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History on the 20th of April

History
Date Text
20 Apr 1441 RELIGIOUS During the Council of Florence (1438-45), Eugenius IV issued the bull "Etsi non dubitemus," which asserted the superiority of the pope over the Councils.
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20 Apr 1718 RELIGIOUS Birth of David Brainerd, colonial American missionary to the Indians of New England. Following his premature death from tuberculosis at 29, Brainerd's journal (published in 1649 by the Jonathan Edwards) influenced hundreds to become missionaries after him.
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20 Apr 1826 RELIGIOUS Birth of Erastus Johnson, American hymnwriter. A lifelong student of the Bible, Johnson, at age 47, penned the hymn, "O Sometimes the Shadows are Deep" (a.k.a. "The Rock That Is Higher Than I").
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20 Apr 1911 WW2 Chuichi Nagumo enrolled at the naval gunnery school. 
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20 Apr 1912 WW2 Rear Admiral Eitaro Kataoka was named the Chief of Staff of the Mako naval port at Pescadores islands, Taiwan. 
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20 Apr 1913 WW2 The French battleship Provence was launched at Lorient, France. 
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20 Apr 1914 WW2 Max Wünsche was born. 
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20 Apr 1914 WW2 US Naval Aviation's first combat action began when the base detachment, including three aircraft and three pilots under Lieutenant J. H. Towers, left Pensacola, Florida, United States in the battleship USS Mississippi to assist forces at Vera Cruz, Mexico, where they flew observation and photographic sorties. 
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20 Apr 1916 WW2 The Escadrille Américaine (latterly the Escadrille Lafayette) was established as a US volunteer unit flying Nieuport II aircraft with the French Aéronautique Militaire on the Western Front in WW1. 
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20 Apr 1916 WW2 Masafumi Arima departed for an overseas tour. 
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20 Apr 1918 WW2 Joseph Rochefort enlisted in the United States Navy. 
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20 Apr 1920 WW2 Tenryu was transferred to the reserves at Kure, Japan. 
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20 Apr 1921 WW2 Tenryu was placed in reserve at Kure, Japan for the installation of radio direction finder equipment. 
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20 Apr 1923 WW2 Quintin Brand was appointed a staff officer at the headquarters of the No. 5 Wing RAF. 
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20 Apr 1925 WW2 Settsu received a new commanding officer. 
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20 Apr 1928 WW2 Colbert was launched at Brest Naval Shipyard, France. 
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20 Apr 1932 WW2 French Army ordered five prototype vehicles from the design that would later be designated AMR 33. 
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20 Apr 1933 WW2 Vice Admiral Shizue Tsuda was named the commanding officer of the newly recommissioned Ryojun Military Port (previously known as Port Arthur; now Lushunkou, Liaoning Province, China), Kwantung Leased Territory in northeastern China. Rear Admiral Hisoharu Kubota was named Tsuda's chief of staff. 
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20 Apr 1933 WW2 Franklin Roosevelt ordered that no American could export gold without government authorization. 
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20 Apr 1934 WW2 Rudolf Höss was promoted to the rank of SS-Sturmmann. 
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20 Apr 1934 WW2 Hermann Göring transferred control of the Gestapo secret police organization to Heinrich Himmler. 
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20 Apr 1934 WW2 Heinrich Himmler appointed Reinhard Heydrich the head of Gestapo in Prussia, Germany. 
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20 Apr 1934 WW2 The British Cabinet approved the 28 Mar 1934 proposal from the Naval Board, which suggested the transfer of HMS Phaeton, currently under construction, to Australia as HMAS Sydney. 
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20 Apr 1936 WW2 Werner Mölders was promoted to the rank of Oberleutnant, effective as of 1 Apr 1936. 
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20 Apr 1936 WW2 Werner von Blomberg was promoted to the rank of Generalfeldmarschall. 
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20 Apr 1936 WW2 Walther von Brauchitsch was promoted to the rank of General der Artillerie. 
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20 Apr 1936 WW2 Wolfgang Falck was promoted to the rank of Oberleutnant. 
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20 Apr 1936 WW2 The French Army issued the second order for AMR 35 light tanks. 
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20 Apr 1936 WW2 Robert von Greim was promoted to the rank of Oberst. 
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20 Apr 1937 WW2 In Spain, two Anarchist battalions, who were dissatisfied with their movement's representation in the Republican Government, went on strike and pulled out, leaving a 15-mile gap in the front line in front of the little town of Marquina directly east of Guernica. Von Richthofen, commanding the German Condor Legion, quickly realised that if the gap was exploited, the Republican Forces in the area would be forced to withdraw and could be trapped if the single bridge at Guernica was destroyed by bombing. 
