France Timeline

The worst rail tragedy in France's peacetime history occurred on the night of 23 December 1933 near Lagny, about seventeen miles east of Paris. The Paris-Strasbourg flyer, speeding in a t...

The Munich Agreement was an agreement regarding the Sudetenland, which were areas along borders of Czechoslovakia, mainly inhabited by Czech Germans. The agreement was negotiated at a con...

The Anglo-German Naval Agreement (A.G.N.A) of June 18, 1935 was a bilateral agreement between the United Kingdom and German Reich regulating the size of the Kriegsmarine in relation to th...

French patrols cross the frontier into Germany near Saarbrucken, marking the beginning of the Saar offensive. A total of 11 divisions advance along a 32 km frontage. There is negligible G...

On September 12, the Anglo French Supreme War Council gathered for the first time at Abbeville in France. It was decided that all offensive actions were to be halted immediately. Maurice ...

Von Manstein, chief of staff of Army Group A, had originally formulated his plan in October 1939 in Koblenz on instigation of his superior General Gerd von Rundstedt, who rejected Halder'...

On 10 October 1939, the British refused Hitler's offer of peace; on 12 October the French did the same. Franz Halder, the chief of staff of the OKH, the German Army High Command, presente...

The Mechelen Incident of 10 January 1940, also known as the Mechelen affair, was an event during the Phoney War. A German aircraft with an officer on-board carrying the plans for Fall Gel...

Adolf Hitler gave his approval to the Manstein Plan on 17th February, 1940, but it was not activated until the 10th May, when the Luftwaffe bombed Dutch and Belgian airfields and the Germ...

The Norwegian Campaign was the name used by the Allies – United Kingdom and France – for their first direct land confrontation with the military forces of Nazi Germany in World War II. Th...

Germany initiated Fall Gelb on the evening prior to and the night of 10 May. During the late evening of 9 May, German forces occupied Luxembourg. Army Group B launched its (feint) offensi...

Although the German troops managed to capture the three airfields, they failed in their primary objective of taking the city of Hague and forcing the Dutch to surrender. Accordingly, the ...

On the morning of 10 May 1940 the Dutch awoke to the sound of aircraft engines roaring in the sky. Nazi Germany had commenced operation Fall Gelb and attacked the Netherlands, Belgium, Fr...

On the morning of 12 May, in response to Belgian pressure and necessity, the Royal Air Force and the Armée de l'Air undertook several air attacks on the German-held Maastricht and Meuse b...

In the afternoon General Winkelman received information about armoured forces advancing in the Langstraat region, on the road between 's-Hertogenbosch and the Moerdijk bridges. He still f...

In the early morning of 13 May General Winkelman, advising the Dutch government, considered the general situation to be critical. On land the Dutch had been cut off from the Allied front ...

At Sedan the Meuse Line consisted of a strong defensive belt, six kilometres deep according to the modern principles of zone defence on slopes overlooking the Meuse valley and strengthene...

The paratroopers enjoyed more success in Rotterdam and areas near the critical Moerdijk bridges. Dutch troops bitterly contested Dordrecht, another critical target. After four days of fig...

At 05:00 on 15 May a German messenger reached The Hague, inviting Winkelman to Rijsoord for a meeting with von Küchler, to negotiate the articles of a written capitulation document. Both ...

On the morning of 15 May German Army Group A broke the defences at Sedan and was now free to "dash" to the English Channel. The Allies now considered a whole sale withdrawal from the Belg...

"I looked out of the open window, over a large area of Amsterdam, over all the roofs and on to the horizon, which was such a pale blue that it was hard to see the dividing line. As long as..." —Anne Frank

On the morning of 20 May, Maurice Gamelin ordered the armies trapped in Belgium and northern France to fight their way south and link up with French forces that would be pushing northward...

During the afternoon of 21 May, the attack by the 50th Division and the 1st Tank Brigade was progressing south from Arras. This was to be the only large scale attack mounted by the BEF du...

The story of the Battle of Dunkirk is one of heroic courage amidst untold tragedy. In the year 1940, at a time when World War II was in full rage, Hitler's army was winning against France...

Due to war-time censorship and the desire to keep up the morale of the nation, the full extent of the unfolding "disaster" around Dunkirk was not publicised. However, the grave plight of ...

