March 1944 in History

Events in History

Event of Interest

Mar 13 USSR recognizes Italian government of Pietro Badoglio

Mar 15 Italian town of Cassino destroyed by Allied bombing
Mar 16 French Vichy Internal minister Pierre Pucheu sentenced to death for treason
Mar 17 Mount Vesuvius in Italy erupts after months of volcanic unrest, destroying several towns near the volcano
Mar 18 Nazi Germany occupies Hungary
Mar 20 2,500 women trample guards and floorwalkers to purchase 1,500 alarm clocks announced for sale in a Chicago Illinois department store
Mar 20 Bus falls off bridge into Passaic River NJ, killing 16

Event of Interest

Mar 21 US General Eisenhower postpones invasion of the south of France until after Normandy

34th US President & WWII General Dwight D. Eisenhower

Mar 22 600+ 8th Air Force bombers attack Berlin
Mar 23 Italian resistance group bombs occupying German police at Via Rasella, Rome; killing 33 and wounding 110 of the 156 man force; retaliation kills 335 civilians
Mar 24 76 Allied officers escape Stalag Luft 3 (Great Escape)
Mar 24 811 British bombers attack Berlin

Execution

Mar 24 Ardeatine massacre: Nazis led by SS officers Herbert Kappler, Erich Priebke and Karl Hass execute 335 civilians and political prisoners in occupied Rome in retaliation for the previous day's Via Rassela bombing that killed 33 Germans [1]

Mar 24 RAF rear gunner Nicholas Alkemade survives a jump from his Lancaster bomber 18,000 feet over Germany without a parachute; his fall broken by pine trees and soft snow, suffers only a sprained leg
Mar 25 Germany troop executes 335 residents of Rome
Mar 26 705 British bombers attack Essen, Germany
Mar 27 2,000 Jews are murdered in Kaunas Lithuania
Mar 27 40 Jewish policemen in Riga, Latvia, ghetto are shot by the Gestapo
Mar 27 Children's Aktion-Nazis collect all the Jewish children of Lovno

Event of Interest

Mar 27 Transport No. 70 departs Drancy (France) internment camp, taking 1,000 French Jews to Auschwitz extermination camp in Nazi German occupied Poland; 480 killed upon arrival, approximately 152 survive the war

Mar 28 Astrid Lindgren sprains ankle and begins writing "Pippi Longstocking"
Mar 30 781 British bombers attack Nuremberg
Mar 31 Hungary orders all Jews to wear yellow stars

Birthdays in History

Mar 1 John Breaux, American politician (Rep-D-LA, 1972-87, Senator 1987-2005), born in Crawley, Louisiana
Mar 1 John Napier, English set designer (Royal Shakespeare Company), born in London, England
Mar 3 Janice Garfat, rocker (Dr Hook)
Mar 5 Roy Gutman, American journalist, Pulitzer Prize winner
Mar 7 Elton Gallegly, American politician (Rep-R-California 1987-2013), born in Huntington Park, California
Mar 7 Jürgen Theobaldy, German writer, born in Strasberg, France
Mar 7 Michael Rosbash, American geneticist (Nobel Prize 2017, Drosophila period gene), born in Kansas City, Missouri
Mar 7 Stanley Schmidt, American science fiction writer and editor, born in Cincinnati, Ohio
Mar 8 Buzz Hargrove, Canadian labour leader
Mar 14 Peter Paul Zahl, German left-wing writer and printer (shot two police officers), born in Freiburg, Germany (d. 2011)
Mar 18 Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, Israeli military leader and politician, (d. 2012)
Mar 18 Dick Smith, Australian Adventurer and Businessman
Mar 19 Lynda Bird Johnson Robb, LBJ's daughter
Mar 19 Said Musa, Prime Minister of Belize

Sirhan Sirhan (79 years old)

Mar 19 Palestinian-born assassin of US Senator Robert F. Kennedy, born in Jerusalem, Mandatory Palestine

Mar 22 Tony McPhee, English rocker (The Groundhogs), born in Humberston, England
Mar 24 Vojislav Koštunica, Serbian Prime Minister
Mar 25 Terry L. Bruce, American politician (Rep-D-IL, 1985-93), born in Olney, Illinois
Mar 29 James Diggle, British classicist, born in Rochadale
Mar 29 Nana Akufo-Addo [William Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo], Ghanaian politician, President of Ghana (2017-), born in Accra, Gold Coast
Mar 30 Gerrit Komrij, Dutch poet/essayist (Happy Schizo)

Deaths in History

Mar 4 Emanuel Weiss, American hitman (b. 1906) (executed)
Mar 4 Fannie Barrier Williams, American educator and political activist (b. 1855)

Louis Buchalter (1897-1944)

Mar 4 Jewish-American mobster (Murder, Inc.), executed at 47

Mar 4 Louis Capone, New York organized crime figure (b. 1896) (executed)
Mar 5 Max Jacob, French poet and writer, dies in nazi concentration camp at 67
Mar 6 Ernst Cohen, Dutch chemist, gassed at Auschwitz concentration camp at 74
Mar 10 David Vogel, Ukrainian author, dies in Auschwitz at 52
Mar 11 Hendrik W. van Loon, Dutch-American radio commentator and writer, dies at 62
Mar 12 Artur Gavazzi, Croatian geographer, dies at 82
Mar 15 Otto von Below, German commandant (WWI), dies at 86
Mar 19 William Hale Thompson, American mayor of Chicago (b. 1869)
Mar 22 Pierre Pucheu, French Internal minister to Vichy government, executed by firing squad at 44
Mar 23 O.C. Wingate, British General-Major (Burma), dies in air crash in India at 41
Mar 28 Chayyim Most, Rabbi/Maggid of Kovono, killed by Nazis
Mar 28 Stephen Leacock, Canadian economist and humorist (Literary Lapses), dies at 75
Mar 31 Mineichi Koga, admiral of Japanese fleet, dies