1939
A Happy New Year and Calling All Dogs broadcast on The National Programme.
The first episode of Eric Gillett reading of War & Peace.
The second test at Cape Town was drawn. England's five hundred and fifty nine for nine included centuries for Wally Hammond, Les Ames and Bryan Valentine.
Eugene O'Neill's Marco Millions broadcast.
A new Reich Chancellery designed by Albert Speer was inaugurated on the Voßstraße in Berlin. Susannah Yolande Fletcher born in Chelsea.
JB Priestley's Bees On The Boat-Deck - starring Ralph Richardson - broadcast. Two schoolboys of thirteen were caned for playing truant but said it 'was worth it,' because they had travelled sixty-five miles in an open railway truck, then did the return journey in a passenger train. The adventure of the boys - Charlie Parsley and Ronnie Parsons, of Wood Green - began when they saw the film Crime School, in which 'The Dead End Kids' stowed away on a train. On their first day back at school after the Christmas holidays at lunch-time the pair decided to do a bunk. Near New Barnet they clambered into an empty truck of a stationary goods train. 'At last the train stopped. We argued and then decided to get out,' said Charlie. 'We walked along the line and came to a station. A porter told us we were at Holme, Huntingdonshire. The station-master gave us tea and cakes. Then he put us in a train for London. At school we got four strokes of the cane, but it was worth it.'
The casting of Vivien Leigh to play Scarlett O'Hara in the film adaptation of Gone With The Wind was announced. Son Of Frankenstein - starring Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff, Lionel Atwell and Bela Lugosi - premiered. A British delegation led by Neville Chamberlain met Pope Pius XI. The pope talked of the resistance democracies must make against the dangerous regimes of the world, as well as racial persecution and the need to help refugees. George Formby's 'Little Wooden Toolshed In The Garden'/'Frigid Air Fanny' released.
King Of The Underworld - starring Humphrey Bogart and Kay Francis - premiered. Barbara Ewing born in Carterton, New Zealand.
Lionel Brown's Square Pegs broadcast. Three early morning bomb explosions occurred in the London suburbs, one of them knocking out a power station that affected twenty five thousand people. These were the first of the S-Plan bombings conducted by the Irish Republican Army.
Paul Willis Grist born in Glamorgan.
England won the third test at Durban by an innings and thirteen runs. Eddie Paynter scored two hundred and forty three and Wally Hammond one hundred and twenty in England's four hundred and sixty nine for four. Ken Farnes took seven wickets as England twice bowled out the hosts.
Gunga Din starring Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen and Douglas Fairbanks Junior premiered in Los Angeles.
Stafford Cripps was expelled from the Labour Party for advocating the creation of a Popular Front. Angela Margaret Leslie Thorne born in Karachi.
The first radio adaptation of Harry Blyth's Sexton Blake stories - featuring George Curzon in the title role - broadcast on The National Programme as part of the Lucky Dip strand. Horace Heidt & His Musical Knights' recording of 'Little Sir Echo' released.
Germaine Greer born in Melbourne.
Money For Jam broadcast.
Reginald Arkell's 1066 & All That broadcast.
John Ford's Stagecoach - with John Wayne in his first starring role - premiered.
Janet Suzman born in Johannesburg.
Peter John Purves born in Preston.
Norman Lee's Murder In Soho - starring Jack La Rue, Sandra Storme, Bernard Lee, Martin Walker, James Hayter and Googie Withers - premiered.
The fourth test at Johannesburg was drawn. Len Hutton top-scored for England with ninety two.
During the Catalonia Offensive, the Spanish Nationalists took Girona.
Gardner Davies's adaptation of Gas Light broadcast.
James Birdie's The Anatomist broadcast.
The Home Office announced plans to provide shelters to thousands of homes in districts most likely to be bombed in the event of war. The steel shelters, nicknamed Anderson Shelters after Lord Privy Seal Sir John Anderson were designed so that two unskilled people could erect them. Robert Johnson's 'Love In Vain Blues'/'Preachin' Blues (Up Jumped the Devil)' released in the US.
Peter John Purves born in Preston.
Raymond Daniel Manzarek born in Chicago.
John Ford's Stagecoach - starring Claire Trevor and John Wayne in his breakthrough role - premiered.
Wolverhampton Wanderers four-one victory over Leeds United saw the club debut of Jimmy Mullen - the first of four hundred and eighty six games for Wolves in a career that lasted until 1960. Susan Travers born in London.
Gwendoline Allsop born in Crich, Derbyshire.
Jonathan Hugh Gascoyne-Cecil born in London.
The Academy Awards were held in Los Angeles. You Can't Take It With You won Best Picture. The first pay-per-view sporting event in history took place when a live BBC broadcast of a boxing match between Eric Boon and Arthur Danahar was also shown at three London cinemas. Only about twenty thousand London households had television sets and the crowds at the cinemas were packed.
Lionel Brown's Square Pegs - starring James Mason - broadcast.
A book titled The Strange Death Of Adolf Hitler was published in the United States, immediately drawing worldwide attention. Written anonymously, the book claimed that high officials within the Nazi Party assassinated Hitler the night before the Munich Conference by arranging for his omelette to be poisoned. The book claimed that Hitler was now being impersonated by body doubles. Hugh Thornton Walters born in Mexborough.
Lloyd Bacon's The Oklahoma Kid - starring James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart - premiered.
REJ Brooke's Condemned To Be Shot broadcast.
Ian Hay's Little Ladyship broadcast, featuring the TV début of Joan Greenwood. Victoria Louise Samantha Marie Elizabeth Therese Eggar born in Hampstead.
Jonathan Newth born in Devon.
Michael Wearing born in Southport.
The fifth test at Durban was drawn. The match, which began on 3 March lasted for ten days and only ended because the England team had to catch the boat home. Nineteen hundred and eighty one runs were scored in the match (still a test record) with hundreds from Pieter Van Der Bijl, Dudley Nourse and Alan Meville for South Africa and Paul Gibbs, Wally Hammond and Bill Edrich (two hundred and nineteen) for England. England were still forty one runs short of their target of six hundred and ninety six with five wickets standing. Reg Perks made his test debut and took five wickets in South Africa's first innings.
The Nazis marched unopposed into Czechoslovakia.
Neville Chamberlain made a speech in Birmingham condemning Hitler for breaking the word he gave at the Munich Conference and warning that Britain would resist any further territorial expansion by Germany.
Piers Inigo Haggard born in London.
A child of twelve who wanted to have her hair permanently waved should be taken over her mother's knee and spanked, according to Judge Richardson at the County Court, Sunderland when a claim against a hairdresser for negligence came before him. 'If a child of this age gets burned while having her hair waved,' he said, 'I should be inclined to say, "Serve her jolly-well right." It might be more of advantage than disadvantage to be pulled up in her somewhat precocious vanity.' Giving judgement for the defendant, hairdresser Sarah Jane McGough, from whom twelve-year-old Ruth Harrison claimed fifteen pounds, Judge Richardson remarked: 'She must have very foolish parents who spend three shillings and sixpence on having her hair permanently waved. It is a waste of money.'
Michael Powell's 1937 movie The Edge Of The World - starring Niall MacGinnis, John Laurie and Belle Chrystall - first shown on TV. Christine Hargreaves born in Salford.
Workman won the Grand National. William Wyler's Wuthering Heights starring - Merle Oberon, Laurence Olivier, David Niven and Geraldine Fitzgerald, Henry Koster's Three Smart Girls Grow Up - starring Deanna Durbin, Nan Grey and Helen Parrish and Cenek Slégl's Venoušek A Stázička - starring Vera Ferbasová and Eva Gérová - premiered.
Robin Hawdon born in Newcastle Upon Tyne.
Lilian Ridgway born in Urmston, Lancashire.
Magyar Melody broadcast. The Nationalists launched the final offensive of the Spanish Civil War.
The three-year Siege of Madrid ended with the Nationalist capture of the city.
John C Wood born in Bristol.
Sidney Lanfield's The Hound Of The Baskervilles - starring Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, Richard Greene and Wendy Barrie - premiered.
Lead Belly began a series of recordings in New York which would later be released as the LP Negro Sinful Songs. The recordings included 'Looky, Looky, Yonder', 'Black Betty', Ain't Gonna Go Down To The Well No Mo' and 'The Gallis Pole'.
Marvin Pentz Gay Junior born in Washington DC.
George King's The Face At The Window - starring Tod Slaughter, Marjorie Taylor and John Warwick - premiered.
Glenn Miller & His Orchestra recorded 'Moonlight Serenade'. Hugh Masekela born in Witbank, South Africa.
Britain's largest aircraft carrier, HMS Illustrious, was launched at Barrow-in-Furness.
Britain and France agreed on a mutual assistance pact with Poland, pledging to come to Poland's aid in the event of a German attack.
David Paradine Frost born in Tenterden, Kent. Francis Ford Coppola born in Detroit. The Italian invasion of Albania began. The Albanians offered little resistance. King Zog fled Albania to Greece as Italian forces entered Tirana. Leo McCarey's Love Affair - starring Ireme Dunne and Charles Boyer and Leigh Jason's The Flying Irishman premiered.
The game of darts was banned in Glasgow pubs for being 'too dangerous.'
The John Steinbeck novel The Grapes of Wrath was published. Valerie Lilley born in Larne.
England beat Scotland two-one in the Home International championship at Hampden Park. Tommy Lawton scored the winner after earlier setting up a goal for debutant Pat Beasley of Huddersfield town. Preston's Jimmy Dougal scored on his first appearance for the hosts. First Division leaders Everton (without Mercer and Lawton) drew nil-nil with Preston North end (without Dougal and Bill Shankly).thirty one listed nations (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belgium, Great Britain and Ireland, France, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Poland, Hungary, Rumania, Yugoslavia, Russia, Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey, Iraq, the Arabias, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and Iran) would not be attacked. Hitler's response, two weeks later, was to mock Roosevelt's message with sarcasm and reply that the fear of war was caused by press speculation. With two years, Hilter on his own, had attacked thirteen of them.
Mary Isobel Catherine Bernadette O'Brien born in West Hampstead.
Carol Reed's A Girl Must Live - starring Margaret Lockwood, Renee Houston and Lilli Palmer - premiered.
Disgraceful old Nazi stinker Adolf Hitler's fiftieth birthday was celebrated - with much pompous and faintly ridiculous goosestepping and 'seig-heiling' - as a national holiday throughout Germany. Dignitaries from twenty three countries attended the celebrations although official representatives from Great Britain, France and the United States were conspicuous by their absence. Nevertheless, three high-ranking members of British society did attend; Walter John Montagu Douglas Scott, the Eighth Duke of Buccleuch, Lord Stewart of the Royal Household and brother-in law of the Duke of Gloucester was one. Arthur Ronald Nall-Cain, former Tory MP for Liverpool Wavertree before inheriting his father's title as the Second Baron Brocket was another. And Major General John Bonny Fuller, one of the most decorated British Army officers and a celebrated military strategic (as well as being a close personal friend of General William Ironside, the Inspector General of Britain's Overseas Forces) was also there. None of whom, obviously, were complete and total fascist scum or anything even remotely like it, just to make that very clear. Billie Holiday recorded 'Strange Fruit' in New York. Raymond Michael Brooks born in Brighton.
Dark Victory - starring Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart and Ronald Reagan - premiered. Ann Mitchell born in Stpney.
Gallipoli broadcast on The National Programme.
Juarez - starring Paul Muni and Bette Davis - premiered.
Marina Martin born in London.
The government announced that 'due to international events,' a bill would be introduced in parliament introducing military conscription for all males aged twenty and twenty one.
Portsmouth beat Wolverhampton Wanderers four-one in the last FA Cup final before the outbreak of war. Carol Reed's A Girl Must Live - starring Margaret Lockwood, Renée Houston, Lilli Palmer and Hugh Sinclair - premiered.
The 1939 New York World's Fair opened. NBC inaugurated its first television broadcast with coverage of President Roosevelt at the event.
In a notable television first, the BBC's mobile unit broadcast an entire performance of Me & My Girl - starring Lupino Lane - live from the Victoria Palace. AP Herbert's Two Gentlemen Of Soho broadcast.
Peter Dean born in Hoxton, East London.
