OpsLens

27 September: This Day in Military History

1860: During an insurrection on Panama, a landing party of Marines from the sloop-of-war USS St. Mary’s land and take control of a railway station.

1941: At Baltimore Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt launches SS Patrick Henry – the first of what will be 2,710 “Liberty Ships.” 13 more of the cost-effective and mass-produced cargo ships are launched this day, and the ships will carry millions of tons of supplies across the Atlantic during World War II.

1942: The Liberty Ship SS Stephen Hopkins becomes the only U.S. merchant ship to sink a vessel when she refuses to surrender to the German raider Stieg. Hopkins will slip under the waves, but not before her crews mortally wound Stier with their 4-in. gun. 15 of the ship’s 58-man crew will survive 31 days at sea on an open lifeboat before reaching the shores of Brazil.

Meanwhile, in the Pacific Theater, when three companies of Marines are surrounded by Japanese forces along Guadalcanal’s Matanikau River, battalion commander Lt. Col. Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller assembles a rescue force to prevent the annihilation of his men. The destroyer USS Ballard (DD-627) bombards Japanese positions for 30 minutes while Coast Guard landing craft withdraw the Marines under heavy fire.

Signalman First Class Douglas A. Munro, leader of the Higgins boats, is killed while covering the evacuation – becoming the only Coast Guardsman awarded the Medal of Honor.

Douglas A. Munro statue, Cape May, NJ

1944: As 39 B-24 “Liberator” bomber crews of the 445 Bomb Group attack Kessel, Germany, over 100 Luftwaffe fighters take to the skies to square off against the American attackers. In what becomes perhaps the worst disaster for the Army Air Forces during World War II, 25 Liberators are shot down in Germany. Two of the crippled warplanes crash-land in France, one in Belgium, and another in England. Two bombers are forced to make emergency landings at alternate airstrips, and only four crews manage to return to Royal Air Force Station Tibenham.

B-24 Hit by Flak

1956: (Featured Image) Over California’s Mojave Desert, Capt. Miburn G “Mel” Apt (USAF) cuts loose from the B-50 “Superfortress” and his Bell X-2 rocket plane streaks past the chase planes. Apt becomes the first pilot to fly past Mach 3 (2,098 mph), but sadly Apt’s tenure as the “Fastest Man Alive” is short lived. Just after setting the record, his plane loses control and breaks up, killing the test pilot.