On 20 June, the Italian campaign began and, on 21 June, troops of the Italian Royal Army crossed the French border in three places The Italians attacked in two directions. One force attem...

During this period, Hitler built up his forces on Germany's western frontier. In April 1940, German forces invaded Denmark and Norway. In May 1940, Hitler's forces attacked France, conque...

On 25 June 1940, after the Fall of France, France and Italy signed an armistice and an Italian zone of occupation was agreed upon. The initial zone was 832 km² and contained 28,500 inhabi...

The Japanese Invasion of French Indochina (仏印進駐 Futsu-in shinchū?), also known as the Vietnam Expedition, was an attempt by the Empire of Japan, during the Second Sino-Japanese War to blo...

The St. Nazaire Raid (also called Operation Chariot) was a successful British seaborne attack on the heavily defended docks of St. Nazaire in occupied France on the night of March 28, 194...

On March 23, 1942 Führer Directive Number 40 called for the official creation of the Atlantic Wall. After the St. Nazaire Raid, on April 13, 1942 Adolf Hitler ordered naval and submarine ...

For Camus, life has no rational meaning or order. We have trouble dealing with this notion and continually struggle to find rational structure and meaning in our lives. This struggle to f...

In late 1943, as part of the war effort, the British Government evacuated approximately 3000 local residents in the area of Slapton, South Hams District of Devon. Some of them had never l...

Operation Tonga was the codename given to the airborne operation undertaken by the British 6th Airborne Division between 5 June and 7 June 1944 as a part of Operation Overlord and the Nor...

Utah Beach was the codename for the right flank or westernmost of the Allied landing beaches during the D-Day invasion of Normandy, as part of Operation Overlord on 6 June 1944. Utah was ...

Omaha Beach is the code name for one of the main landing points of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy landings on June 6 1944, during World War II. The beach...

"Soldiers, sailors and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force. You are about to embark upon the great crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are u..." —Dwight D. Eisenhower

Pointe du Hoc is a clifftop location on the coast of Normandy in northern France. It lies 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Omaha Beach, and stands on 100 ft (30 m) tall cliffs overlooking the sea...

Sword Beach was the codename of one of the five main landing beaches in Operation Neptune, which was the initial assault phase of Operation Overlord (the Allied invasion of Normandy on 6 ...

Gold Beach was the code name for one of the central D-Day landing beaches that Allied forces used to invade German-occupied France on June 6, 1944, during World War II. Gold Beach lay ...

Juno Beach was one of the five main landing sites of the Allied invasion of the coast of Normandy on D-Day during World War II. It was situated between Sword Beach and Gold Beach. It is...

The Brécourt Manor Assault (June 6, 1944) during the U.S. parachute assault of the Normandy Invasion of World War II is often cited as a classic example of small-unit tactics and leadersh...

Operation Perch was a Second World War British offensive that took place between 7–14 June 1944, during the Battle of Normandy. The offensive was intended to encircle and seize the German...

The British flotilla were moving westward down the Channel when the German ships were detected by radar just after 1 am on 9 June. Jones turned his force to meet the Germans, who were by ...

The attack was carried out by soldiers of the Der Führer Regiment of the 2nd Waffen-SS Panzer Division Das Reich. On that day they killed a total of 642 men, women and children without gi...

During the Battle of Normandy, the headquarters of Panzer Group West was established in the Chateau at La Caine. On 9 June 1944, three days after the Normandy landings, the headquarters' ...

Leading the attack of the 502nd, the 3rd Battalion (3rd/502nd PIR) under Lt Col. Robert G. Cole found Bridge No. 2 (the Douve bridge) unrepaired and the engineers assigned to the task pin...

The Battle of Le Mesnil-Patry was the last major combat operation conducted by Canadian land forces in Normandy during the month of June 1944. The Queen's Own Rifles of Canada, supported ...

During the night German fire subsided. Company H crept through the opening in the obstacle, and when it did not suffer any casualties, at 04:00 Company G and the Headquarters Company foll...

To complete the capture of Carentan, Gen. Courtney Hodges of First Army created a task force under Gen. Anthony McAuliffe to coordinate the final assault. The mission to take Hill 30 was ...