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david leigh-smith
283 articles

On This Day…November 5th.

November 5, 2018 · in News · · 5 · 5.4K

Gunner Kenneth Bratton being removed from the turret of his TBF Avenger aboard the USS Saratoga following a successful strike on Rabaul, 5 November 1943...

With Armistice day almost upon us, this photo from Nov 5th , 1918 shows how the US Army marked deserters and 'stragglers' toward the end of the Hundred Day Offensive (from the Battle of Amiens to the end of the conflict), the last and decisive battle of World War I.

A Panzer IV medium tank on a training exercise on 5 November, 1943. Nice photo as modelling reference, this tank belonged to German Panzergrenadier Division 'Großdeutschland', an elite combat unit of the German Army that fought on the Eastern Front in World War II.

Japanese 'Zero' just missing the posrt side of the carrier USS Ticonderoga as viewed from USS Essex on 5 November 1944.

Reader reactions:
4  Awesome

1 additional image. Click to enlarge.


5 responses

  1. Also November 5, 1944: AMM 2/c Loyce Deen is buried at sea in his Avenger, the only crewman buried in his airplane. As my writing mentor Wendell Mayes (an FDO aboard Essex at the time) said: "It was the saddest, most moving moment I experienced during the war."

    1 attached image. Click to enlarge.

  2. Very interesting photos, David.

    Thanks for adding your part, Tom.

  3. Rest In peace, Loyce.

  4. Ditto that and for all buried at sea. No head stones for they.

  5. I have a photo in my WW-II scrapbook of the guy being pulled out of the Avenger and it's one of 1,107 that I have saved during WW-II. I scanned all of those photos and put them on a DVD disk. I have a mix of color and black & white paper prints on the DVD. I got the original photo prints from the airplane books I bought during WW-II. I use to sell copies of the DVD for 20 bucks.
    Rodney @[email protected]

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