The following events occurred in September 1943:
September 1, 1943 (Wednesday) Amon Göth, the Nazi commandant of the Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp, decreed that the Jewish prisoners would no longer be allowed to work in the factories in neighboring Płaszów, including the one operated by Oskar Schindler. Thereafter, Jews were required to remain inside the camp at all times, although non-Jewish Poles could continue to work.David Crowe, Oskar Schindler: The Untold Account of His Life, Wartime Activities, and the True Story Behind the List (Basic Books, 2007) p280 Minami-Tori-shima, a Japanese coral atoll that included an airstrip, located approximately from Tokyo, was attacked by the United States in the first successful strike of the new Fast Carrier Task Force. Rear Admiral Charles Pownall commanded Task Force 15, with three carriers (the Essex, the Yorktown and the Independence) and several support ships, that attacked the atoll.Patrick Degan, Flattop Fighting in World War II: The Battles Between American and Japanese Aircraft Carriers (McFarland, 2003) p281 The Japanese submarine I-182 was depth charged and sunk in the Coral Sea by the destroyer USS Wadsworth.
September 2, 1943 (Thursday) Seweryn Klajnman, an 18-year-old Jewish inmate at the Treblinka extermination camp, led an escape of 13 of his fellow prisoners. The group killed the Ukrainian SS guard, who was overseeing their work detail, with a crowbar. Klajnman then changed into the guard's uniform, and with rifle in hand and shouting orders, marched his group out of the camp's gates as if going to a new assignment.Martin Gilbert, The Routledge Atlas of the Holocaust (Routledge, 2009) p157
The ocean liner MS Gripsholm, operated by neutral Sweden to make exchanges of civilians between the Allied Powers and the Axis Powers, departed from Jersey City, New Jersey toward Mormugao in Portuguese India with 1,330 Japanese diplomats and their families residing in the United States on board. By agreement between the U.S. and Japan, the Japanese ship Teia Maru would bring American civilians to Mormugao, where an exchange would take place on October 15."Swedish Ship Sails, To Return Americans", Pittsburgh Press, September 2, 1943, p6 Born: Glen Sather, Canadian ice hockey player, coach and Hockey Hall of Fame inductee; in High River, Alberta
September 3, 1943 (Friday) The Italian mainland was invaded by the Allies for the first time during World War II, as the British commanding General, Sir Bernard Montgomery, sent the first British and Canadian troops across the Messina Strait, from Sicily to the southern tip of Italy."ALLIES INVADE ITALY!", Pittsburgh Press, September 3, 1943, p1 The British Eighth Army, 5th Division, and the Canadian 1st Division began Operation Baytown at 0430 GMTDeborah Grahame-Smith, Global Chaos (Marshall Cavendish, 2010) p50 and encountered little resistance after going ashore at Reggio di Calabria. At the same time, General Giuseppe Castellano, acting with the authorization of the Italian government, secretly met with Allied officials at the village of Cassibile in Sicily to sign the Armistice of Cassibile, Italy's unconditional surrender, to "come into force at a moment most favorable to the Allies". U.S. Army General Walter Bedell Smith signed on behalf of the Allies.Philip Morgan, The Fall of Mussolini: Italy, the Italians, and the Second World War (Oxford University Press, 2007)Robert Andrews and Jules Brown, The Rough Guide to Sicily (Rough Guides, 2002) p288 The Nazi German SS began the arrest of thousands of Jews in Belgium, with two days of raids on the cities of Brussels and Antwerp. The first of ten deportations by railroad would begin on September 20.Peter Longerich, Holocaust:The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews (Oxford University Press, 2010) p388 The Japanese submarine I-25 was sunk off Espiritu Santo by the destroyer USS Ellet, with the loss of all 94 crew. Born: Valerie Perrine, American film actress and model; in Galveston, Texas Died: Leon Moisseiff, 70, American engineer and suspension bridge designer
September 4, 1943 (Saturday)
Soviet Union premier Joseph Stalin hosted Sergei Izvekov (the acting patriarch Pimen I of the Russian Orthodox Church), and two other metropolitans, and offered to allow the Church to hold worship services, in return for the Church's acknowledging "the legitimacy of the Soviet state" and refraining from criticism of the government's policies. The assembled clerics agreed, and the announcement of the end of restrictions was made the next day. British troops, under the command of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, captured the Italian ports of Reggio Calabria and San Giovanni di Gerace. Major General George Wootten's Australian 9th Division and the 2nd Engineer Special brigade became the first Allied troops to land at New Guinea since the capture of the island by Japanese troops, coming ashore near Lae. With the Australian 7th Division, commanded by Major General George Alan Vasey, arriving soon afterward, Lae would be captured on September 16.
