Air Operations - Europe

• 12 Bostons carry out an accurate bombing raid on the Mondeville power station without a loss.
• 208 aircraft are dispatched to bomb Dortmund. This force which is several times larger than any previously sent to this city includes 142 Wellingtons, 34 Hampdens, 20 Stirlings, 8 Halifaxes and 4 Manchesters. 132 aircraft claim to have bombed the target but bombing photographs indicate the bombs fell across a 40-mile stretch of the Ruhr. The ground reports from Dortmund say 1 industrial building is destroyed, 1 military establishment severely damaged, 4 private dwellings are destroyed with 31 being damaged. 4 people are killed and 27 injured. 5 Wellingtons and 4 Hampdens are lost on the raid.
• In minor operations, 23 aircraft are sent to Le Havre where all the bombs fall on open country, 5 Blenheim intruders to Soesterberg airfield and 1 Stirling lays mines near Heligoland. 1 Wellington is lost on the Le Havre raid.

Avro Lancaster Mk I of No.44 (Rhodesia) Squadron, 14 April 1942, while practicing for the daylight, low-level attack on the M.A.N. diesel engineering works at Augsburg which took place three days later on 17 April.

Avro Lancaster Mk I

Allied Planning

The British government and its military advisers provisionally accept the American plan Bolero, submitted by Gen Marshall, for the American build-up in preparation for a second front.

Battle of the Atlantic

• The US destroyer Roper (DD-147) sinks U-85 near Cape Hatteras. There were no survivors. This is the first submarine kill by an American ship.[MORE]

U-85

Class	Type VIIB
CO	Kapitänleutnant Eberhard Grueger
Location	Atlantic, off Cape Hatteras
Cause	Depth charge
Casualties	45
Survivors	None

• The British freighter Empire Thrush (6160t) is torpedoed and sunk by U-203 about 8 miles north of Diamond Shoals, North Carolina. The entire crew is rescued by the antisubmarine vessel Asterion (AK-100).
• U-571 sinks the unarmed US freighter Margaret (3352t) off the eastern seaboard at it en route for New York from San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Burma

The demolition of oil installations around Yenangyaung, the largest oil field in the Far East, is begun in order to deny them to the Japanese. The Japanese begin to surround the Chinese 55th Div in the area of Mauchi-Loikaw.

Eastern Front

There is renewed fighting near Vyazma as the 50th Army launches a strong attack to free the encircled 33rd Army and Group Belov. Initial progress is good; by afternoon leading elements of the 50th Army are only 3 miles from Group Belof, having taken the Zaitsevo heights by storm. The Luftwaffe then enters the battle, launching a crushing attack upon the advancing units. Repeated assaults inflict crippling casualties, forcing the 50th Army to fall back.

Mediterranean

The British submarine Upholder is sunk by the Italian motor torpedo boat Pegaso north of Tripoli with a loss of 33 on board.

Occupied France

(15th?)French Resistance carries out a grenade attack on the German HQ building in Arras.

Vichy, Politics

Pierre Laval forms a new government in Vichy. Germany has been increasingly dissatisfied with its Vichy partners. Pressure is exerted, therefore, to bring about a completely subservient regime. Petáin is to remain as head of state. Laval becomes chief of government and assumes actual direction of the Vichy administration.

Bristol Torbeaus of 825 Squadron attacking a Japanese merchantman attempting to enter the naval harbor at Haikou, Hainan - 14 April 4, 1942.

British Planes Attacking Japanese Freighter