Finnegans Wake by James Joyce was published. Joyce began working on Finnegans Wake shortly after the 1922 publication of Ulysses. By 1924 instalments of Joyce's new work began to appear, in serialised form, in Parisian literary journals The Transatlantic Review and transition (sic), under the title 'fragments from Work in Progress.' Joyce invented a unique polyglot-language or idioglossia solely for the purpose of this work. This language is composed of composite words from some sixty to seventy world languages, combined to form puns, or portmanteau words and phrases intended to convey several layers of meaning at once. Initial reaction to Finnegans Wake, both in its serialised and final published form, was largely negative, ranging from bafflement at its radical reworking of the English language to open hostility. Even close friends and family were disapproving of Joyce's seemingly impenetrable text, with Joyce's brother Stanislaus 'rebuk[ing] him for writing an incomprehensible night-book,' and former friend Oliver Gogarty believing the book to be a joke, pulled by Joyce on the literary community, referring to it as 'the most colossal leg-pull in literature since Macpherson's Ossian.' When Ezra Pound, a former champion of Joyce's and admirer of Ulysses, was asked his opinion on the text, he wrote 'Nothing so far as I make out, nothing short of divine vision or a new cure for the clap can possibly be worth all the circumambient peripherization.' HG Wells, in a personal letter to Joyce, argued that 'you have turned your back on common men, on their elementary needs and their restricted time and intelligence [...] I ask: who the hell is this Joyce who demands so many waking hours of the few thousands I have still to live for a proper appreciation of his quirks and fancies and flashes of rendering?' Even Joyce's patron Harriett Weaver wrote to him in 1927 to inform him of her misgivings regarding his new work, stating 'I am made in such a way that I do not care much for the output from your Wholesale Safety Pun Factory nor for the darknesses and unintelligibilities of your deliberately entangled language system. It seems to me you are wasting your genius.' The wider literary community were equally disparaging, with DH Lawrence declaring in a letter to Maria and Aldous Huxley, having read sections in transition, 'My God, what a clumsy olla putrida James Joyce is! Nothing but old fags and cabbage-stumps of quotations from the Bible and the rest, stewed in the juice of deliberate journalistic dirty-mindedness – what old and hard-worked staleness, masquerading as the all-new!' Vladimir Nabokov, who had also admired Ulysses, described Finnegans Wake as 'nothing but a formless and dull mass of phony folklore, a cold pudding of a book, a persistent snore in the next room [...] and only the infrequent snatches of heavenly intonations redeem it from utter insipidity.' Modern critics tend to regard the work as a genuine, twenty four carat masterpiece. Albeit, one that is easier to both enjoy and understand if one is reading it whilst stoned off ones tits.
Cecil B DeMille's Union Pacific - staring Barbara Stanwyck - premiered. Alison Patricia Seebohm born in Luton.
Everton won the First Division title despite losing their final game three-nil at Grimsby. Wolverhampton Wanderers finished second. Confessions Of A Nazi Spy - starring Edward G Robinson - premiered.
Jimmy Lee Ruffin born in Collinsville, Mississippi.
The first published appearance of Batman in Detective Comics issue twenty seven.
The Henry Miller novel Tropic Of Capricorn was released in France. It was banned in the United States until 1961.
The first episode of Danger! Men At Work! broadcast. The first episode of RF Delderfield's Cocklemouth Comet broadcast on The Regional Programme.
Harvey Keitel born in New York. England drew two-two with Italy in a 'friendly' international at the San Siro in Milan. Tommy Lawton and Willis Hall scored for the visitors with Amedeo Biavati of Bologna and Lazio's Silvio Piola replying. In the midst of the obvious path to war in Europe, Stanley Rous visited Robert Vansittart, the Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office to seek advice regarding England's forthcoming summer tour of Europe. 'When?' asked Vansittart. 'End of May!' was the reply. 'In that case it will be all right' responded Vansittart. 'It is August which will be the danger month.' Once more (although far less infamously than Berlin the previous year), the Fascist salute was given by a highly pissed-off England team, both before and after the match which was watched by Signor Mussolini's sons, Vittorio and Bruno and his nephew, Vito. Sixteen-year-old housemaid, Winifred Higgs was killed when St Cyprian's School for boys at Eastbourne burned down in the early hours. All of the pupils escaped, but the cook and housemaids bacame trapped on the top floor. The cook climed onto the roof where she was rescued by firemen and several maids escaped down the fire escape, but Miss Higgs fell onto a flat roof and died from her injuries.
George More O'Ferrall's adaptation of Sun Up broadcast.
Goodbye, Mister Chips - starring Robert Donat and Greer Garsonm, Alfred Hitchcock's adaptation of Jamaica Inn - starring Charles Laughton, Maureen O'Hara, Leslie Banks and Robert Newton, George Nichols' Man Of Conquest and Howard Hawks's Only Angels Have Wings - starring Cary Grant and Jean Arthur - premiered.
England lost two-one to Yugoslavia in a friendly international in Belgrade. Frank Broome scored for the visitors. Political differences between the Croats and the Serbs had spread to sport and the Croat Football Association on 17 May, had ordered all players under its jurisdiction not to play in international matches for Yugoslavia. Seven of the home side, therefore, came from the Beogradski SK club whilst three more played for SK Jugoslavija. Eddie Hapgood had torn his ankle ligaments in the melee that preceded the first Yugoslav goal. Nevertheless, he played on for the following seventy minutes. A labourer, George Willis, was acquitted of the murder of eighty five-year-old Frederick Paul. The old man had been shot and then his body dragged into a pond. Circumstantial evidence convinced the police that Willis was the murderer and that robbery had been his motive, but an elaborate demonstration at Reading Assizes of Willis using a pair of tweezers that Paul's son had said belonged to his father, to extract screws from a watch, was enough to convince the jury that he was not guilty of anything except being handy with tweezers.
Edward Poor Montgomery's For Those In Peril broadcast. Nancy Kwan Ka-shen born in Hong Kong. William Fox born in London.
You Can't Get Away With Murder - starring Humphrey Bogart, Gale Page and Billy Halop - premiered.
Germany and Italy signed a ten-year military and political alliance known as the Pact of Steel.
In Winnipeg, King George VI gave a radio address broadcast around the world extolling the century of peace between Canada and the United States. Blue Peter won The Derby. The race was televised live in six major London theatres. England played their last pre-war football international, a friendly in București beating Rumania two-nil. West Ham United's Len Goulden and Charlton Athletic's Don Welsh were the scorers. Brentford's Les Smith made his international debut. Sixteen-year-old Kenneth Derfel was remanded at Manchester City Juvenile Court on the charge of murdering a five-year-old girl, Patricia Carney in Wythenshawe, three months earlier. After sexually assaulting two other girls, he abducted Patricia, but then strangled her when she started screaming. He was found guilty and sentenced to be detained at His Majesty's pleasure.
Ian Murray McKellen born in Burnley.
Hal Roach's Captain Fury - starring Brian Aherne - premiered.
Nicholas Phipps's First Stop North broadcast.
John Ford's Young Mister Lincoln - starring Henry Fonda - premiered.
Roy William Neil's The Good Old Days - starring Max Miller, Hal Walters and Kathleen Gibson - premiered.
An attempt was made on the life of Marina, Duchess of Kent. As her car was pulling away from her home in Belgrave Square to see Wuthering Heights at the cinema, a man fired a sawn-off shotgun at it, but missed. The man was soon arrested and the Duchess was not aware of the attack until she returned.
Christopher Duke Sandford born in Croydon.
Walter Forde's The Four Just Men - starring Hugh Sinclair, Griffith Jones, Francis L Sullivan, Frank Lawton and Anna Lee - premiered.
Members of the Hitler Youth were forbidden from eating ice cream cones. They were informed by their superiors that it was 'not in conformity with the dignity' of the uniform. James Gordon Reid born in Hamilton, Scotland.
Rachael Heyhoe Flint born in Wolverhampton. John Young Stewart born in Milton, Dunbartonshire.
An adaptation of Karel Capek's The Insect Play broadcast.
Michael Lionel Standing born in London.
Penelope Horner born in London. Peter Gordeno born in Rangoon, Burma.
Annette Christine Andreallo born in Sydney. Michael Alan Gothard born in London.
Hermann Lang of Germany won the Belgian Grand Prix at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps. British driver Dick Seaman crashed his car into a tree during lap twenty two. After the impact, the car caught fire, with the unconscious driver still inside. Seaman died a few hours later as a result of his burns.
England won the first of a three test series against The West Indies at Lord's by eight wickets. George Headley, with one hundred and six in the first innings and one hundred and seven in the second, became the first cricketer to make separate hundreds in a test at Lord's. It was the second time he had achieved this feat against England. Jeff Stollmeyer, on his test debut, made fifty nine out of one hundred and forty seven in West Indies' first innings and Bill Copson, also making his test debut, took five for eighty five. England's reply was based on one hundred and ninety six for Len Hutton. Hutton shared a fourth wicket partnership of two hundred and forty eight with Denis Compton, who made one hundred and twenty. With the whole of the final day to save the match, West Indies looked to be on course at one hundred and ninety for four, but lost their last six wickets for thirty five runs. Copson took four in the innings to finish with nine wickets in the match.
Leslie Fenton's Stronger Than Desire - starring Virginia Bruce, Walter Pidgeon and Rita Johnson and Bachelor Mother - starring Ginger Rogers and David Niven - premiered. George Formby's 'I'm The Husband Of The Wife Of Mister Wu'/'It's A Grand And Healthy Life' released.
The first World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon) opened in New York in conjunction with the World's Fair.
The Daily Telegraph began a campaign to give Winston Churchill a position in the British cabinet.
Leonard Sachs's adaptation of Luck Of The Devil broadcast.
Nicholas Phipps's Look Here! broadcast. Dick Burton won the Open Championship. Bobby Riggs defeated fellow American Elwood Cooke in the Men's Singles final at Wimbledon. The French comedy-drama The Rules of the Game directed by Jean Renoir premiered in Paris.
The Fame Of Grace Darling broadcast.
Len Harvey defeated Jock McAvoy at White City to win the British light heavyweight boxing title.
The first episode of It's That Man Again broadcast on The National Programme.
James Whale's The Man In The Iron Mask - starring Louis Hayward, Joan Bennett and Warren William and featuring the movie debut of Peter Cushing - premiered.
Hundreds of British troops joined the French in Bastille Day parades marking the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Storming of the Bastille. It was the first time that Britain and France held military demonstrations together since the World War.
Sir Oswald Mosley gave a speech in the Earls Court Exhibition Centre attended by over twenty thousand numbskulls. He presented a plan that he said would 'bring peace in our time and our children's time' that called for a 'hands-off' policy in Eastern Europe, disarmament in Western Europe, return of colonies to Germany and for the British Empire to concentrate on its own affairs. 'Why is it a moral duty to go to war if a German kicks a Jew across the Polish frontier?' Mosley declared. 'We are going, if the power lies within us ... to say that our generation and our children shall not die like rats in Polish holes.' Corin William Redgrave born in Marylebone.
A group of Royal Air Force bombers flew from London to Marseilles and back as a demonstration of British air power. It was not lost on the public that the distance was about the same as the distance from London to Berlin.
Mahatma Gandhi wrote directly to Adolf Hitler, addressing him as his 'friend' and requesting that Hitler refrain from starting a war 'which may reduce humanity to the savage state.' The letter never reached Hitler. Each Dawn I Die - starring James Cagney and George Rat - premiered.
During the reading of a bill designed to crush IRA activities, Home Secretary Samuel Hoare announced the police discovery of a document known as S-Plan. Hoare read excerpts from the document that included plans to sabotage aeroplane and munitions factories and damage supplies of water and electricity. Neville Chamberlain informed the House that the government had reached an agreement with Japan that 'the Japanese forces in China have special requirements for the purpose of safeguarding their own security and maintaining public order in regions under their control and that they have to suppress or remove any such acts or causes as will obstruct them or benefit their enemy.' The British government, Chamberlain explained, had 'no intention of countenancing any act or measures prejudicial to the attainment of the above-mentioned objects by Japanese forces.' Chamberlain denied opposition suggestions that Britain was now on the side of Japan in its war against China.
The second test at Old Trafford was drawn. Rain and bad light ruined the match, with only thirty five minutes play possible on the first day. Bertie Clarke's leg-spin and Rolph Grant's off-spin caused an England collapse to sixty two for five, but Joe Hardstaff made seventy six out of one hundred and eleven in one hundred minutes. England declared when Hardstaff was out with the thought that the pitch would get more difficult, but Grant made forty seven out with three sixes off Tom Goddard. On the morning of the last day, only George Headley, with fifty one, offered much resistance, Bill Bowes taking six for thirty three. The catch that Wally Hammond took to dismiss Headley in West Indies' second innings was his one hundredth in tests: the first non-wicketkeeper to achieve this.
The National Programme's Tunes Of The Town featured extracts from the one thousandth performance of Me & My Girl.
The Day Is Gone broadcast.
