1943 - What happened in 1943 ?

January 1943

Monday 11:

The United States and United Kingdom give up territorial rights in China.

Thursday 14:

Franklin D. Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to travel via airplane while in office (Miami, Florida to Morocco to meet with Winston Churchill to discuss World War II).

Friday 15:

The world's largest office building, The Pentagon, is dedicated (Arlington, Virginia).

Monday 18:

Warsaw Ghetto Uprising: The first uprising of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.

Sunday 24:

World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill conclude a conference in Casablanca.

February 1943

Tuesday 02:

World War II: The last Nazi forces surrender to the Soviets following the Battle of Stalingrad.

Tuesday 09:

World War II, Battle of Guadalcanal: After forcing the remaining Japanese to be evacuated the night before, American authorities declared Guadalcanal secure.

Thursday 11:

General Dwight Eisenhower selected to command the allied armies in Europe.

Sunday 14:

German General Erwin Rommel and his Afrika Korps launch an offensive against Allied defenses in Tunisia.

Saturday 27:

The Smith Mine #3 in Bearcreek, Montana, United States explodes, killing 74 men.

March 1943

Tuesday 02:

United States and Australian forces sink Japanese convoy ships.

Wednesday 03:

World War II: In London, 173 people are killed in a crush while trying to enter an air-raid shelter at Bethnal Green tube station.

Friday 05:

First flight of Gloster Meteor jet aircraft in Britain.

Monday 08:

World War II: Japanese troops counter-attack American forces on Hill 700 in Bougainville in a battle that will last five days.

Friday 26:

In the Aleutian Islands the battle begins when United States Navy forces intercept Japanese attempting to reinforce a garrison at Kiska.

April 1943

Tuesday 13:

The Jefferson Memorial is dedicated in Washington, DC, on the 200th anniversary of Thomas Jefferson's birth.

Friday 16:

Dr. Albert Hofmann discovers the psychedelic effects of LSD.

Monday 19:

Bicycle Day – Swiss chemist Dr. Albert Hofmann deliberately takes LSD for the first time.

Thursday 22:

Albert Hofmann writes his first report about the hallucinogenic properties of LSD.

Friday 30:

World War II: Operation Mincemeat – The submarine HMS Seraph surfaces in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Spain to deposit a dead man planted with false invasion plans and dressed as a British military intelligence officer.

May 1943

Tuesday 11:

World War II: American troops invade Attu in the Aleutian Islands in an attempt to expel occupying Japanese forces.

Thursday 13:

World War II: German Afrika Korps and Italian troops in North Africa surrender to Allied forces.

Saturday 15:

Joseph Stalin dissolves the Comintern (or Third International).

Sunday 16:

World War II: The Dambuster Raids by RAF 617 Squadron on German dams.

Monday 17:

The United States Army contracts with the University of Pennsylvania's Moore School to develop the ENIAC.

June 1943

Tuesday 01:

A civilian flight from Lisbon to London is shot down by the Germans during World War II, killing all aboard, including actor Leslie Howard.

Thursday 03:

A mob of 60 from the Los Angeles Naval Reserve Armory beats up everyone perceived to be Hispanic, starting a week-long race riot (see Zoot Suit Riots).

Friday 04:

Military coup in Argentina ousts Ramón Castillo.

Saturday 19:

Race riots occur in Beaumont, Texas, United States.

July 1943

Monday 05:

World War II: An Allied invasion fleet sails for Sicily (Operation Husky, July 10, 1943).

Friday 09:

Allied forces perform an amphibious invasion of Sicily.

Monday 19:

World War II: Rome is bombed by the Allies for the first time in the war.

Tuesday 20:

World War II: Axis leaders Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini confer in northern Italy

Saturday 24:

World War II: Operation Gomorrah begins: British and Canadian aeroplanes bomb Hamburg by night, those of the Americans by day. By the end of the operation in November, 9,000 tons of explosives will have killed more than 30,000 people and destroyed 280,000 buildings.

August 1943

Wednesday 11:

First Quebec Conference of Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt, T. V. Soong and William Lyon Mackenzie King begins.

Tuesday 17:

World War II: The US 7th Army under General George S. Patton arrive in Messina, Italy, followed several hours later by the British 8th Army under Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery, thus completing the Allied conquest of Sicily.

Monday 23:

World War II: Kharkov liberated.

Sunday 29:

German-occupied Denmark scuttles most of its navy; Germany dissolves Danish government.

Tuesday 31:

The USS Harmon, the first U.S. Navy ship to be named for a black person, is commissioned.

September 1943

Friday 03:

World War II: Mainland Italy is invaded by Allied forces for the first time in the war.

Sunday 05:

World War II: The 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment under U.S. General Douglas MacArthur lands and occupies Nazdab in Papua New Guinea.

Friday 10:

German forces began their occupation of Rome during World War II.

Sunday 12:

Benito Mussolini, dictator of Italy, is rescued from house arrest by German commando Otto Skorzeny

Wednesday 29:

U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower and Italian Marshal Pietro Badoglio sign an armistice aboard the British ship Nelson off the shore of Malta.

October 1943

Friday 01:

World War II: Naples falls to Allied soldiers.

Thursday 07:

Japan executes 100 American prisoners on Wake Island.

Wednesday 13:

World War II: The new government of Italy sides with the Allies and declares war on Germany.

Friday 22:

Kassel: RAF conducts an air raid on the city of 236,000 people, killing 10,000, rendering 150,000 homeless. Second firestorm raid in Germany

Thursday 28:

The Philadelphia Experiment supposedly occured.

November 1943

Monday 15:

German SS leader Heinrich Himmler orders that Gypsies were to be put "on the same level as Jews and placed in concentration camps." (see Porajmos)

Tuesday 16:

World War II: American bombers strike a hydro-electric power facility and heavy water factory in German-controlled Vermork, Norway.

Saturday 20:

United States Marines land on Tarawa and Makin atolls in the Gilbert Islands and take heavy fire from Japanese shore guns.

Monday 22:

Lebanon gains independence from France.

Monday 29:

The second session of AVNOJ, the Anti-fascist council of national liberation of Yugoslavia, is held in Jajce, Bosnia and Herzegovina, determining the post-war ordering of the country.

December 1943

Saturday 04:

Great Depression ends in the United States: With unemployment figures falling fast due to World War II-related employment, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt closes the Works Progress Administration.

Friday 24:

US General Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes the supreme Allied commander

Sunday 26:

The German warship Scharnhorst sinks off the coast of North Cape in Norway after being attacked by the British Royal Navy late the previous evening.

Thursday 30:

Chandra Bose raises the flag of Indian independence at Port Blair.