the Grebbe Line, a forward defensive line in the Netherlands
Apr 25 Clandestine Radio 1212, used to hoax Nazi Germany's final transmission
Apr 25 Last Boeing B-17 attack against Nazi Germany
Apr 25 Soviet forces complete their encirclement of Berlin, cutting off all access points west of the German capital

Pétain Arrested for Treason

Apr 26 Marshal Philippe Pétain, leader of France's Vichy collaborationist regime during World War II, arrested for treason

Apr 26 World War II: Battle of Bautzen - last successful German tank-offensive of the war and last noteworthy victory of the Wehrmacht
Apr 27 2nd Republic of Austria forms
Apr 27 Italian partisans capture Benito Mussolini at Dongo (Lake Como)
Apr 27 US 5th army enters Genoa
Apr 27 World War II: The Völkischer Beobachter, the newspaper of the Nazi Party, ceases publication
Apr 28 British commandos attack Elbe & occupy Lauenburg
Apr 28 US 5th army reaches Swiss border

Hacksaw Ridge

Apr 29 Conscientious objector Desmond Doss saves 75 wounded soldiers in the Battle of Okinawa at Hacksaw Ridge. Later depicted in the Oscar-winning film "Hacksaw Ridge".

Soldier and Conscientious Objector Desmond Doss

Apr 29 First food drop by RAF above Nazi-occupied Holland (Operation Manna)
Apr 29 German armies in Italy sign an unconditional surrender to the Western Allies to be carried out on 2 May
Apr 29 Japanese army evacuates Rangoon, British Burma
Apr 29 US Army liberates 31,601 people from the Dachau Nazi concentration camp in Germany
Apr 29 Venice and Mestre captured by the Allies

Arthur Godfrey Time

Apr 30 "Arthur Godfrey Time" begins a 27 year run on CBS radio

Apr 30 Adolf Hitler commits suicide along with his new wife Eva Braun in the Fuhrerbunker in Berlin as the Red Army captures the city
Apr 30 Concentration camp Munchen-Allag freed