Peggy Barwell's adaptation of Prison Without Bars broadcast. Hildegarde Neil born in London.
Walter Forde's Cheer Boys Cheer - starring Nova Pilbeam, Edmund Gwenn, Jimmy O'Dea and Peter Coke - premiered.
Glenn Miller & His Orchestra recorded 'In the Mood'.
Albert Einstein signed a letter written by Leo Szilard addressed to Franklin Roosevelt, warning that Germany might develop an atomic weapon and suggesting the United States should start its own nuclear program. The letter would ultimately result in the Manhattan Project. William Wellman's Beau Geste - starring Gary Cooper, Ray Milland, Robert Preston, Brian Donlevy and Susan Hayward - premiered.
Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Spy In Black - starring Conrad Veidt and Valerie Hobson - premiered.
Hans Deppe's Das Ekel - starring Hans Moser - premiered.
Swedish businessman Birger Dahlerus arranged a meeting at his house in Schleswig-Holstein between his friend Hermann Göring and seven important British businessmen in an effort to avoid war. The meeting was affable and Dahlerus believed that an informal agreement was in place. Danzig rejected Polish demands, refusing to recognise untrained Polish officials as supervisors of Danzig customs. Susan Margery Jeaffreson Lloyd born in Aldeburgh.
Francesca Meredith Carroll born in Leicester.
John M Stahl's When Tomorrow Comes - starring Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer - premiered.
Oliver Robert Ford Davies born in Ealing.
The BBC's second adaptation of James Birdie's Tobias & The Angel broadcast.
Maurice Elvey's Sword Of Honour - starring Geoffrey Toone, Sally Gray, Dorothy Dickson and Wally Patch - premiered.
Indian troops arrived in Egypt to strengthen British forces there. U-boat commander Karl Dönitz received a coded instruction for his forces to put out to sea at once. Victor Fleming's adaptation of The Wizard Of Oz - starring Judy Garland - premiered at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood.
George McDonald born in San Fernando, Trinidad & Tobago. Carole Augusta Shelley born in London.
The Man They Could Not Hang - starring Boris Karloff - premiered. Anthony Valentine born in Blackburn.
The TV debuts of Nosmo King and Hubert in Cabaret. John Cromwell's In Name Only - starring Cary Grant, Carole Lombard and Kay Francis - premiered.
Hitler received a message from his ambassador in Moscow reporting that the Russians were prepared to meet with Joachim von Ribbentrop to negotiate a non-aggression pact. Hitler welcomed the news but wanted the date of von Ribbentrop's visit to be brought forward. A secret meeting of the Politburo was allegedly held in which Joseph Stalin outlined the strategy of the Soviet Union in the upcoming war. Stalin supposedly said that the war among the Western powers should go on as long as possible so all belligerents would be weakened, creating an ideal opportunity for Soviet expansion. Peter Edward Baker born in Lewisham.
Stalin agreed to Hitler's proposal to have von Ribbentrop come to Moscow on 23 August. Hitler, who was having dinner with Eva Braun and guests at the time the message arrived, allegedly pounded the table and exclaimed: 'I have them!' The Soviet Union informed the Anglo-French mission that no military pact was possible unless Poland consented to having the Red Army pass through its territory. Since this condition was not acceptable, the negotiations were called off. Charlie Chaplin delayed production on his new film, tentatively called The Dictators, due to the uncertainty of the situation in Europe.
The song 'You Are My Sunshine' was recorded for the first time, by The Pine Ridge Boys for Bluebird Records. The third test at The Oval was drawn. Debutant Tyrell Johnson took the wicket of Walter Keeton with his first delivery in test cricket, but Norman Oldfield made eighty on his first appearance for England and, with Hutton making seventy three and Hardstaff ninety four, England were all out for three hundred and fifty two before the end of the first day. Jeff Stollmeyer and George Headley both made fifties for West Indies in a cautious start on the second day, but then Vic Stollmeyer, making his test debut and Ken Weekes added one hundred and sixty three in one hundred minutes for the fifth wicket. Stollmeyer was out for ninety six but Weekes went on to one hundred and thirty seven. On the final morning, Learie Constantine hit seventy nine from the final ninety two balls of the innings. Len Hutton (an undefeated one hundred and sixty five) and Wally Hammond (one hundred and thirty eight) shared a third wicket partnership of two hundred and sixty four.
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact was signed. Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union agreed not to attack each other and to remain neutral if attacked by a third power. Secret clauses in the pact divided up other countries into respective spheres of influence, including a partitioning of Poland. John Cobb set a new land speed record of three hundred and sixty nine per hour at Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The record stood until 1947.
Hitler summoned the British Ambassador to Germany Sir Nevile Henderson and talked with him for about an hour. Hitler said it was 'necessary to solve the Polish question once and for all' and offered to make a pact with Britain guaranteeing the Empire's existence and potentially leading to an agreement on armaments limitation in the future. Five people were killed and seventy were injured by an IRA bomb explosion in Coventry. The Louvre was closed to the public (officially for 'repair work') so its art treasures could be packed up and transported to secret locations for safekeeping. John Michael Jones born in Brentford.
In a famous football match known in Poland as The Last Game, Poland defeated the highly renowned Hungarian team four-two.
The TV debut of eleven year old Bruce Forsyth on Come & Be Televised.
Roy William Neil's Murder Will Out - starring John Loder, Jane Baxter and Jack Hawkins - premiered.
John Robert Parker Ravenscroft born in Heswell, Merseyside. The fascist William Joyce and his wife, Margaret, fled to Germany. Joyce had reportedly been tipped off - most likely by his former friend Maxwell Knight, the head of MI5's M section - that the British authorities intended to detain him under the recently enacted Defence Regulation 18B.
The Royal Navy was mobilised and Army and Royal Air Force reserves were called up. Hitler issued Directive Number One, ordering an attack on Poland to begin the next day. In a false flag operation, Nazis posing as Poles seized the Gleiwitz radio station and broadcast an anti-German message in Polish. Peter Childs born in Eastbourne.
Germany invaded Poland. Operation Pied Piper, a four-day evacuation of children from major UK cities began. Blackouts were imposed across Britain. The army was officially mobilised and the BBC Home Service began broadcasting, replacing The National Programme. The first International Film Festival (the forerunner to the Cannes Film Festival) was supposed to open on this day, but it was postponed. The festival only screened a single film, The Hunchback Of Notre Dame. The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes - starring Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, George Zucco and Ida Lupino - premiered. Mary Jean Tomlin born in Detroit. Yorkshire won the cricket county championship for the third consecutive year. The final game of the season - a nine wicket victory over Sussex at Hove - would be the last first class match played in England until 1945. Playing in his last game before his death, in 1943, Hedley Verity took seven for nine in Sussex's second innings. Yorkshire were captained by Brian Sellers and had five batsmen who all scored more than one thousand championship runs: Len Hutton (two thousand one hundred and sixty seven), Wilf Barber (thirteen hundred and eighty eight), Herbert Sutcliffe (twelve hundred and thirty), Maurice Leyland (eleven hunred and ninety one) and Arthur Mitchell (one thousand and eighty seven). The bowling depended on Verity (one hundred and sixty five wickets), Ellis Robinson (one hundred and two) and Bill Bowes (ninety six). Runners-up Middlesex were well served by Bill Edrich (nineteen hundred and forty eight runs), Denis Compton (eighteen hundred and fifty three) and Jack Robertson (fifteen hundred and sixty two). Wicket-keeper Fred Price had an outstanding season with fifty three catches and twenty stumpings. Middlesex relied heavily on its two main bowlers Jim Sims (one hundred and forty two wickets) and Jim Smith (eighty four). Gloucestershire finished third under England captain Wally Hammond who scored two thousand one hundred and twenty one championship runs. Other performers for Gloucestershire included batsmen Charlie Barnett, Jack Crapp and George Emmett, seam bowler Colin Scott and the outstanding Tom Goddard who was the championship's leading wicket-taker with one hundred and eighty one wickets. Essex finished fourth. Noted batsmen at other counties included John Langridge (Sussex), Les Ames (Kent), Joe Hardstaff Jr (Nottinghamshire), Arthur Fagg (Kent), Eddie Paynter (Lancashire), Harold Gimblett (Somerset) and Laurie Fishlock (Surrey) who all made more than seventeen hundred runs. Walter Keeton of Nottinghamshire was recognised by Wisden as one of its Five Cricketers of the Year after he scored an undefeated three hundred and twelve against Middlesex, the highest individual score of the season. The German nuclear weapons programme, known as Uranverein, was formed. The Heereswaffenamt had squeezed the Reichsforschungsrat out of the Reichserziehungsministerium (the Reich Ministry of Education) and started the formal German nuclear energy project under military auspices. The project had its first meeting on 16 September, organized by Kurt Diebner and held in Berlin. The invitees included Walther Bothe, Siegfried Flügge, Hans Geiger, Otto Hahn, Paul Harteck, Gerhard Hoffmann, Josef Mattauch and Georg Stetter. A second meeting was held soon thereafter and included Werner Heisenberg, Klaus Clusius, Robert Döpel and Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker.
The Football Association suspended (and, subsequently cancelled) the 1939-40 season after just three games when the government legislated that large crowd gatherings were to be suppressed with the implementation of the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act. A few minor leagues, such as the Northern League, did manage to complete a season, but more than half of the teams were unable to fulfil their fixtures. Many footballers joined the armed forces and, as a result, teams were depleted and fielded guest players in regional league competitions. The FA Cup was resumed in 1946 and The Football League for the 1946–47 season. In the final games before war, Arsenal beat Sunderland five-two at Highbury with Ted Drake scoring four, Blackpool defeated Wolverhampton Wanderers, Charlton Athletic won two-nil against Manchester United and Liverpool beat Chelsea. In the Second Division, Newcastle United hammered Swansea Town eight-one (Ray Bowden scored a hat-trick and Tommy Pearson two), Tottenham Hotspur won four-three at West Bromwich Albion and Coventry City won four-two at home to Barnsley. Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic scored ten against Northampton in the Third Division South whilst, in the Third Division North, there were wins for the likes of Accrington Stanley, Carlisle United, Lincoln City (four-three against Gateshead) and New Brighton (who beat Doncaster Rovers four-two). Glasgow Rangers, Glasgow Celtic, Falkirk and Kilmarnock all won in the Scottish First Division where there were also big victories for Ayr United (six-one against Hamilton Academicals), Albion Rovers (five-three at Hibernain), Heart of Midlothian (four-two at Motherwell) and Saint Mirren. The Preliminary Round of the - never completed - FA Cup was also played, with Woking winning twelve-nil at Egham and Wealdstone defeating Old Johnians seven-three. Leeds United's one-nil defeat at home to Sheffield United in the First Division saw the debut of Jim Milburn, the first of three hundred and ten appearances for Leeds and Bradford Park Avenue in a (war-interrupted) career that lasted until 1955.
Britain and France declared war on Germany. Neville Chamberlain announced on BBC Radio that Britain and Germany were at war at 11.15am. The BBC Television Service was suspended, about twenty minutes after the conclusion of the Mickey Mouse cartoon Mickey's Gala Première, amid fears that the Alexandra Palace VHF transmissions could act as guidance beacons for enemy bombers attempting to locate Central London. As a consequence, the rest of the war continued in sound only.
Winston Churchill accepted Chamberlain's offer to join his war cabinet as First Lord of the Admiralty. In the first British offensive action of the war, the Royal Air Force launch a raid on the German fleet in the Heligoland Bight. They targeted the German pocket-battleship Admiral Scheer anchored off Wilhelmshaven at the Western end of the Kiel Canal. Several aircraft were lost in the attack and, although the German vessel was hit three times, all of the bombs failed to explode. George Formby's 'Dan, The Dairy Man'/'The Blue-Eyed Blonde Next Door' released.
Goerge Robert Lazenby born in Goulburn, New South Wales. The United States officially declared neutrality in the European war. Which was really helpful. Golden Boy - starring Barbara Stanwyck and William Holden - premiered. Geraldine Moffat born in Nottingham.
A 'friendly fire' incident known as the Battle of Barking Creek claimed the first life of an RAF fighter pilot in the war. Everything's On Ice - starring Lynne Roberts, Edgar Kennedy and Irene Dare - premiered. Suzanne Neve born in London.
German troops reached the suburbs of Warsaw and the siege of the city began.
The Glenn Miller and Ray Eberle version of 'Over the Rainbow' topped the Your Hit Parade chart. The French Saar Offensive stalled at the heavily mined Warndt Forest.
Off the coast of Norway, the submarine HMS Oxley was mistaken for an enemy by HMS Triton and sunk. There were only two survivors.
