World War II Chronicle

World War II Chronicle: August 10, 1941

Chris Carter

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On this day in 1941, Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt and British prime minister Winston Churchill took a break from the Atlantic Charter Conference in Newfoundland’s Placentia Bay for Sunday church service.

The two heads of state are seen here, aboard the Royal Navy’s brand-new battleship HMS Prince of Wales, seated just to the left of the left gun barrel. Also pictured are Adm. Ernest J. King, Commander-in-Chief, Atlantic Fleet; General George C. Marshall, U.S. Army Chief of Staff; General Sir John Dill, Chief of the Imperial General Staff; Adm. Harold R. Stark, Chief of Naval Operations; and Admiral Sir Dudley Pound, First Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Staff. The battleship USS Arkansas is in the background.

Another shot:

Front row: Roosevelt (left), Churchill; back row: King, Marshall, Dill, Stark, and Pound.

The White House had told the American press earlier in the month that the president would leave Washington, D.C. on a fishing trip, but Roosevelt boarded the cruiser USS Augusta while in Massachusetts’ Vineyard Bay. A Secret Service agent remained aboard the president’s yacht and impersonated the Roosevelt to maintain secrecy.

Churchill and Roosevelt aboard USS Augusta on Aug. 9, 1941. Roosevelt is assisted by son Elliot (Capt., U.S. Army) as Franklin Jr. (Ensign, U.S.N.R.) looks on. More on FDR’s sons here.

Meanwhile, Charles Lindbergh spoke in front of nearly 20,000 people at an American First rally in Cleveland, asking those in attendance to consider whether they lived in a republic or if they were being pushed into a war by a government of subterfuge (see page two)… The Soviet Union’s massive Tupolev ANT-20bis “Maxim Gorky” airliner is pictured on page five, which mentions the Red Army could turn into a bomber as it has the range to strike Berlin.

The Maxim Gorky had a 207-foot wingspan

The Germans shouldn’t be overly concerned: the original “Maxim Gorky” crashed during a 1935 air show and there is only one of these monsters left. It features six engines and the wing is so long and large that there is a mechanic station between the engines…

A view of the mechanic’s cupola between the number 4 and 5 engines on the plane’s right wing

Sports section begins on page 26, which features a story on how confident Ted Williams is that he will finish the season over .400… This week in the war summarized on page 34

Evening star. (Washington, D.C.), 10 August 1941. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1941-08-10/ed-1/

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