World War II As It Happened
A MaritimeQuest Daily Event Special Presentation
Wednesday July 3, 1940
Day 307

July 3, 1940: Front page of the Manchester Evening News, Manchester, England.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Daily Mail, Hull, England.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of the Nottingham Evening Post, Nottingham, England.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the report in column 3: "Lone Raider's Bomb - Wrecks Half A Dozen Homes - Kills 10 - Enemy Plane Shot Down"
(I draw your attention to this report only to add this. In a meeting of the British War Cabinet on this day it was decided to stop giving the exact details of casualties from air raids. In recent days, especially in the U.S. papers, the number of those killed by German bombs has been highlighted by the press in a way that did not please Churchill and the war cabinet. They also felt that the enemy was being given information which should not be allowed. Their conclusion was as follows;

"Reports of casualties caused by German air raids should in future be stated in general terms and should not give the details of the precise numbers killed and injured."

A few days later the Minister of Information, Duff Cooper, sent a memo to the war cabinet arguing that not reporting the true numbers would undermine the public trust in the information being given out by the government. Mr. Cooper made a very strong argument making several well thought out points. He surmised that the press would consider this a sign of "the Government's lack of confidence in public moral" in respect to the conduct of the war. However, his most important argument was this;

"The public will hardly pay even perfunctory attention to official communiques which substitute vague and stereotyped adjectives for figures. Rumour will be their only source of information as to the effect of raids in other parts of the country. Rumour unchecked by facts exaggerates rapidly and wildly. This can be substantiated by anyone who sees the Press submissions to the Censorship. In the result the failure to give at once full figures which the pubic can believe will demoralise the public more than any figures could; since (1) rumour will multiply the true figures and (2) the public will be resentful and perturbed that their own Government dare not trust them with the truth."

Perhaps never have truer words been written than the last sentence, "the public will be resentful and perturbed that their own Government dare not trust them with the truth." This is exactly what has happened over the years, not only in the U.K. but most especially in the U.S.A. The government has lied to the public for so many decades, that the public does not believe them when (if) they tell the truth. The public can no longer tell the difference between truth and lie, not that much truth comes out of any government official. This is a poison that has been injected into the public by the government and it's something that needs an antidote before it's, if it's not already, too late.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of the Press and Journal, Aberdeen, Scotland.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the headline at top right: "Scharnhorst Caught In Dry Dock"
(In official British papers from the time, it was their belief that Scharnhorst had been damaged, however it was a case of misidentification as Scharnhorst was not damaged, it was actually Prinz Eugen that was hit. Prinz Eugen was still being fitted out and was not yet in commission. The damage was described as slight and the commissioning was delayed for a month. As an interesting side note, it was during this raid that the British used a one-ton bomb, which was the largest weapon delivered so far during the war. It was supposed to hit the ships, but a faulty release mechanism in the Hampden bomber caused the bomb to be dropped in a non-military area.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Examiner, Launceston, Tasmania, Australia.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Sydney Sun, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the report at bottom left: "Reynaud And Balbo Mysteries"
(Whoever the "special representative" was that wrote this report, seemed to want to create another myth or conspiracy theory. In reality there were no mysteries involved with Reynaud or Balbo. Reynaud was injured in a car crash, not of suspicious origin, and Balbo was shot down by his own anti-aircraft guns by mistake. Still I guess they needed to fill some column space.)
[Also see "Hero Rests After Mysterious Death" in the Biddeford Daily Journal of July 13, 1940.]


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Telegraph, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Lethbridge Herald, Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the headline: "U-Boat Sinks Ship With Nazi, Italian Internees"
(About 800 people were killed when U-47 under the command of Kapitänleutnant Günther Prien, torpedoed the ship. Many of the dead were his countrymen.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Winnipeg Tribune, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the report in column 1: "Death Penalty For Treason In Canada Urged"
Also note the report in column 7-8: "Anti-Jewish Fury Sweeps Rumania"
(By the time the war was over, more than 250,000 Rumanian Jews had been rounded up and murdered, by the Nazis and the Rumanians.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of Haarlem's Dagblad, Haarlem, Netherlands.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of the Biddeford Daily Journal, Biddeford, Maine.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the report in column 6: "British Ships Lose Heavily"
(Within days of reports like this one the British War Cabinet would move to restrict the publication of merchant shipping losses in the same way they restricted the publication of air raid casualties. (See above.) Duff Cooper would challenge this move as well. His argument for this was again, public trust. He pointed out that if the public had the confidence that they were being told the truth, then they would not believe the lies coming from the enemy. He also included these figures;

"Since the commencement of hostilities 21,908 British, 2,013 Allied and 3,326 neutral ships, a total of 27,247 ships have been convoyed. 34 British, 3 Allied and 3 neutral ships, a total of 40, have been lost. The British loss ratio is 1 in 644."

I have the resources to research this and determine if it is completely accurate, but I don't have the time to do it. So the figures will have to stand as is.

His words about public confidence ring true to today, in the U.S.A. we don't have the confidence to believe what the government is telling us, that's why so many cranks get so much attention and so many people believe so many crazy things. For this, you have the government to blame, they knew this would be the result, but if they keep people off balance, they can get away with so much more than they could if you were paying attention. That is one of the ways they spent 30 TRILLION Dollars more of YOUR money, than they took from you in taxes.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Evening Star, Washington, D.C.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
Note the report in column 2-3: "Anti-Jewish Riots Grow Worse As Nation Mourns Lost Areas"
(Many of the U.S. papers carried this report.)
The below report appeared on page 4 of The Evening Star.
(I wish all Americans would read this, especially those who think they are oppressed in America. This report shows you what real oppression is.)
 


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Evening Gazette, Xenia, Ohio.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
Note the report in column 2: "Plan Operation To Save Life Of Baby"
(The child was born without an esophagus, I don't know if the surgery was successful or not.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Port Arthur News, Port Arthur, Texas.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of the Nevada State Journal, Reno, Nevada.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of The Bakersfield Californian, Bakersfield, California.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of the Hamburger Neueste Zeitung, Altona, Hamburg, Germany.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
 
1. Sensationelle Funde an der Loire.
(Sensational finds on the Loire.)
2. Russische oelfelder sollten bombardiert werden.
(Russian oil fields should be bombed.)
 
3. Die politischen Geheimakten des französischen Generalstabes erbeutet.
(The secret political files of the French General Staff looted.)


July 3, 1940: Front page of the Völkischer Beobachter, the official newspaper of the NSDAP.
(Click on the image for a readable version.)
1. Der größte Feldzug aller Zeiten.
(The greatest campaign of all time.)
2. Der Abschlußbereicht über die Schlacht in Frankreich.
(The final report on the battle in France.)



   
Page published July 3, 2021