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor returned to England from self-imposed exile in France. General Gamelin orders to halt to the Saar Offensive into Germany after having taken only a handful of villages.
The German submarine U-39 attacked HMS Ark Royal off Rockall, but the torpedoes fell short of their target. Three British destroyers in the vicinity hunted down U-39 and disabled it with depth charges, rescuing all the crew. It was the first U-boat to be sunk in World War II.
Busby Berkeley's Babes In Arms - starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland - and The Rains Came - starring Myrna Loy and Tyrone Power - premiered.
The aircraft carrier HMS Courageous was torpedoed and sunk by U-29 on patrol off the coast of Ireland. The Soviet Union invaded Poland, occupying the territory East of the Curzon Line.
William Joyce began making English-language propaganda broadcasts over German radio to England. He would earn the nickname Lord Haw-Haw.
Gregory Ratoff's Intermezzo - starring Leslie Howard and Ingrid Bergman - and Herbert Wilcox's Nurse Edith Cavell - starring Anna Neagle - premiered.
Wolverhamton Wanderers' five-three victory over West Bromwich Albion in a wartime friendly saw the club debut of Billy Wright, although his official first class debut wouldn't come until 1946 - the first of five hundred and forty one games for Wolves in a career that lasted until 1959.
The Luftwaffe bombed Warsaw for the first time, reducing entire streets to rubble and causing widespread fires. The British government considered the bombing a breach of the pledge Germany made at the start of the war to refrain from 'indiscriminate attacks.' Roger Middleton born in Sheffield.
Eric Tomlinson born in Bispham, Lancashire.
In the first offensive operations by the German Army in Western Europe, guns on the Siegfried Line opened up on villages behind the French Maginot line. Chancellor Sir John Simon introduced an emergency war budget raising income tax, inheritance tax, profits tax and duties on alcohol, sugar and tobacco. Even with this new tax revenue Britain still faced a deficit of nine hundred and thirty eight million smackers.
Rudolph Malcolm Walker born in Trinidad. The Siege of Warsaw ended after twenty days when the Polish garrison capitulated to the Germans.
Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory - starring Gary Cooper, David Niven and Andrea Leeds - premiered. Rear Admiral John Godfrey, Director of Naval Intelligence, circulated a memorandum which, according to the historian Ben MacIntyre, 'bore all the hallmarks of [Godfrey's personal assistant] Lieutenant Commander Ian Fleming.' The Trout Memo compared the deception of an enemy in wartime to fly fishing and contained several schemes to be considered for use against the Axis powers to lure U-boats and German surface ships towards minefields. Item Twenty Eight was an scheme to plant misleading papers on a corpse which would be found by the enemy; the suggestion was similar to Operation Mincemeat, the 1943 plan to conceal the intended invasion of Italy from North Africa, which was developed by Charles Cholmondoley in October 1942.
The German pocket-battleship Admiral Graf Spee sank its first merchant ship, the British freighter Clement off the coast of Pernambuco, Brazil.
First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill gave a radio address reviewing the first month of the war. During this broadcast he described the Soviet Union as 'a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.' Geoffrey Whitehead born in Sheffield.
Timothy Carlton Congdon Cumberbatch born in Oxford.
Adolf In Blunderland - 'A Political Parody written by Max Kester and James Dyrenforth, music written and arranged by Max Saunders' - broadcast on The Home Service. Meanwhile, the actual Adolf addressed a special session of the Reichstag. After speaking at length about the victory over Poland he then proposed an international security conference, hinting at desire for an armistice by saying that such a conference would be impossible 'while cannons are thundering.' Britain and France rejected these overtures and the uneventful phase of the war known as The Phoney War would drag on until May 1940. Melvyn Bragg born in Carlisle. Eric C Kenton's Everything's On Ice - starring Irene Dare, Edgar Kennedy, Roscoe Karns and Lynee Roberts - premiered.
The British Expeditionary Force completed its crossing to France. Vivian Leopold James born in Kogarah, New South Wales.
Germany issued orders (Case Yellow) to prepare for the invasion of Belgium, France, Luxembourg and The Netherlands.
German submarine U-40 struck a mine and sank in the English Channel. U-42 was sunk Southwest of Ireland by depth charges from the destroyers Imogen and Ilex. H Robinson Cleaver At The Organ and F Buckley Hargreaves' These Days In The North broadcast.
The battleship HMS Royal Oak was sunk in Scapa Flow harbour by U-47, under the command of Günther Prien. The first episode of Somewhere In England broadcast.
Nine planes of the Luftwaffe conducted an air-raid on the Firth of Forth, damaging three British ships and killing sixteen Royal Navy crew before Spitfires of Six Zero Three Squadron arrived and shot down three of the enemy aircraft, the first to be downed over British territory.
Reinhard Heydrich issued a decree - commonly referred to as the Festsetzungserlaß - prohibiting all Romani from changing their registered place of residence. At the first big wartime variety concert organised by ENSA, which was broadcast by the BBC from RAF Hendon, Adelaide Hall performed 'We're We're Going To Hang Out The Washing On The Siegfried Line' accompanied by Mantovani & His Orchestra. Frank Capra's Mister Smith Goes To Washington - starring James Stewart and Jean Arthur - premiered.
Because her daughter, aged nineteen, wore slacks, a Liverpool mother, assisted by the girl's sisters, held her down over a table and caned her, the Daily Mirror reported. The mother described the punishment in detail in a letter to the Richmond Women Conservatives, who, at a recent meeting, described the wearing of slacks by women as 'disgusting.' 'I have three daughters and my second, aged nineteen, bought a pair of so-called slacks,' the mother said. 'Both her sisters and myself protested strongly at the exhibition she made of herself. The neighbours were passing comments. My other two girls and myself talked it over and I bought a long cane of the "swishing" variety. One evening we forced her over the kitchen table till her slacks were skin tight and each one in turn gave her a sound smacking with the open palm. I weigh thirteen stone, so you may know she felt it. Then I gave her a dozen strokes of the cane across the tightest part. I took my time and laid them on well, and told her it would happen daily if she still persisted in wearing them.'
Walter Summers' The Dark Eyes Of London - starring Béla Lugosi, Hugh Williams, Greta Gynt and Edmon Ryan - premiered.
The first episode of The Music Goes Round - presented by Roy Speer - broadcast. At The Circus - staring The Marx Brothers - premiered. George Ian Cullen born in West Boldon.
The first episode of Kipling's Just So Stories and Major WH Osman's The Pigeon Goes To War broadcast.
The Roaring Twenties - starring James Cagney, Priscilla Lane, Humphrey Bogart and Gladys George - premiered. Including probably the longest death-scene in movie history. 'This is Eddie Bartlett ... He used to be a big shot.'
John Marwood Cleese born in Weston-Super-Mere.
Heinrich Himmler issued a secret directive to the SS and police encouraging them to procreate with women of 'good blood', even outside of marriage, 'to regenerate life for Germany.' The directive explained that the SS would support all mothers of children of good blood regardless of legitimacy, so no father would need to be concerned about creating a burden for them.
Patricia Docksey's Cullercoats broadcast.
West of the Orkney Islands, the German submarine U-56 encountered the battleship HMS Nelson with Winston Churchill aboard. U-56 fired three torpedoes all of which failed to explode. The U-boat's commander Wilhelm Zahn became known as 'the man who almost killed Churchill.' Grace Barnett Wing born in Highland, Illinois.
Thomas Patrick O'Connor born in Bootle, Liverpool.
Parts of Poland, including the Danzig Corridor, were annexed by Germany. The Soviet Union annexed the Eastern parts of occupied Poland to Ukraine and Belorussia.
Thorold Dickinson's The Arsenal Stadium Mystery - starring Leslie Banks, Greta Gynt, Ian McLean, Liane Linden, Anthony Bushell, Esmond Knight and George Allison - premiered.
US Congress amended the Neutrality Act of 1937, repealing the embargo on arms to belligerents but placing sales on a cash and carry basis to avoid a repeat of the situation after World War I when Britain and France ran into difficulty with making their war debt payments to the United States. John Ford's Drums Along the Mohawk - starring Claudette Colbert and Henry Fonda - and The Flying Deuces - starring Laurel and Hardy - premiered. The Alexander Korda-produced RAF movie The Lion Has Wings - directed by, among others, Michael Powell and rushed through production after the outbreak of war - premiered in the UK. Fats Waller's recording of 'Your Feet's Too Big' released.
Hitler escaped a bomb blast in the Munich Bürgerbräukeller where he was speaking on the anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923. Carpenter Johann Georg Elser was arrested with incriminating documents at the Swiss border and brought back to Munich for interrogation. His attempt to assassinate Hitler would have succeeded if the Führer's annual speech had not begun thirty minutes earlier than it did in previous years. Meg Wynn Owen born in Wales. Sylvia Ann Butterfield born in Leeds.
Ernst Lubitsch's Ninotchka - starring Greta Garbo - premiered.
The first episode of The Shadow Of The Swastika broadcast on The Home Service. Henry Koster's First Love - starring Deanna Durbin - premiered.
Queen Elizabeth made a broadcast to the women of the British Empire reminding them that in the war 'we, no less than men, have real and vital work to do.' Although Britain did not hold an official Armistice Day ceremony at the Whitehall Cenotaph, wreaths were laid on behalf of the King and Queen and people still came to leave flowers. There was no official two minutes' silence, but most Britons publicly observed it anyway. Michael Curtiz's The Private Lives Of Elizabeth & Essex - starring Bette Davis, Errol Flynn, Olivia De Havilland and Vincent Price - premiered.
British soil was bombed by the Germans for the first time, in the Shetland Islands. No casualties were inflicted. HMS Blanche was sunk by a mine in the Thames Estuary, the first British destroyer lost to enemy action in the war.
The first British civilian casualty of the war occurred when a German bomber killed James Isbister in an air raid on Orkney. Al Capone was released from federal custody after serving seven-and-a-half years of his eleven-year sentence for tax evasion. Capone was suffering heavily from paresis and upon release he immediately went to a Baltimore hospital for treatment. Aaron's Field, 'a morality play for the eve of war, by DG Bridson' broadcast.
Tower Of London - starring Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff and Vincent Price - premiered.
Margaret Eleanor Atwood born in Ottawa. Ian McCulloch born in Glasgow.
DC Comics published Flash Comics issue one, featuring the first appearances of the superheroes The Flash and Hawkman.
The Official Secrets Act 1939 received Royal Assent in the United Kingdom, revising the Act of 1920.
Imperial Airways and British Airways Ltd. merged to form British Overseas Airways Corporation.
Shelagh Delaney born in Salford.
Twelve Bristol Blenheims of the Royal Air Force conducted a bombing raid on the German seaplane base at Borkum. Little damage was done but all the British aircraft returned safely. The British government ceremonially turned over Magna Carta to the Library of Congress for safekeeping during the war. The Thirteenth Century document had been brought to the United States for display during the New York World's Fair and it was deemed too dangerous to ship it back during wartime. In case she died in vain, obviously.
The German submarine U-35 surfaced and surrendered near the Shetland Islands after being disabled by depth charges from the destroyers HMS Icarus, Kashmir and Kingston.
The Soviet Union attacked Finland in what would become known as The Winter War.
Vickers Wellington bombers raided German warships at Heligoland. A German anti-aircraft battery was hit, probably the first British bomb of the war to land on German soil.
Off the coast of Uruguay, the captain of the German passenger steamer Ussukuma decided to scuttle the ship when it was intercepted by the cruiser Ajax. The Ajax rescued the crew of the Ussukuma and interned them as enemy civilians.
Twenty Three Years Ago, presented by David Lloyd George, broadcast.
Jennie Lindon born in Worthing.
The Battle of the River Plate took place followed, three days later, by the sinking of the Graf Spee, scuttled in neutral waters off Uruguay. Eric William Flynn born in Hainan Island, China.
Gone with the Wind - starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Leslie Howard and Olivia de Havilland - premiered at Loew's Grand Theatre in Atlanta. Yvonne-Thérèse-Marie-Camille Bédat de Monlaur born in Pau, France.
Edward James Kendrick born in Union Springs, Alabama.
Michael John Moorcock born in London.
George Formby recorded 'Imagine Me On The Maginot Line' and 'Mister Wu's A Window Cleaner Now' for Regal Zonophone Records.
The animated Gulliver's Travels premiered.
The Crime Wave At Blandings broadcast on The Home Service.
His Majesty The King's Christmas Message To The Empire broadcast, concluding with a moving quotation from Minnie Louise Haskins' poem God Knows ('I said to the man who stood at the Gate of the Year, "Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown"'). The Soldier Sings broadcast.
