istoryworld
Events relating to europe
Working as an official war artist, Henry Moore creates an iconic series of drawings of Londoners sleeping at night in underground stations
Lord Craigavon (previously James Craig) dies in office after nineteen years as northern Ireland's prime minister
The ration book is introduced in Britain, at first just for bacon, butter and sugar, but soon also for meat, eggs, tea, milk, cheese, jam, and clothing
303 captured merchant seamen are rescued in a daring British raid on the German supply ship Altmark, in use as a floating prison in a Norwegian fjord
The Treaty of Moscow ends the war between the USSR and Finland, after 200,000 Soviet deaths in the three months of hostilities
More than 4000 Polish officers are massacred at Katyń on Stalin's orders
German ships and marines occupy the harbours of neutral Denmark and Norway
The German invasion of Norway includes the world's first airborne assault, with troops arriving by plane to attack the airports of Oslo and Stavanger
Allied ships on patrol in the North Sea, soon followed by troops, rush to the defence of Norway
German tanks cross the borders into neutral Netherlands, Luxembourg and Belgium
After the German invasion of the Netherlands and Belgium, Winston Churchill replaces Chamberlain as the British prime minister
German troops force their way into France through the Ardennes, launching the Battle of France
The French rely on the heavily fortified Maginot Line to keep out the Germans, but they outflank it
Only two days after crossing the Netherlands border, a German division reaches the coast near Rotterdam
Queen Wilhelmina and the Dutch government escape just in time to Britain
Winston Churchill, in his first speech to the House of Commons as prime minister, offers the nation nothing but 'blood, toil, tears and sweat'
The caretaker government of the Netherlands surrenders to the German invaders
A German army races west through northern France, aiming to cut off the Allied troops in Belgium
Fishing smacks and private launches are enlisted from southern England's coasts and rivers for a rescue mission across the Channel
German tanks reach the French coast at Abbeville, nine days after crossing the border from Germany
Evacuation begins from Dunkirk, and over the next ten days some 860 vessels ferry troops across the Channel
The Belgians surrender to the German armies encircling them north and south
Some 340,000 British and French troops have by now been rescued from Dunkirk, but a million Allied soldiers are now prisoners of the Germans
The last Allied forces withdraw from Norway, leaving the country entirely in the hands of its German occupiers
Mussolini declares war on a France already on the verge of defeat