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20 Apr 1937 WW2 Georg von Küchler was promoted to the rank of General der Artillerie. 
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20 Apr 1938 WW2 The Ki-36 liaison aircraft took its first flight. 
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20 Apr 1938 WW2 The US 2nd Marine Brigade of the Fleet Marine Force arrived at San Diego, California, United States from Shanghai, China. 
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20 Apr 1938 WW2 A British purchasing mission led by Air Commodore Arthur Harris visited the United States to select suitable aircraft for use by the RAF in its expansion programme. The first aircraft selected were the Lockheed Hudson and the North American Harvard, 200 of each being ordered at a cost of US$ 5.4 million. 
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20 Apr 1939 WW2 Alpino was commissioned into service. 
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20 Apr 1939 WW2 Italian Ambassador in Berlin, Germany, Attalico, sent a message to Rome, Italy, noting that war between Germany and Poland seemed imminent. 
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20 Apr 1940 WW2 Adolf Hitler authorized the creation of a joint Norwegian-Danish-German SS regiment. 
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20 Apr 1940 WW2 The British 148th Brigade arrived at Lillehammer, Norway by train at 0250 hours and began to march south toward the front lines held by Norwegian troops on both sides of Lake Mjøsa. At Namsos, Norway, German aircraft destroyed large quantities of British supplies and equipment piled near the docks; the British could do little to fight back as they were short on anti-aircraft weapons; in an attempt to remedy this, the 263 Squadron RAF dispatched 18 Gladiator biplanes to Scapa Flow, where they would be ferried to Norway by HMS Glorious. In the United Kingdom, the British War Cabinet canceled the plans for direct landings at Trondheim, Norway (Operation Hammer) in fear of heavy casualties; a failure in communications meant that the British 146th Brigade remained in precarious positions near Trondheim. 
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20 Apr 1940 WW2 Keith Park took command of the 11 Group of the Royal Air Force Fighter Command. 
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20 Apr 1940 WW2 Werner Mölders shot down a French P-36 fighter near Saarbrücken, Germany. 
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20 Apr 1940 WW2 Danish Army began to demobilize. 
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20 Apr 1940 WW2 German High Command issued a secret order to discharge servicemen with mixed Jewish heritage and servicemen who were married to Jewish women. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 German submarine U-73 sank British ship Empire Endurance 400 miles west of Ireland at 0332 hours; the ship was the former German ship Alster, having been captured in Norway in the previous year. 65 were killed and the military supplies destined for Egypt were lost. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 Athens, Greece was heavily bombed by German dive bombers; one of seven RAF Hurricane aircraft lost in beating off the raid was flown by Squadron Leader Marmaduke "Pat" Pattle, believed to be the Allies' top scoring fighter pilot of the war with at least 50 kills (that number could not be officially recognised as his record of service in Greece was lost); Pattle died trying to protect a fellow pilot. Piraeus, Greece was also attacked from the air, sinking Greek destroyer Psara with 37 killed; 22 German aircraft were lost while the British lost 10 Hurricane fighters. Unable to withstand the German advances, British forces withdrew from Mount Olympus toward Thermopylae on the same day that King George II led a new government. To the north in Albania, General Tsolakoglou surrendered the Greek Epirus Army, without authorization, to the German Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler Regiment; Italian leader Mussolini protested, requesting that the surrender must be accepted by an Italian general. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 The American Liberty ship, Paul Hamilton, loaded with men and explosives, was hit by an aerial torpedo off Algiers, French Algeria and blew to pieces. Not one of the 580 men on board, the vast majority US Army Air Force personnel, survived. Only one body was ever recovered. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 British Commander-in-Chief Middle East General Wavell requested for more tanks to reinforce Tobruk, Libya. Prime Minister Churchill agreed and ordered a convoy to sail directly into the Mediterranean Sea to deliver 295 tanks to Tobruk. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 Erich Raeder attempted to convince Adolf Hitler to allow German submarines to attack American ships; Hitler rejected the request, citing his unwillingness to provoke the Americans to fully enter the war. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 Adolf Hitler celebrated his birthday at the temporary headquarters Frühlingssturm in eastern Austria. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 Georgios Tsolakoglou surrendered the III Army Corps to the Germans. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 British anti-submarine trawler HMT Topaze was accidentally rammed by British battleship HMS Rodney and sank in the Clyde Estuary, Scotland, United Kingdom, killing 18. 