The Butterfly That Stamped broadcast on The Home Service. The first Royal Australian Air Force squadron, Number Ten Squadron RAAF, arrived in Britain. Phillip Harvey Spector born in New York.
The first Indian troops arrived in France to join the British & Commonwealth Expeditionary Force. The first episode of John Dickson Carr's Who Killed Matthew Corbin? broadcast on The Home Service.
The Minister of Food, William Morrison, announced that starting 8 January, rationing would be expanded to include butter, bacon, ham and sugar. The German submarine U-30 spotted the British battleship HMS Barnham West of the Butt of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides and hit it with a torpedo. Four crew members were killed but the Barham was able to make it back to Liverpool where it underwent six months of repairs.
A Testement Of Beauty, compiled by Moray McLaren and Val Gielgud, broadcast. William Dieterle's adaptation of The Hunchback of Notre Dame - starring Charles Laughton, Sir Cedric Hardwicke and Maureen O'Hara - and George Marshall's Destry Rides Again - starring Marlene Dietrich and James Stewart - premiered.
Lewis Milestone's adaptation of John Steinbeck's Of Mice & Men - starring Burgess Meredith, Betty Field and Lon Chaney Jnr - premiered. The Temptation Of Samuel Burge broadcast.
The German Propaganda Minister Doctor Goebbels (who had none at all) made a radio address reviewing the 'official' Nazi version of the events of 1939. No predictions were made for 1940 other than saying that the next year 'will be a hard year and we must be ready for it.'
A Happy New Year and Calling All Dogs broadcast on The National Programme.
The first episode of Eric Gillett reading of War & Peace.
The second test at Cape Town was drawn. England's five hundred and fifty nine for nine included centuries for Wally Hammond, Les Ames and Bryan Valentine.
A new Reich Chancellery designed by Albert Speer was inaugurated on the Voßstraße in Berlin. Susannah Yolande Fletcher born in Chelsea.
JB Priestley's Bees On The Boat-Deck - starring Ralph Richardson - broadcast. Two schoolboys of thirteen were caned for playing truant but said it 'was worth it,' because they had travelled sixty-five miles in an open railway truck, then did the return journey in a passenger train. The adventure of the boys - Charlie Parsley and Ronnie Parsons, of Wood Green - began when they saw the film Crime School, in which 'The Dead End Kids' stowed away on a train. On their first day back at school after the Christmas holidays at lunch-time the pair decided to do a bunk. Near New Barnet they clambered into an empty truck of a stationary goods train. 'At last the train stopped. We argued and then decided to get out,' said Charlie. 'We walked along the line and came to a station. A porter told us we were at Holme, Huntingdonshire. The station-master gave us tea and cakes. Then he put us in a train for London. At school we got four strokes of the cane, but it was worth it.'
The casting of Vivien Leigh to play Scarlett O'Hara in the film adaptation of Gone With The Wind was announced. Son Of Frankenstein - starring Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff, Lionel Atwell and Bela Lugosi - premiered. A British delegation led by Neville Chamberlain met Pope Pius XI. The pope talked of the resistance democracies must make against the dangerous regimes of the world, as well as racial persecution and the need to help refugees. George Formby's 'Little Wooden Toolshed In The Garden'/'Frigid Air Fanny' released.
King Of The Underworld - starring Humphrey Bogart and Kay Francis - premiered. Barbara Ewing born in Carterton, New Zealand.
Lionel Brown's Square Pegs broadcast. Three early morning bomb explosions occurred in the London suburbs, one of them knocking out a power station that affected twenty five thousand people. These were the first of the S-Plan bombings conducted by the Irish Republican Army.
Paul Willis Grist born in Glamorgan.
England won the third test at Durban by an innings and thirteen runs. Eddie Paynter scored two hundred and forty three and Wally Hammond one hundred and twenty in England's four hundred and sixty nine for four. Ken Farnes took seven wickets as England twice bowled out the hosts.
Gunga Din starring Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen and Douglas Fairbanks Junior premiered in Los Angeles.
Stafford Cripps was expelled from the Labour Party for advocating the creation of a Popular Front. Angela Margaret Leslie Thorne born in Karachi.
The first radio adaptation of Harry Blyth's Sexton Blake stories - featuring George Curzon in the title role - broadcast on The National Programme as part of the Lucky Dip strand. Horace Heidt & His Musical Knights' recording of 'Little Sir Echo' released.
Germaine Greer born in Melbourne.
Money For Jam broadcast.
Reginald Arkell's 1066 & All That broadcast.
John Ford's Stagecoach - with John Wayne in his first starring role - premiered.
Janet Suzman born in Johannesburg.
Peter John Purves born in Preston.
Norman Lee's Murder In Soho - starring Jack La Rue, Sandra Storme, Bernard Lee, Martin Walker, James Hayter and Googie Withers - premiered.
The fourth test at Johannesburg was drawn. Len Hutton top-scored for England with ninety two.
During the Catalonia Offensive, the Spanish Nationalists took Girona.
Gardner Davies's adaptation of Gas Light broadcast.
James Birdie's The Anatomist broadcast.The Home Office announced plans to provide shelters to thousands of homes in districts most likely to be bombed in the event of war. The steel shelters, nicknamed Anderson Shelters after Lord Privy Seal Sir John Anderson were designed so that two unskilled people could erect them. Robert Johnson's 'Love In Vain Blues'/'Preachin' Blues (Up Jumped the Devil)' released in the US.
Peter John Purves born in Preston.
Raymond Daniel Manzarek born in Chicago.
John Ford's Stagecoach - starring Claire Trevor and John Wayne in his breakthrough role - premiered.
Wolverhampton Wanderers four-one victory over Leeds United saw the club debut of Jimmy Mullen - the first of four hundred and eighty six games for Wolves in a career that lasted until 1960. Susan Travers born in London.
Gwendoline Allsop born in Crich, Derbyshire.
Jonathan Hugh Gascoyne-Cecil born in London.
The Academy Awards were held in Los Angeles. You Can't Take It With You won Best Picture. The first pay-per-view sporting event in history took place when a live BBC broadcast of a boxing match between Eric Boon and Arthur Danahar was also shown at three London cinemas. Only about twenty thousand London households had television sets and the crowds at the cinemas were packed.
Lionel Brown's Square Pegs - starring James Mason - broadcast.
A book titled The Strange Death Of Adolf Hitler was published in the United States, immediately drawing worldwide attention. Written anonymously, the book claimed that high officials within the Nazi Party assassinated Hitler the night before the Munich Conference by arranging for his omelette to be poisoned. The book claimed that Hitler was now being impersonated by body doubles. Hugh Thornton Walters born in Mexborough.
Lloyd Bacon's The Oklahoma Kid - starring James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart - premiered.
REJ Brooke's Condemned To Be Shot broadcast.
Ian Hay's Little Ladyship broadcast, featuring the TV début of Joan Greenwood. Victoria Louise Samantha Marie Elizabeth Therese Eggar born in Hampstead.
Jonathan Newth born in Devon.
Michael Wearing born in Southport.
The fifth test at Durban was drawn. The match, which began on 3 March lasted for ten days and only ended because the England team had to catch the boat home. Nineteen hundred and eighty one runs were scored in the match (still a test record) with hundreds from Pieter Van Der Bijl, Dudley Nourse and Alan Meville for South Africa and Paul Gibbs, Wally Hammond and Bill Edrich (two hundred and nineteen) for England. England were still forty one runs short of their target of six hundred and ninety six with five wickets standing. Reg Perks made his test debut and took five wickets in South Africa's first innings.
The Nazis marched unopposed into Czechoslovakia.
Neville Chamberlain made a speech in Birmingham condemning Hitler for breaking the word he gave at the Munich Conference and warning that Britain would resist any further territorial expansion by Germany.
Piers Inigo Haggard born in London.
Michael Powell's 1937 movie The Edge Of The World - starring Niall MacGinnis, John Laurie and Belle Chrystall - first shown on TV. Christine Hargreaves born in Salford.
Workman won the Grand National. William Wyler's Wuthering Heights starring - Merle Oberon, Laurence Olivier, David Niven and Geraldine Fitzgerald, Henry Koster's Three Smart Girls Grow Up - starring Deanna Durbin, Nan Grey and Helen Parrish and Cenek Slégl's Venoušek A Stázička - starring Vera Ferbasová and Eva Gérová - premiered.
Robin Hawdon born in Newcastle Upon Tyne.
Lilian Ridgway born in Urmston, Lancashire.
Magyar Melody broadcast. The Nationalists launched the final offensive of the Spanish Civil War.
The three-year Siege of Madrid ended with the Nationalist capture of the city.
John C Wood born in Bristol.
Sidney Lanfield's The Hound Of The Baskervilles - starring Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, Richard Greene and Wendy Barrie - premiered.
Lead Belly began a series of recordings in New York which would later be released as the LP Negro Sinful Songs. The recordings included 'Looky, Looky, Yonder', 'Black Betty', Ain't Gonna Go Down To The Well No Mo' and 'The Gallis Pole'.
Marvin Pentz Gay Junior born in Washington DC.
George King's The Face At The Window - starring Tod Slaughter, Marjorie Taylor and John Warwick - premiered.
Glenn Miller & His Orchestra recorded 'Moonlight Serenade'. Hugh Masekela born in Witbank, South Africa.
Britain's largest aircraft carrier, HMS Illustrious, was launched at Barrow-in-Furness.
Britain and France agreed on a mutual assistance pact with Poland, pledging to come to Poland's aid in the event of a German attack.
David Paradine Frost born in Tenterden, Kent. Francis Ford Coppola born in Detroit. The Italian invasion of Albania began. The Albanians offered little resistance. King Zog fled Albania to Greece as Italian forces entered Tirana. Leo McCarey's Love Affair - starring Ireme Dunne and Charles Boyer and Leigh Jason's The Flying Irishman premiered.
The game of darts was banned in Glasgow pubs for being 'too dangerous.'
The John Steinbeck novel The Grapes of Wrath was published. Valerie Lilley born in Larne.
England beat Scotland two-one in the Home International championship at Hampden Park. Tommy Lawton scored the winner after earlier setting up a goal for debutant Pat Beasley of Huddersfield town. Preston's Jimmy Dougal scored on his first appearance for the hosts. First Division leaders Everton (without Mercer and Lawton) drew nil-nil with Preston North end (without Dougal and Bill Shankly).thirty one listed nations (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belgium, Great Britain and Ireland, France, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Poland, Hungary, Rumania, Yugoslavia, Russia, Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey, Iraq, the Arabias, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and Iran) would not be attacked. Hitler's response, two weeks later, was to mock Roosevelt's message with sarcasm and reply that the fear of war was caused by press speculation. With two years, Hilter on his own, had attacked thirteen of them.
Mary Isobel Catherine Bernadette O'Brien born in West Hampstead.
Disgraceful old Nazi stinker Adolf Hitler's fiftieth birthday was celebrated - with much pompous and faintly ridiculous goosestepping and 'seig-heiling' - as a national holiday throughout Germany. Dignitaries from twenty three countries attended the celebrations although official representatives from Great Britain, France and the United States were conspicuous by their absence. Nevertheless, three high-ranking members of British society did attend; Walter John Montagu Douglas Scott, the Eighth Duke of Buccleuch, Lord Stewart of the Royal Household and brother-in law of the Duke of Gloucester was one. Arthur Ronald Nall-Cain, former Tory MP for Liverpool Wavertree before inheriting his father's title as the Second Baron Brocket was another. And Major General John Bonny Fuller, one of the most decorated British Army officers and a celebrated military strategic (as well as being a close personal friend of General William Ironside, the Inspector General of Britain's Overseas Forces) was also there. None of whom, obviously, were complete and total fascist scum or anything even remotely like it, just to make that very clear. Billie Holiday recorded 'Strange Fruit' in New York. Raymond Michael Brooks born in Brighton.
Dark Victory - starring Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart and Ronald Reagan - premiered. Ann Mitchell born in Stpney.
Gallipoli broadcast on The National Programme.
Juarez - starring Paul Muni and Bette Davis - premiered.
Marina Martin born in London.
The government announced that 'due to international events,' a bill would be introduced in parliament introducing military conscription for all males aged twenty and twenty one.
Portsmouth beat Wolverhampton Wanderers four-one in the last FA Cup final before the outbreak of war. Carol Reed's A Girl Must Live - starring Margaret Lockwood, Renée Houston, Lilli Palmer and Hugh Sinclair - premiered.
The 1939 New York World's Fair opened. NBC inaugurated its first television broadcast with coverage of President Roosevelt at the event.
