World War II Database

• Home
• » Events
• » WW2 Timeline
• » 30 Apr 1945

• The Western Allies captured Finnmark, Norway. ww2dbase [TH]
• Soviets and US First Army linked up near Ellenburg, Germany. ww2dbase [TH]
• British Second Army freed 20,000 prisoners of war from Sandbostel, Germany. ww2dbase [TH]
• American B-24 bombers sank Japanese transport Kunikawa Maru at Borneo. ww2dbase [CPC]
• Ira Eaker was named deputy commander of the Army Air Forces and chief of the Air Staff. ww2dbase [Ira Eaker | CPC]
• Patrol Boat No. 102 was transferred from the Japanese Navy Southwest Area Fleet to the Kure Navy District. ww2dbase [Stewart | CPC]

• The frigate, HMS Goodall, became the last ship to be sunk in the war against Germany when she was torpedoed by submarine U-286 in the Barents Sea with heavy loss of life returning from escorting a Russian convoy. ww2dbase [Barents Sea | AC]

• Anglo-Indian forces gained a beachhead on the west bank of the Pegu River at Pegu, Burma. ww2dbase [Battle of Rangoon | Pegu | CPC]

• Suichuan Airfield in Jiangxi Province, China was reactivated. ww2dbase [Suichuan Airfield | Suichuan, Jiangxi | CPC]

• German police chief Obergruppenführer Karl Hermann Frank announced over radio that any attempt to rise up by the citizens of Prague in the puppet state of Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia would be wiped out violently. ww2dbase [Karl Hermann Frank | Prague Strategic Offensive | Prague | CPC]

• William Joyce's "Germany Calling" radio program ceased broadcasting as British Army troops closed in on the radio station facilities in Hamburg, Germany. ww2dbase [William Joyce | Hamburg | CPC]
• The recently married Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun committed suicide in Berlin, Germany. Their bodies were burned near the Chancellery bunker. ww2dbase [Adolf Hitler | Reich Chancellery | Battle of Berlin | Berlin | CPC]
• In the Tiergarten district of Berlin, Germany, Zhukov launched an assault, refusing to permit an armistice, demanding only unconditional surrender. Soviet infantrymen, just 800 metres from the Reichstag, were attacked from the rear by SS diehards in the Kroll Opera House; the building was taken after several hours of bitter hand-to-hand fighting. ww2dbase [Reichstag Building and Kroll Opera House | Battle of Berlin | Berlin | TH, AC]
• US troops captured München, Germany. 50 kilometers to the northeast, at Moosburg, US Third Army freed over 100,000 prisoners of war. ww2dbase [Southern Germany Campaign | München-Oberbayern | TH, CPC]
• Eva Hitler committed suicide in the Führerbunker in Berlin, Germany by ingesting cyanide. ww2dbase [Eva Braun | Berlin | CPC]
• Ferdinand Schörner was made the Commander-in-Chief of the German Army. ww2dbase [Ferdinand Schörner | CPC]
• Walter Schreiber was captured by Soviet forces in Berlin, Germany. ww2dbase [Walter Schreiber | Berlin | CPC]

• USS Ray departed Apra Harbor, Guam, Mariana Islands for her seventh war patrol. ww2dbase [Ray | Apra Harbor | CPC]

• USS Sunfish departed Pearl Harbor, US Territory of Hawaii. ww2dbase [Sunfish (Gato-class) | Honolulu, Oahu | CPC]
• Barbers Point Naval Air Station: Air Group 6 arrived on board. ww2dbase [Barbers Point Naval Air Station | Ewa, Oahu | DS]

• US Fifth Army in Italy made contact with French forces near the Italo-French border. On the same day, US troops captured Milan, Italy. ww2dbase [Operation Grapeshot and Operation Roast | TH, CPC]

• Japanese hospital ship Hikawa Maru departed Yokosuka, Japan for her 24th voyage with the Japanese Navy. ww2dbase [Hikawa Maru | Yokosuka, Kanagawa | CPC]

• Commissioner of the German occupation in the Netherlands, Arthur Seyß-Inquart, officially agreed that Allied aircraft delivering food and other supplies to Dutch civilians would not be harassed by German defensive fire. ww2dbase [Operations Manna, Chowhound, and Faust | Arthur Seyß-Inquart | CPC]

• USS Trepang sank Miho Maru in the Yellow Sea. ww2dbase [Trepang | Yellow Sea | CPC]
• USS Springer was depth charged by a Japanese destroyer while attempting to attack Japanese shipping in the Yellow Sea; she would survive the attack with minor damage; 4 torpedoes were expended in her attempt to fire back at the destroyer. ww2dbase [Springer | Yellow Sea | CPC]

• US 22nd Bombardment Group aircraft dropped 142 250-pound bombs on Japanese Navy Oil Refinery No. 6 (USAAF referred to this facility as the "Toshien Oil Refinery") at Toshien District, Takao (now Zuoying District, Kaohsiung), Taiwan. A direct hit was scored on the eastern-most oil tank, and the resulting black smoke rose to the altitude of 5,000 feet. ww2dbase [Takao Guard District | Takao | CPC]

• Flight Sergeant Edward James Wright, a Canadian air gunner in a Lancaster bomber of 428 Squadron, was killed in a crash near RAF Station Hixon in Staffordshire, England, United Kingdom.. At just 16 years of age he was one of the youngest of the 20,000 Bomber Command airmen to be killed during WW2. ww2dbase [Hixon, England | AC]
• The USAAF 306th Bomb Group flying from RAF Thurleigh launched a leaflet dropping mission (nickels) to 11 cities in the Netherlands, France, and Germany. ww2dbase [Bombing of Hamburg, Dresden, and Other Cities | Bombing of Cities in France and Low Countries | RAF Thurleigh | Thurleigh, England | DS]

• George Brett retired from the US Army. ww2dbase [George Brett | CPC]

• USS Parche arrived at Midway Atoll, ending her fifth war patrol. ww2dbase [Parche | Midway Bases | Midway | CPC]

30 Apr 1945 Interactive Map