World War II Database

• Home
• » Events
• » WW2 Timeline
• » 17 Mar 1941

• German submarines U-99 and U-100 attacked Allied convoy HX-112 250 miles southeast of Iceland; U-99 sank 2 freighters and three tankers, while damaging another tanker. At 0318 hours, destroyers HMS Walker and HMS Vanoc depth charged U-100, forcing her to surface, then HMS Vanoc rammed U-100; as U-100 sank, 38 were killed, including commanding officer Kapitänleutnant Joachim Schepke. At 0343 horus, HMS Walker dropped 6 depth charges on U-99, killing 3 and forcing her to surface from heavy damage. U-99 was scuttled by her crew. 6 U-100 and 40 U-99 officers and men were captured by the British, including U-99's commanding officer Korvettenkapitän Otto Kretschmer. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Frenchman Francois Scornet, 22, became the only civilian to be executed by firing squad in Jersey of the Channel Islands throughout the German occupation. Scornet was one of 16 young Army Cadets who had fled France in a small boat with the intention of joining the Free French forces in England, United Kingdom. Lost in rough weather, they sailed into Guernsey, Channel Islands believing it to be the Isle of Wight and were captured. As an example to other escapees, Scornet was picked out as the ringleader and shot. After the war his remains were reinterred in his home village in Brittany, France. ww2dbase [AC]
• German armed merchant cruiser Kormoran and submarine U-124 made rendezvous with cruiser Admiral Scheer 1,150 miles southwest of Cape Verde Islands. U-124 transferred quartz aboard Admiral Scheer for her radar; although planned, the transfer of torpedoes from Kormoran to U-124 was canceled due to rough seas. ww2dbase [Admiral Scheer | CPC]
• German submarine U-106, after tracking Allied convoy SL-68 for the past two days, struck 250 miles west of Dakar, French West Africa at 2107 hours, sinking British ship Andalusian and Dutch ship Tapanoeli. ww2dbase [CPC]

• British 11th African Division captured Jijiga, Ethiopia, Italian East Africa unopposed. ww2dbase [Invasion of Italian East Africa | Jijiga | CPC]

• US Coast Guard cutter Cayuga delivered American representatives to Greenland in search of suitable locations for bases. ww2dbase [CPC]

• Lieutenant General Erwin Rommel sent a message to the besieged Italian garrison at Giarabub in southeastern Libya, asking the troops to hold on for a few more weeks and promising that his forces would arrive in relief in that time. ww2dbase [Battle of Giarabub | Erwin Rommel | Giarabub | CPC]

• Battleship Bismarck departed Kiel, Germany, arriving at Gotenhafen (Gdynia), occupied on the same day. ww2dbase [Deutsche Werke Gotenhafen | Bismarck | Gdynia, Pomorskie | CPC]

• In Britain, jam and marmelade rationed to 8 ounces per person per month. ww2dbase [CPC]
• HMS Dianthus was commissioned into service with Lieutenant Commander Clement Bridgman in command. ww2dbase [Dianthus | CPC]
• Richard Saul was made Companion of the Order of the Bath. ww2dbase [Richard Saul | CPC]

• Roddie Edmonds enlisted in the United States Army at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, United States. ww2dbase [Roddie Edmonds | Chickamauga, Georgia | DS]

17 Mar 1941 Interactive Map