In a notable television first, the BBC's mobile unit broadcast an entire performance of Me & My Girl - starring Lupino Lane - live from the Victoria Palace. AP Herbert's Two Gentlemen Of Soho broadcast.
Peter Dean born in Hoxton, East London.
Finnegans Wake by James Joyce was published. Joyce began working on Finnegans Wake shortly after the 1922 publication of Ulysses. By 1924 instalments of Joyce's new work began to appear, in serialised form, in Parisian literary journals The Transatlantic Review and transition (sic), under the title 'fragments from Work in Progress.' Joyce invented a unique polyglot-language or idioglossia solely for the purpose of this work. This language is composed of composite words from some sixty to seventy world languages, combined to form puns, or portmanteau words and phrases intended to convey several layers of meaning at once. Initial reaction to Finnegans Wake, both in its serialised and final published form, was largely negative, ranging from bafflement at its radical reworking of the English language to open hostility. Even close friends and family were disapproving of Joyce's seemingly impenetrable text, with Joyce's brother Stanislaus 'rebuk[ing] him for writing an incomprehensible night-book,' and former friend Oliver Gogarty believing the book to be a joke, pulled by Joyce on the literary community, referring to it as 'the most colossal leg-pull in literature since Macpherson's Ossian.' When Ezra Pound, a former champion of Joyce's and admirer of Ulysses, was asked his opinion on the text, he wrote 'Nothing so far as I make out, nothing short of divine vision or a new cure for the clap can possibly be worth all the circumambient peripherization.' HG Wells, in a personal letter to Joyce, argued that 'you have turned your back on common men, on their elementary needs and their restricted time and intelligence [...] I ask: who the hell is this Joyce who demands so many waking hours of the few thousands I have still to live for a proper appreciation of his quirks and fancies and flashes of rendering?' Even Joyce's patron Harriett Weaver wrote to him in 1927 to inform him of her misgivings regarding his new work, stating 'I am made in such a way that I do not care much for the output from your Wholesale Safety Pun Factory nor for the darknesses and unintelligibilities of your deliberately entangled language system. It seems to me you are wasting your genius.' The wider literary community were equally disparaging, with DH Lawrence declaring in a letter to Maria and Aldous Huxley, having read sections in transition, 'My God, what a clumsy olla putrida James Joyce is! Nothing but old fags and cabbage-stumps of quotations from the Bible and the rest, stewed in the juice of deliberate journalistic dirty-mindedness – what old and hard-worked staleness, masquerading as the all-new!' Vladimir Nabokov, who had also admired Ulysses, described Finnegans Wake as 'nothing but a formless and dull mass of phony folklore, a cold pudding of a book, a persistent snore in the next room [...] and only the infrequent snatches of heavenly intonations redeem it from utter insipidity.' Modern critics tend to regard the work as a genuine, twenty four carat masterpiece. Albeit, one that is easier to both enjoy and understand if one is reading it whilst stoned off ones tits.
Cecil B DeMille's Union Pacific - staring Barbara Stanwyck - premiered. Alison Patricia Seebohm born in Luton.
Everton won the First Division title despite losing their final game three-nil at Grimsby. Wolverhampton Wanderers finished second. Confessions Of A Nazi Spy - starring Edward G Robinson - premiered.
Jimmy Lee Ruffin born in Collinsville, Mississippi.
The first published appearance of Batman in Detective Comics issue twenty seven.
The Henry Miller novel Tropic Of Capricorn was released in France. It was banned in the United States until 1961.
The first episode of Danger! Men At Work! broadcast. The first episode of RF Delderfield's Cocklemouth Comet broadcast on The Regional Programme.
Harvey Keitel born in New York. England drew two-two with Italy in a 'friendly' international at the San Siro in Milan. Tommy Lawton and Willis Hall scored for the visitors with Amedeo Biavati of Bologna and Lazio's Silvio Piola replying. In the midst of the obvious path to war in Europe, Stanley Rous visited Robert Vansittart, the Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office to seek advice regarding England's forthcoming summer tour of Europe. 'When?' asked Vansittart. 'End of May!' was the reply. 'In that case it will be all right' responded Vansittart. 'It is August which will be the danger month.' Once more (although far less infamously than Berlin the previous year), the Fascist salute was given by a highly pissed-off England team, both before and after the match which was watched by Signor Mussolini's sons, Vittorio and Bruno and his nephew, Vito. Sixteen-year-old housemaid, Winifred Higgs was killed when St Cyprian's School for boys at Eastbourne burned down in the early hours. All of the pupils escaped, but the cook and housemaids bacame trapped on the top floor. The cook climed onto the roof where she was rescued by firemen and several maids escaped down the fire escape, but Miss Higgs fell onto a flat roof and died from her injuries.
George More O'Ferrall's adaptation of Sun Up broadcast.
Goodbye, Mister Chips - starring Robert Donat and Greer Garsonm, Alfred Hitchcock's adaptation of Jamaica Inn - starring Charles Laughton, Maureen O'Hara, Leslie Banks and Robert Newton, George Nichols' Man Of Conquest and Howard Hawks's Only Angels Have Wings - starring Cary Grant and Jean Arthur - premiered.
England lost two-one to Yugoslavia in a friendly international in Belgrade. Frank Broome scored for the visitors. Political differences between the Croats and the Serbs had spread to sport and the Croat Football Association on 17 May, had ordered all players under its jurisdiction not to play in international matches for Yugoslavia. Seven of the home side, therefore, came from the Beogradski SK club whilst three more played for SK Jugoslavija. Eddie Hapgood had torn his ankle ligaments in the melee that preceded the first Yugoslav goal. Nevertheless, he played on for the following seventy minutes. A labourer, George Willis, was acquitted of the murder of eighty five-year-old Frederick Paul. The old man had been shot and then his body dragged into a pond. Circumstantial evidence convinced the police that Willis was the murderer and that robbery had been his motive, but an elaborate demonstration at Reading Assizes of Willis using a pair of tweezers that Paul's son had said belonged to his father, to extract screws from a watch, was enough to convince the jury that he was not guilty of anything except being handy with tweezers.
Edward Poor Montgomery's For Those In Peril broadcast. Nancy Kwan Ka-shen born in Hong Kong. William Fox born in London.
You Can't Get Away With Murder - starring Humphrey Bogart, Gale Page and Billy Halop - premiered.
Germany and Italy signed a ten-year military and political alliance known as the Pact of Steel.
In Winnipeg, King George VI gave a radio address broadcast around the world extolling the century of peace between Canada and the United States. Blue Peter won The Derby. The race was televised live in six major London theatres. England played their last pre-war football international, a friendly in București beating Rumania two-nil. West Ham United's Len Goulden and Charlton Athletic's Don Welsh were the scorers. Brentford's Les Smith made his international debut. Sixteen-year-old Kenneth Derfel was remanded at Manchester City Juvenile Court on the charge of murdering a five-year-old girl, Patricia Carney in Wythenshawe, three months earlier. After sexually assaulting two other girls, he abducted Patricia, but then strangled her when she started screaming. He was found guilty and sentenced to be detained at His Majesty's pleasure.
Ian Murray McKellen born in Burnley.
Hal Roach's Captain Fury - starring Brian Aherne - premiered.
Nicholas Phipps's First Stop North broadcast.
John Ford's Young Mister Lincoln - starring Henry Fonda - premiered.
Roy William Neil's The Good Old Days - starring Max Miller, Hal Walters and Kathleen Gibson - premiered.
An attempt was made on the life of Marina, Duchess of Kent. As her car was pulling away from her home in Belgrave Square to see Wuthering Heights at the cinema, a man fired a sawn-off shotgun at it, but missed. The man was soon arrested and the Duchess was not aware of the attack until she returned.
Christopher Duke Sandford born in Croydon.
Walter Forde's The Four Just Men - starring Hugh Sinclair, Griffith Jones, Francis L Sullivan, Frank Lawton and Anna Lee - premiered.
Members of the Hitler Youth were forbidden from eating ice cream cones. They were informed by their superiors that it was 'not in conformity with the dignity' of the uniform. James Gordon Reid born in Hamilton, Scotland.
Rachael Heyhoe Flint born in Wolverhampton. John Young Stewart born in Milton, Dunbartonshire.
An adaptation of Karel Capek's The Insect Play broadcast.
Penelope Horner born in London. Peter Gordeno born in Rangoon, Burma.
Annette Christine Andreallo born in Sydney. Michael Alan Gothard born in London.
Hermann Lang of Germany won the Belgian Grand Prix at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps. British driver Dick Seaman crashed his car into a tree during lap twenty two. After the impact, the car caught fire, with the unconscious driver still inside. Seaman died a few hours later as a result of his burns.
England won the first of a three test series against The West Indies at Lord's by eight wickets. George Headley, with one hundred and six in the first innings and one hundred and seven in the second, became the first cricketer to make separate hundreds in a test at Lord's. It was the second time he had achieved this feat against England. Jeff Stollmeyer, on his test debut, made fifty nine out of one hundred and forty seven in West Indies' first innings and Bill Copson, also making his test debut, took five for eighty five. England's reply was based on one hundred and ninety six for Len Hutton. Hutton shared a fourth wicket partnership of two hundred and forty eight with Denis Compton, who made one hundred and twenty. With the whole of the final day to save the match, West Indies looked to be on course at one hundred and ninety for four, but lost their last six wickets for thirty five runs. Copson took four in the innings to finish with nine wickets in the match.
Leslie Fenton's Stronger Than Desire - starring Virginia Bruce, Walter Pidgeon and Rita Johnson and Bachelor Mother - starring Ginger Rogers and David Niven - premiered. George Formby's 'I'm The Husband Of The Wife Of Mister Wu'/'It's A Grand And Healthy Life' released.
The first World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon) opened in New York in conjunction with the World's Fair.
The Daily Telegraph began a campaign to give Winston Churchill a position in the British cabinet.
Leonard Sachs's adaptation of Luck Of The Devil broadcast.
Nicholas Phipps's Look Here! broadcast. Dick Burton won the Open Championship. Bobby Riggs defeated fellow American Elwood Cooke in the Men's Singles final at Wimbledon. The French comedy-drama The Rules of the Game directed by Jean Renoir premiered in Paris.
The Fame Of Grace Darling broadcast.
Len Harvey defeated Jock McAvoy at White City to win the British light heavyweight boxing title.
The first episode of It's That Man Again broadcast on The National Programme.
James Whale's The Man In The Iron Mask - starring Louis Hayward, Joan Bennett and Warren William and featuring the movie debut of Peter Cushing - premiered.
Hundreds of British troops joined the French in Bastille Day parades marking the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Storming of the Bastille. It was the first time that Britain and France held military demonstrations together since the World War.
Sir Oswald Mosley gave a speech in the Earls Court Exhibition Centre attended by over twenty thousand numbskulls. He presented a plan that he said would 'bring peace in our time and our children's time' that called for a 'hands-off' policy in Eastern Europe, disarmament in Western Europe, return of colonies to Germany and for the British Empire to concentrate on its own affairs. 'Why is it a moral duty to go to war if a German kicks a Jew across the Polish frontier?' Mosley declared. 'We are going, if the power lies within us ... to say that our generation and our children shall not die like rats in Polish holes.' Corin William Redgrave born in Marylebone.
Mahatma Gandhi wrote directly to Adolf Hitler, addressing him as his 'friend' and requesting that Hitler refrain from starting a war 'which may reduce humanity to the savage state.' The letter never reached Hitler. Each Dawn I Die - starring James Cagney and George Rat - premiered.
During the reading of a bill designed to crush IRA activities, Home Secretary Samuel Hoare announced the police discovery of a document known as S-Plan. Hoare read excerpts from the document that included plans to sabotage aeroplane and munitions factories and damage supplies of water and electricity. Neville Chamberlain informed the House that the government had reached an agreement with Japan that 'the Japanese forces in China have special requirements for the purpose of safeguarding their own security and maintaining public order in regions under their control and that they have to suppress or remove any such acts or causes as will obstruct them or benefit their enemy.' The British government, Chamberlain explained, had 'no intention of countenancing any act or measures prejudicial to the attainment of the above-mentioned objects by Japanese forces.' Chamberlain denied opposition suggestions that Britain was now on the side of Japan in its war against China.
The second test at Old Trafford was drawn. Rain and bad light ruined the match, with only thirty five minutes play possible on the first day. Bertie Clarke's leg-spin and Rolph Grant's off-spin caused an England collapse to sixty two for five, but Joe Hardstaff made seventy six out of one hundred and eleven in one hundred minutes. England declared when Hardstaff was out with the thought that the pitch would get more difficult, but Grant made forty seven out with three sixes off Tom Goddard. On the morning of the last day, only George Headley, with fifty one, offered much resistance, Bill Bowes taking six for thirty three. The catch that Wally Hammond took to dismiss Headley in West Indies' second innings was his one hundredth in tests: the first non-wicketkeeper to achieve this.