September 5, 1943 (Sunday) U.S. Army Air Forces Lieutenant Alex Doster became the first person to test the paratrooper pick-up system that had been designed by All American Aviation Company. Designed to rescue downed fliers who were stranded in terrain that could not be reached from the air, the All American system used the same principle that had been applied to the picking up of mail sacks from the air. Lt. Doster volunteered for the test, wearing a special harness that minimized the g-force that resulted from being picked up from the ground at a speed of , and, within three minutes, climbed aboard a Stinson aircraft piloted by Norm Rintoul. In what General Douglas MacArthur described as "the first major parachute jump in the Pacific War", the U.S. Army 503rd Parachute Regiment landed and seized the Japanese held airport at Nadzab, just east of the port city of Lae in northeastern Papua New Guinea. Born: Dolores Prida, Cuban-born American advice columnist; in Caibarién (d. 2013) Died: Aleš Hrdlička, 74, Czech anthropologist
September 6, 1943 (Monday) In the U.S., a train crash killed 79 people and 116 injured 116 others. The Congressional Limited Express, operated by the Pennsylvania Railroad at Philadelphia, had been en route from Washington to New York City, with 541 passengers. At 6:08 pm, nine of the 16 cars on the train derailed, after an axle on the seventh one had caught fire, causing a chain reaction that sent the cars crashing into each other.Edgar A. Haine, Railroad Wrecks (Associated University Presses, 1993) pp 111–112; "66 Killed, 106 Hurt In PRR Wreck" Pittsburgh Press, September 7, 1943, p1 The important railway junction of Konotop fell to the Soviet 60th Army. The struck a mine and sank in the Bay of Biscay with the loss of all 52 crew. Born: Richard J. Roberts, British molecular biologist and winner of 1993 Nobel Prize in Medicine; in Derby Roger Waters, English rock musician (Pink Floyd); in Great Bookham, Surrey Died: Reginald McKenna, 80, British Home Secretary (1911–1915) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (1915–1916)
September 7, 1943 (Tuesday) As the German Army retreated from the Ukrainian SSR in the Soviet Union, Heinrich Himmler issued his "scorched earth" (verbrannte Erde) order, with the goal to be "not one person remains, no cattle, no wheat, no railroad track ... neither a house nor a mine which would not be destroyed for years ... no well which would not be poisoned."Scorched Earth", in Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements (A to F), Edmund Jan Osmańczyk and Anthony Mango, eds. (Taylor & Francis, 2003) p2019 A fire at the Gulf Hotel in Houston killed 55 men, most of them elderly residents. The blaze broke out shortly after midnight at the three-story building."46 Die, 20 Hurt in Hotel Blaze— Many Leap to Their Death In Houston Fire", Pittsburgh Press, September 7, 1943, p1 The Italian submarine was torpedoed and sunk off Salerno by the British submarine Shakespeare, with the loss of all 46 crew.Chesneau, Roger, ed. (1980). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922–1946. Greenwich, UK: Conway Maritime Press. p. 308. ISBN 0-85177-146-7. Born: Gloria Gaynor, American singer, known for "I Will Survive"; as Gloria Fowles, in Newark, New Jersey
September 8, 1943 (Wednesday) Italy surrendered to the Allied forces after more than three years as a member of the alliance of the Axis powers. At 7:30 in the evening local time, radio listeners in Italy were stunned to hear their Prime Minister, Marshal Pietro Badoglio, read the statement that "The Italian Government, recognizing the impossibility of continuing the unequal struggle against the overwhelming power of the enemy, and with the object of avoiding further and more grievous harm to the nation, has requested an armistice from General Eisenhower ... This request has been granted. The Italian forces will, therefore, cease all acts of hostility against the Anglo-American forces wherever they may be met ...""Official Texts of Surrender, Pittsburgh Press, September 8, 1943, p1 U.S. Army General Dwight D. Eisenhower released the news of the unconditional surrender, "effective this instant", at the same time in a broadcast from Allied Headquarters in North Africa."ITALY QUITS WAR!", Pittsburgh Press, September 8, 1943, p1 Half of the 70,000 Allied prisoners of war in Italy were able to escape in a single day, walking out of the camps when their prison guards deserted.Thomas R. Brooks, The War North of Rome: June 1944 - May 1945 (Da Capo Press, 2009) p118Philip Jowett, The Italian Army 1940–45 (3): Italy 1943–45 (Osprey Publishing, 2001) German troops had moved into northern Italy, where the 35,000 member Jewish population was concentrated, during the 45 days since the overthrow of Benito Mussolini.Risa B. Sodi, Narrative & Imperative: The First Fifty Years of Italian Holocaust Writing (1944–1994) (Peter Lang, 2007) p30 U.S. warplanes conducted the Frascati air raid, killing 485 civilians. In his first public statement since March 22, Germany's Adolf Hitler delivered a radio address from Berlin to talk about the recent withdrawal of Italy from the war. Saying that "I see the time has come to speak again to the German people," Hitler said that the loss of Italy was not "due to lack of German assistance", but, rather, "failure or ill will of those elements which by systematic sabotage have caused capitulations.""Hitler Breaks Long Silence", Pittsburgh Press, September 10, 1943, p1 Allied forces began the Dodecanese Campaign, an attempt to capture the Italian-held Dodecanese islands of Greece. The Soviet 5th Shock Army entered Stalino. Germany ordered the removal of 5,006 Jewish residents of Theresienstadt, which had been set aside by the Nazis as a city where Jewish intellectuals could be relocated to live without interference. The group was sent to Birkenau, near the extermination camp in Auschwitz, with orders that they receive Sonderbehandlung (special treatment) for six months. In March 1944, the order would expire and the residents would be executed.Hermann Langbein, People in Auschwitz (University of North Carolina Press, 2004) p47 The first classes commenced at the Grace Bible Institute in Omaha, Nebraska, with 23 students. The college would be renamed Grace University in 1995 and close in 2018."University History", GraceUniversity.edu Born: Negasso Gidada, President of Ethiopia from 1995 until 2001; in Dembidolo (d. 2019) Died: Julius Fučík, 40, Czech resistance leader, was executed
September 9, 1943 (Thursday)