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20 Apr 1941 WW2 The bombing of London, England, United Kingdom which began on the previous date ended before dawn; 449 were killed. Via a speech made in Ireland, Irish Prime Minister Eamon De Valera protested the German bombing of Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom; "they are our people", he said, "we are one and the same people, and their sorrows in the present instance are also our sorrows". 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 German submarine U-654 sank Swedish ship Agra and US freighter Steel Maker off the east coast of the United States. Not too far away, U-572 sank British ship Empire Dryden and U-109 sank British ship Harpagon. 75 miles north of the Turks and Caicos Island east of Cuba, U-154 sank empty Canadian ship Vineland. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 An assassination attempt on the head of French Fascist organization Jacques Doriot took place; it resulted in failure. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 USS Lexington arrived in the South Pacific. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 German Jews were banned from using public transportation. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 Tatsuta Maru arrived at Kupang, Timor and then departed later on the same day. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 USS Hammann arrived at Tongatapu, Tonga. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 Major General George Brett assumed command of Allied air forces in Australia. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 USS Astoria arrived at Tongatapu, Tonga. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 Japanese troops captured Taunggyi, Burma, capital of the southern Shan States, along with its large gasoline store. In central Burma, troops of the Japanese 56th Division pushed Chinese troops out of Loikaw, while troops of the Japanese 18th Division clashed with Chinese troops at Kyidaunggan. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 USS Wasp delivered 46 Spitfire fighters to Malta; most of them would be destroyed in combat within days. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 British submarine HMS Trident sank German freighter Hödur 1.5 miles off the coast near Namsos, Norway at about 1200 hours. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 A Type 96 240mm howitzer was brought to the Bataan Peninsula on Luzon, Philippine Islands by the Japanese for the purpose of bombarding the island of Corregidor. On the same day, on the island of Panay, Japanese Army troops declared the island secure. 
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20 Apr 1942 WW2 German troops broke out of the Demyansk Pocket in Russia through the Ramushevo corridor. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 The British government announced a limited recruitment for women for the Home Guard. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 World Jewish Congress representative in Geneva Gerhart Riegner outlined a plan to borrow local currency in Romania and France for efforts to rescue Jews in those countries. The loans were to be backed by US Dollars in Swiss bank accounts. This scheme was devised to provide funding in those countries without actually sending dollars into Axis-held territories, which would risk the funding being captured by the enemy, which would place the World Jewish Congress in a legal bind per United States wartime law. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 British troops captured the Enfidaville Airfield in Tunisia. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 USAAF aircraft attacked Japanese positions at Nauru. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Company Sergeant Major Chhelu Ram was wounded rescuing his commanding officer in Tunisia. Taking command he then led a successful hand-to-hand assault in which he was wounded again, this time mortally. He was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Yekaterina Budanova was featured on the cover of the young adult political publication Ogonek. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 USS Scorpion sank the Japanese converted gunboat Meiji Maru No. 1, hitting her with 1 of 3 torpedoes fired. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 US Army B-24 bombers based at Funafuti, Ellice Islands attacked Tarawa, Gilbert Islands. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Japanese troops under Koga attacked the British Maungdaw-Buthidaung line in Burma. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Joseph Stilwell was invited to join in on the meeting already arranged between Franklin Roosevelt and Claire Chennault. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 A medical examination was conducted on Isoroku Yamamoto's remains. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Barbers Point Naval Air Station: Part of Marine Fighting Squadron 222 (VMF-222) departed. Part of Marine Fighting Squadron 215 (VMF-215) departed. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Satoru Anabuki, flying Ki-43 fighter "Fubuki", claimed a Hurricane fighter and a P-36 fighter over Imphal, India, but only the P-36 downing was confirmed, increasing his score to 32. 
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20 Apr 1943 WW2 Naka departed Hashirajima, Japan. 
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20 Apr 1943 RELIGIOUS In Poland, Germans Nazi troops massacred the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 The cruiser USS Milwaukee was transferred to the Soviet Navy, under Lend-Lease, and renamed Murmansk. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Amon Göth was given the rank of SS-Hauptsturmführer in the reserve forces of the Waffen-SS. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Oberstgeneral Hube was killed in a plane crash leaving Berchtesgaden, Germany. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 USS Seahorse sank Japanese submarine RO-45 west of Saipan, Mariana Islands, hitting her with three of four torpedoes fired. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Allied leadership in the South Pacific determined that 90% of Rabaul, New Britain had been destroyed, and there was no further need to continue the aerial bombardment campaign against Rabaul. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 USS Harder bombarded Woleai, Caroline Islands under the cover of a rain squall. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Ding Delong was named the commanding officer of the Chinese 37th Army. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 The Japanese siege of Kohima, India was beginning to be lifted. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Italian motor torpedo boats sank British landing ship LST-305 off Anzio, Italy. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Japanese hospital ship Hikawa Maru departed Yokosuka, Japan for her 19th voyage with the Japanese Navy. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 Destroyer Yukikaze departed Kure, Japan to escort battleship Yamato and cruiser Maya to Lingga, Borneo. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 USS Franklin transited through the Panama Canal. 