The National Programme's Tunes Of The Town featured extracts from the one thousandth performance of Me & My Girl.
The Day Is Gone broadcast.
Peggy Barwell's adaptation of Prison Without Bars broadcast. Hildegarde Neil born in London.
Walter Forde's Cheer Boys Cheer - starring Nova Pilbeam, Edmund Gwenn, Jimmy O'Dea and Peter Coke - premiered.
Glenn Miller & His Orchestra recorded 'In the Mood'.
Albert Einstein signed a letter written by Leo Szilard addressed to Franklin Roosevelt, warning that Germany might develop an atomic weapon and suggesting the United States should start its own nuclear program. The letter would ultimately result in the Manhattan Project. William Wellman's Beau Geste - starring Gary Cooper, Ray Milland, Robert Preston, Brian Donlevy and Susan Hayward - premiered.
Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Spy In Black - starring Conrad Veidt and Valerie Hobson - premiered.
Hans Deppe's Das Ekel - starring Hans Moser - premiered.
Francesca Meredith Carroll born in Leicester.
John M Stahl's When Tomorrow Comes - starring Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer - premiered.
Oliver Robert Ford Davies born in Ealing.
The BBC's second adaptation of James Birdie's Tobias & The Angel broadcast.
Maurice Elvey's Sword Of Honour - starring Geoffrey Toone, Sally Gray, Dorothy Dickson and Wally Patch - premiered.
Indian troops arrived in Egypt to strengthen British forces there. U-boat commander Karl Dönitz received a coded instruction for his forces to put out to sea at once. Victor Fleming's adaptation of The Wizard Of Oz - starring Judy Garland - premiered at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood.
George McDonald born in San Fernando, Trinidad & Tobago. Carole Augusta Shelley born in London.
The Man They Could Not Hang - starring Boris Karloff - premiered. Anthony Valentine born in Blackburn.
The TV debuts of Nosmo King and Hubert in Cabaret. John Cromwell's In Name Only - starring Cary Grant, Carole Lombard and Kay Francis - premiered.
Hitler received a message from his ambassador in Moscow reporting that the Russians were prepared to meet with Joachim von Ribbentrop to negotiate a non-aggression pact. Hitler welcomed the news but wanted the date of von Ribbentrop's visit to be brought forward. A secret meeting of the Politburo was allegedly held in which Joseph Stalin outlined the strategy of the Soviet Union in the upcoming war. Stalin supposedly said that the war among the Western powers should go on as long as possible so all belligerents would be weakened, creating an ideal opportunity for Soviet expansion. Peter Edward Baker born in Lewisham.
Stalin agreed to Hitler's proposal to have von Ribbentrop come to Moscow on 23 August. Hitler, who was having dinner with Eva Braun and guests at the time the message arrived, allegedly pounded the table and exclaimed: 'I have them!' The Soviet Union informed the Anglo-French mission that no military pact was possible unless Poland consented to having the Red Army pass through its territory. Since this condition was not acceptable, the negotiations were called off. Charlie Chaplin delayed production on his new film, tentatively called The Dictators, due to the uncertainty of the situation in Europe.
The song 'You Are My Sunshine' was recorded for the first time, by The Pine Ridge Boys for Bluebird Records. The third test at The Oval was drawn. Debutant Tyrell Johnson took the wicket of Walter Keeton with his first delivery in test cricket, but Norman Oldfield made eighty on his first appearance for England and, with Hutton making seventy three and Hardstaff ninety four, England were all out for three hundred and fifty two before the end of the first day. Jeff Stollmeyer and George Headley both made fifties for West Indies in a cautious start on the second day, but then Vic Stollmeyer, making his test debut and Ken Weekes added one hundred and sixty three in one hundred minutes for the fifth wicket. Stollmeyer was out for ninety six but Weekes went on to one hundred and thirty seven. On the final morning, Learie Constantine hit seventy nine from the final ninety two balls of the innings. Len Hutton (an undefeated one hundred and sixty five) and Wally Hammond (one hundred and thirty eight) shared a third wicket partnership of two hundred and sixty four.
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact was signed. Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union agreed not to attack each other and to remain neutral if attacked by a third power. Secret clauses in the pact divided up other countries into respective spheres of influence, including a partitioning of Poland. John Cobb set a new land speed record of three hundred and sixty nine per hour at Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The record stood until 1947.
Hitler summoned the British Ambassador to Germany Sir Nevile Henderson and talked with him for about an hour. Hitler said it was 'necessary to solve the Polish question once and for all' and offered to make a pact with Britain guaranteeing the Empire's existence and potentially leading to an agreement on armaments limitation in the future. Five people were killed and seventy were injured by an IRA bomb explosion in Coventry. The Louvre was closed to the public (officially for 'repair work') so its art treasures could be packed up and transported to secret locations for safekeeping. John Michael Jones born in Brentford.
In a famous football match known in Poland as The Last Game, Poland defeated the highly renowned Hungarian team four-two.
The TV debut of eleven year old Bruce Forsyth on Come & Be Televised.
Roy William Neil's Murder Will Out - starring John Loder, Jane Baxter and Jack Hawkins - premiered.
John Robert Parker Ravenscroft born in Heswell, Merseyside. The fascist William Joyce and his wife, Margaret, fled to Germany. Joyce had reportedly been tipped off - most likely by his former friend Maxwell Knight, the head of MI5's M section - that the British authorities intended to detain him under the recently enacted Defence Regulation 18B.
The Royal Navy was mobilised and Army and Royal Air Force reserves were called up. Hitler issued Directive Number One, ordering an attack on Poland to begin the next day. In a false flag operation, Nazis posing as Poles seized the Gleiwitz radio station and broadcast an anti-German message in Polish. Peter Childs born in Eastbourne.
Germany invaded Poland. Operation Pied Piper, a four-day evacuation of children from major UK cities began. Blackouts were imposed across Britain. The army was officially mobilised and the BBC Home Service began broadcasting, replacing The National Programme. The first International Film Festival (the forerunner to the Cannes Film Festival) was supposed to open on this day, but it was postponed. The festival only screened a single film, The Hunchback Of Notre Dame. The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes - starring Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, George Zucco and Ida Lupino - premiered. Mary Jean Tomlin born in Detroit. Yorkshire won the cricket county championship for the third consecutive year. The final game of the season - a nine wicket victory over Sussex at Hove - would be the last first class match played in England until 1945. Playing in his last game before his death, in 1943, Hedley Verity took seven for nine in Sussex's second innings. Yorkshire were captained by Brian Sellers and had five batsmen who all scored more than one thousand championship runs: Len Hutton (two thousand one hundred and sixty seven), Wilf Barber (thirteen hundred and eighty eight), Herbert Sutcliffe (twelve hundred and thirty), Maurice Leyland (eleven hunred and ninety one) and Arthur Mitchell (one thousand and eighty seven). The bowling depended on Verity (one hundred and sixty five wickets), Ellis Robinson (one hundred and two) and Bill Bowes (ninety six). Runners-up Middlesex were well served by Bill Edrich (nineteen hundred and forty eight runs), Denis Compton (eighteen hundred and fifty three) and Jack Robertson (fifteen hundred and sixty two). Wicket-keeper Fred Price had an outstanding season with fifty three catches and twenty stumpings. Middlesex relied heavily on its two main bowlers Jim Sims (one hundred and forty two wickets) and Jim Smith (eighty four). Gloucestershire finished third under England captain Wally Hammond who scored two thousand one hundred and twenty one championship runs. Other performers for Gloucestershire included batsmen Charlie Barnett, Jack Crapp and George Emmett, seam bowler Colin Scott and the outstanding Tom Goddard who was the championship's leading wicket-taker with one hundred and eighty one wickets. Essex finished fourth. Noted batsmen at other counties included John Langridge (Sussex), Les Ames (Kent), Joe Hardstaff Jr (Nottinghamshire), Arthur Fagg (Kent), Eddie Paynter (Lancashire), Harold Gimblett (Somerset) and Laurie Fishlock (Surrey) who all made more than seventeen hundred runs. Walter Keeton of Nottinghamshire was recognised by Wisden as one of its Five Cricketers of the Year after he scored an undefeated three hundred and twelve against Middlesex, the highest individual score of the season. The German nuclear weapons programme, known as Uranverein, was formed. The Heereswaffenamt had squeezed the Reichsforschungsrat out of the Reichserziehungsministerium (the Reich Ministry of Education) and started the formal German nuclear energy project under military auspices. The project had its first meeting on 16 September, organized by Kurt Diebner and held in Berlin. The invitees included Walther Bothe, Siegfried Flügge, Hans Geiger, Otto Hahn, Paul Harteck, Gerhard Hoffmann, Josef Mattauch and Georg Stetter. A second meeting was held soon thereafter and included Werner Heisenberg, Klaus Clusius, Robert Döpel and Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker.
The Football Association suspended (and, subsequently cancelled) the 1939-40 season after just three games when the government legislated that large crowd gatherings were to be suppressed with the implementation of the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act. A few minor leagues, such as the Northern League, did manage to complete a season, but more than half of the teams were unable to fulfil their fixtures. Many footballers joined the armed forces and, as a result, teams were depleted and fielded guest players in regional league competitions. The FA Cup was resumed in 1946 and The Football League for the 1946–47 season. In the final games before war, Arsenal beat Sunderland five-two at Highbury with Ted Drake scoring four, Blackpool defeated Wolverhampton Wanderers, Charlton Athletic won two-nil against Manchester United and Liverpool beat Chelsea. In the Second Division, Newcastle United hammered Swansea Town eight-one (Ray Bowden scored a hat-trick and Tommy Pearson two), Tottenham Hotspur won four-three at West Bromwich Albion and Coventry City won four-two at home to Barnsley. Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic scored ten against Northampton in the Third Division South whilst, in the Third Division North, there were wins for the likes of Accrington Stanley, Carlisle United, Lincoln City (four-three against Gateshead) and New Brighton (who beat Doncaster Rovers four-two). Glasgow Rangers, Glasgow Celtic, Falkirk and Kilmarnock all won in the Scottish First Division where there were also big victories for Ayr United (six-one against Hamilton Academicals), Albion Rovers (five-three at Hibernain), Heart of Midlothian (four-two at Motherwell) and Saint Mirren. The Preliminary Round of the - never completed - FA Cup was also played, with Woking winning twelve-nil at Egham and Wealdstone defeating Old Johnians seven-three. Leeds United's one-nil defeat at home to Sheffield United in the First Division saw the debut of Jim Milburn, the first of three hundred and ten appearances for Leeds and Bradford Park Avenue in a (war-interrupted) career that lasted until 1955.
Winston Churchill accepted Chamberlain's offer to join his war cabinet as First Lord of the Admiralty. In the first British offensive action of the war, the Royal Air Force launch a raid on the German fleet in the Heligoland Bight. They targeted the German pocket-battleship Admiral Scheer anchored off Wilhelmshaven at the Western end of the Kiel Canal. Several aircraft were lost in the attack and, although the German vessel was hit three times, all of the bombs failed to explode. George Formby's 'Dan, The Dairy Man'/'The Blue-Eyed Blonde Next Door' released.
Goerge Robert Lazenby born in Goulburn, New South Wales. The United States officially declared neutrality in the European war. Which was really helpful. Golden Boy - starring Barbara Stanwyck and William Holden - premiered. Geraldine Moffat born in Nottingham.
A 'friendly fire' incident known as the Battle of Barking Creek claimed the first life of an RAF fighter pilot in the war. Everything's On Ice - starring Lynne Roberts, Edgar Kennedy and Irene Dare - premiered. Suzanne Neve born in London.
German troops reached the suburbs of Warsaw and the siege of the city began.
The Glenn Miller and Ray Eberle version of 'Over the Rainbow' topped the Your Hit Parade chart. The French Saar Offensive stalled at the heavily mined Warndt Forest.
Off the coast of Norway, the submarine HMS Oxley was mistaken for an enemy by HMS Triton and sunk. There were only two survivors.
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor returned to England from self-imposed exile in France. General Gamelin orders to halt to the Saar Offensive into Germany after having taken only a handful of villages.
The German submarine U-39 attacked HMS Ark Royal off Rockall, but the torpedoes fell short of their target. Three British destroyers in the vicinity hunted down U-39 and disabled it with depth charges, rescuing all the crew. It was the first U-boat to be sunk in World War II.