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20 Apr 1944 WW2 No. 214 Squadron RAF (of No. 100 group based at RAF Oulton at Aylsham, England, United Kingdom), established in Nov 1943, flew the first operational sortie with their Fortress Mk. III (SD) aircraft. These were extensively modified B-17G aircraft fitted out with electronic countermeasures and radar jamming devices. This Squadron would fly more than 1,000 sorties up to May 1945 losing just eight aircraft on operations. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Soviet artillery began to fall on Berlin, Germany on Adolf Hitler's 56th and last birthday. After a brief birthday celebration, the generals urged Hitler to flee Berlin for southern Germany to continue the fight; Hitler decided not to go, setting up a northern command (under Karl Dönitz) and a southern command (tentatively under Albert Kesselring) instead should Berlin fall. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Germany evacuated civilians from the island of Helgoland after sundown; the evacuation was ordered after a major bombing attack by over 900 British bombers on the previous day. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 US Army troops landed on Catanduanes, Philippine Islands. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 USS Charr arrived at the naval base at Subic Bay, Luzon, Philippine Islands. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 USS Snook failed to respond when requested by a British carrier task force to rescue a downed airman in the Ryukyu Islands, Japan. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Hermann Göring destroyed his lavish Karinhall estate near Eberswalde in Germany, loading all his treasures (most of which plundered from across occupied Europe) onto 24 heavy trucks and several train cars. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 German General of the Infantry Hermann Niehoff distributed chocolate to the encircled troops defending Breslau, Germany (now Wroclaw, Poland) in honor of Adolf Hitler's birthday. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 German pilot Leutnant Rudolf Schmitt became the first to use the He 162 jet fighter's ejection seat. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 I-400 arrived at Dalian, China and began loading fuel. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Chinese and American agents of the Sino-American Special Technical Cooperative Organization (SACO) destroyed a Japanese supply train near Wuchang, Hubei Province, China with 50 pounds of TNT. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Between 13,500 and 15,000 prisoners were transferred from Buchenwald and Gross-Rosen subcamps to the Theresienstadt Concentration Camp in occupied Czechoslovakia over the following 20 days. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Andrei Zhdanov, the head of the Allied Control Commission in Finland, gave Finnish Home Secretary Yrjö Leino a list of 22 men, most of whom were citizens of Finland, and ordered him to arrest them and turning them over to Soviet SMERSH. Leino would comply without questioning. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Lorraine completed a week-long bombardment of German positions in the Gironde estuary in western France between La Rochelle and Bordeaux as the Germans surrendered the Girond-Nord fortress in Royan. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 US Seventh Army captured Nürnberg, Germany. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 The German OKW moved from Zossen near Berlin, Germany to Mürwik, northern Germany to escape the approaching Soviet forces. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Instructed to sacrifice everything for speed the French 5th Armoured Division and Spahi reconnaissance regiment enthusiastically overcame fanatical resistance from German SS units to enter the western suburbs of Stuttgart, Germany. The tanks had moved so fast that it would not be until the following day that their supporting infantry, Moroccan and Algerian Tiralleurs, could catch up, but they had beaten the Americans to the Southwest German city. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 USS Springer departed Guam, Mariana Islands for her second war patrol. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 US 5th Army broke through German defensive lines and reached the Po River Valley north of Bologna, Italy. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Light carrier Ryuho was transferred from Carrier Division 1 of the 2nd Fleet to the Japanese Navy Kure Naval District Force as Reserve Ship No. 4. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Vice Admiral Gisaburo Yamaguchi was named the commanding officer of Chinkai Guard District in southern Korea. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 Joseph Stalin ordered the Soviet Stavka to influence troops to be more humane toward the civilians of conquered German territories in order to ease the future occupation. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 US P-51 fighters based in the Philippine Islands attacked Koshun Airfield, Takao Prefecture, Taiwan. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 In Britain the government lifted the black-out restrictions apart from a five-mile wide strip along the coast. However, theatre lights, floodlighting and neon-type advertising was still banned, not to foil bombers but to save fuel. 
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20 Apr 1945 WW2 USS Ticonderoga departed Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Washington, United States for Alameda, California, United States, and then on to Pearl Harbor, US Territory of Hawaii. 
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20 Apr 1946 WW2 USS Sterlet arrived at Qingdao, China. 
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20 Apr 1947 WW2 Christian X passed away. 
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20 Apr 1948 WW2 Mitsumasa Yonai passed away. 
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20 Apr 1987 RELIGIOUS In Columbus, OH, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) was organized, making it the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S. It represented the merger of three smaller Lutheran bodies, and was officially born on Jan 1, 1988.
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