Busby Berkeley's Babes In Arms - starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland - and The Rains Came - starring Myrna Loy and Tyrone Power - premiered.
The aircraft carrier HMS Courageous was torpedoed and sunk by U-29 on patrol off the coast of Ireland. The Soviet Union invaded Poland, occupying the territory East of the Curzon Line.
William Joyce began making English-language propaganda broadcasts over German radio to England. He would earn the nickname Lord Haw-Haw.
Gregory Ratoff's Intermezzo - starring Leslie Howard and Ingrid Bergman - and Herbert Wilcox's Nurse Edith Cavell - starring Anna Neagle - premiered.
Wolverhamton Wanderers' five-three victory over West Bromwich Albion in a wartime friendly saw the club debut of Billy Wright, although his official first class debut wouldn't come until 1946 - the first of five hundred and forty one games for Wolves in a career that lasted until 1959.
The Luftwaffe bombed Warsaw for the first time, reducing entire streets to rubble and causing widespread fires. The British government considered the bombing a breach of the pledge Germany made at the start of the war to refrain from 'indiscriminate attacks.' Roger Middleton born in Sheffield.
In the first offensive operations by the German Army in Western Europe, guns on the Siegfried Line opened up on villages behind the French Maginot line. Chancellor Sir John Simon introduced an emergency war budget raising income tax, inheritance tax, profits tax and duties on alcohol, sugar and tobacco. Even with this new tax revenue Britain still faced a deficit of nine hundred and thirty eight million smackers.
Rudolph Malcolm Walker born in Trinidad. The Siege of Warsaw ended after twenty days when the Polish garrison capitulated to the Germans.
Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory - starring Gary Cooper, David Niven and Andrea Leeds - premiered. Rear Admiral John Godfrey, Director of Naval Intelligence, circulated a memorandum which, according to the historian Ben MacIntyre, 'bore all the hallmarks of [Godfrey's personal assistant] Lieutenant Commander Ian Fleming.' The Trout Memo compared the deception of an enemy in wartime to fly fishing and contained several schemes to be considered for use against the Axis powers to lure U-boats and German surface ships towards minefields. Item Twenty Eight was an scheme to plant misleading papers on a corpse which would be found by the enemy; the suggestion was similar to Operation Mincemeat, the 1943 plan to conceal the intended invasion of Italy from North Africa, which was developed by Charles Cholmondoley in October 1942.
The German pocket-battleship Admiral Graf Spee sank its first merchant ship, the British freighter Clement off the coast of Pernambuco, Brazil.
First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill gave a radio address reviewing the first month of the war. During this broadcast he described the Soviet Union as 'a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.' Geoffrey Whitehead born in Sheffield.
Timothy Carlton Congdon Cumberbatch born in Oxford.
Adolf In Blunderland - 'A Political Parody written by Max Kester and James Dyrenforth, music written and arranged by Max Saunders' - broadcast on The Home Service. Meanwhile, the actual Adolf addressed a special session of the Reichstag. After speaking at length about the victory over Poland he then proposed an international security conference, hinting at desire for an armistice by saying that such a conference would be impossible 'while cannons are thundering.' Britain and France rejected these overtures and the uneventful phase of the war known as The Phoney War would drag on until May 1940. Melvyn Bragg born in Carlisle. Eric C Kenton's Everything's On Ice - starring Irene Dare, Edgar Kennedy, Roscoe Karns and Lynee Roberts - premiered.
The British Expeditionary Force completed its crossing to France. Vivian Leopold James born in Kogarah, New South Wales.
Germany issued orders (Case Yellow) to prepare for the invasion of Belgium, France, Luxembourg and The Netherlands.
German submarine U-40 struck a mine and sank in the English Channel. U-42 was sunk Southwest of Ireland by depth charges from the destroyers Imogen and Ilex. H Robinson Cleaver At The Organ and F Buckley Hargreaves' These Days In The North broadcast.
The battleship HMS Royal Oak was sunk in Scapa Flow harbour by U-47, under the command of Günther Prien. The first episode of Somewhere In England broadcast.
Nine planes of the Luftwaffe conducted an air-raid on the Firth of Forth, damaging three British ships and killing sixteen Royal Navy crew before Spitfires of Six Zero Three Squadron arrived and shot down three of the enemy aircraft, the first to be downed over British territory.
Reinhard Heydrich issued a decree - commonly referred to as the Festsetzungserlaß - prohibiting all Romani from changing their registered place of residence. At the first big wartime variety concert organised by ENSA, which was broadcast by the BBC from RAF Hendon, Adelaide Hall performed 'We're We're Going To Hang Out The Washing On The Siegfried Line' accompanied by Mantovani & His Orchestra. Frank Capra's Mister Smith Goes To Washington - starring James Stewart and Jean Arthur - premiered.
Walter Summers' The Dark Eyes Of London - starring Béla Lugosi, Hugh Williams, Greta Gynt and Edmon Ryan - premiered.
The first episode of The Music Goes Round - presented by Roy Speer - broadcast. At The Circus - staring The Marx Brothers - premiered. George Ian Cullen born in West Boldon.
The first episode of Kipling's Just So Stories and Major WH Osman's The Pigeon Goes To War broadcast.
The Roaring Twenties - starring James Cagney, Priscilla Lane, Humphrey Bogart and Gladys George - premiered. Including probably the longest death-scene in movie history. 'This is Eddie Bartlett ... He used to be a big shot.'
John Marwood Cleese born in Weston-Super-Mere.
Heinrich Himmler issued a secret directive to the SS and police encouraging them to procreate with women of 'good blood', even outside of marriage, 'to regenerate life for Germany.' The directive explained that the SS would support all mothers of children of good blood regardless of legitimacy, so no father would need to be concerned about creating a burden for them.
Patricia Docksey's Cullercoats broadcast.
West of the Orkney Islands, the German submarine U-56 encountered the battleship HMS Nelson with Winston Churchill aboard. U-56 fired three torpedoes all of which failed to explode. The U-boat's commander Wilhelm Zahn became known as 'the man who almost killed Churchill.' Grace Barnett Wing born in Highland, Illinois.
Thomas Patrick O'Connor born in Bootle, Liverpool.
Parts of Poland, including the Danzig Corridor, were annexed by Germany. The Soviet Union annexed the Eastern parts of occupied Poland to Ukraine and Belorussia.
Thorold Dickinson's The Arsenal Stadium Mystery - starring Leslie Banks, Greta Gynt, Ian McLean, Liane Linden, Anthony Bushell, Esmond Knight and George Allison - premiered.
US Congress amended the Neutrality Act of 1937, repealing the embargo on arms to belligerents but placing sales on a cash and carry basis to avoid a repeat of the situation after World War I when Britain and France ran into difficulty with making their war debt payments to the United States. John Ford's Drums Along the Mohawk - starring Claudette Colbert and Henry Fonda - and The Flying Deuces - starring Laurel and Hardy - premiered. The Alexander Korda-produced RAF movie The Lion Has Wings - directed by, among others, Michael Powell and rushed through production after the outbreak of war - premiered in the UK. Fats Waller's recording of 'Your Feet's Too Big' released.
Hitler escaped a bomb blast in the Munich Bürgerbräukeller where he was speaking on the anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923. Carpenter Johann Georg Elser was arrested with incriminating documents at the Swiss border and brought back to Munich for interrogation. His attempt to assassinate Hitler would have succeeded if the Führer's annual speech had not begun thirty minutes earlier than it did in previous years. Meg Wynn Owen born in Wales. Sylvia Ann Butterfield born in Leeds.
Ernst Lubitsch's Ninotchka - starring Greta Garbo - premiered.
The first episode of The Shadow Of The Swastika broadcast on The Home Service. Henry Koster's First Love - starring Deanna Durbin - premiered.
Queen Elizabeth made a broadcast to the women of the British Empire reminding them that in the war 'we, no less than men, have real and vital work to do.' Although Britain did not hold an official Armistice Day ceremony at the Whitehall Cenotaph, wreaths were laid on behalf of the King and Queen and people still came to leave flowers. There was no official two minutes' silence, but most Britons publicly observed it anyway. Michael Curtiz's The Private Lives Of Elizabeth & Essex - starring Bette Davis, Errol Flynn, Olivia De Havilland and Vincent Price - premiered.
British soil was bombed by the Germans for the first time, in the Shetland Islands. No casualties were inflicted. HMS Blanche was sunk by a mine in the Thames Estuary, the first British destroyer lost to enemy action in the war.
The first British civilian casualty of the war occurred when a German bomber killed James Isbister in an air raid on Orkney. Al Capone was released from federal custody after serving seven-and-a-half years of his eleven-year sentence for tax evasion. Capone was suffering heavily from paresis and upon release he immediately went to a Baltimore hospital for treatment. Aaron's Field, 'a morality play for the eve of war, by DG Bridson' broadcast. Tower Of London - starring Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff and Vincent Price - premiered.
Margaret Eleanor Atwood born in Ottawa. Ian McCulloch born in Glasgow.
DC Comics published Flash Comics issue one, featuring the first appearances of the superheroes The Flash and Hawkman.
The Official Secrets Act 1939 received Royal Assent in the United Kingdom, revising the Act of 1920.
Imperial Airways and British Airways Ltd. merged to form British Overseas Airways Corporation.
Shelagh Delaney born in Salford.
Twelve Bristol Blenheims of the Royal Air Force conducted a bombing raid on the German seaplane base at Borkum. Little damage was done but all the British aircraft returned safely. The British government ceremonially turned over Magna Carta to the Library of Congress for safekeeping during the war. The Thirteenth Century document had been brought to the United States for display during the New York World's Fair and it was deemed too dangerous to ship it back during wartime. In case she died in vain, obviously.
The German submarine U-35 surfaced and surrendered near the Shetland Islands after being disabled by depth charges from the destroyers HMS Icarus, Kashmir and Kingston.
Vickers Wellington bombers raided German warships at Heligoland. A German anti-aircraft battery was hit, probably the first British bomb of the war to land on German soil.
Off the coast of Uruguay, the captain of the German passenger steamer Ussukuma decided to scuttle the ship when it was intercepted by the cruiser Ajax. The Ajax rescued the crew of the Ussukuma and interned them as enemy civilians.
Twenty Three Years Ago, presented by David Lloyd George, broadcast.
Jennie Lindon born in Worthing.
The Battle of the River Plate took place followed, three days later, by the sinking of the Graf Spee, scuttled in neutral waters off Uruguay. Eric William Flynn born in Hainan Island, China.
Gone with the Wind - starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Leslie Howard and Olivia de Havilland - premiered at Loew's Grand Theatre in Atlanta. Yvonne-Thérèse-Marie-Camille Bédat de Monlaur born in Pau, France.
Edward James Kendrick born in Union Springs, Alabama.
Michael John Moorcock born in London.
George Formby recorded 'Imagine Me On The Maginot Line' and 'Mister Wu's A Window Cleaner Now' for Regal Zonophone Records.
The animated Gulliver's Travels premiered.
His Majesty The King's Christmas Message To The Empire broadcast, concluding with a moving quotation from Minnie Louise Haskins' poem God Knows ('I said to the man who stood at the Gate of the Year, "Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown"'). The Soldier Sings broadcast.
The Butterfly That Stamped broadcast on The Home Service. The first Royal Australian Air Force squadron, Number Ten Squadron RAAF, arrived in Britain. Phillip Harvey Spector born in New York.
The first Indian troops arrived in France to join the British & Commonwealth Expeditionary Force. The first episode of John Dickson Carr's Who Killed Matthew Corbin? broadcast on The Home Service.
The Minister of Food, William Morrison, announced that starting 8 January, rationing would be expanded to include butter, bacon, ham and sugar. The German submarine U-30 spotted the British battleship HMS Barnham West of the Butt of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides and hit it with a torpedo. Four crew members were killed but the Barham was able to make it back to Liverpool where it underwent six months of repairs.
A Testement Of Beauty, compiled by Moray McLaren and Val Gielgud, broadcast. William Dieterle's adaptation of The Hunchback of Notre Dame - starring Charles Laughton, Sir Cedric Hardwicke and Maureen O'Hara - and George Marshall's Destry Rides Again - starring Marlene Dietrich and James Stewart - premiered.
Lewis Milestone's adaptation of John Steinbeck's Of Mice & Men - starring Burgess Meredith, Betty Field and Lon Chaney Jnr - premiered. The Temptation Of Samuel Burge broadcast.
The German Propaganda Minister Doctor Goebbels (who had none at all) made a radio address reviewing the 'official' Nazi version of the events of 1939. No predictions were made for 1940 other than saying that the next year 'will be a hard year and we must be ready for it.'
