Timeline: 1941

1941

January: Allied troops capture Bardia and Tobruk in North Africa. In the next three months the Afrika Korps arrives to support Italian forces and captures Agheila on the Tripolitanian border.

14^th March 'For three hours we heard nothing but the drone of planes', Sadie Hall records an attack on Leeds in her diary.

April: Yugoslavia surrenders after German attacks. Allies evacuate Greece, however some 9000 troops are captured.

26^th April William Dexter is taken prisoner in Greece and begins his long period of captivity.

May: As the Battle of the Atlantic continues, with Allied losses mounting, elsewhere HMS Hood is sunk by the Bismarck in Denmark Strait. Bismarck is in turn torpedoed and sunk 3 days later. In Crete, German paratroopers land.

June: German invasion of Russia, 'Operation Barbarossa', along 2,900 km front from the Baltic to the Black Sea.

July: The Final Solution Directive is given by Göring to Heydrich concerning the implementation of the 'complete solution of the Jewish question'.

September: German troops surround Leningrad and seize Kiev. The following month Stalin announces a state of siege in Moscow and the first Arctic convoy arrives, bringing supplies - PQ1.

September Marilyn Richardson applies to join the WAAF.

November 18^th Operation Crusader is successfully launched in the Western Desert, relieving pressure on Tobruk. The following month the siege is raised.

December: Japan attacks Pearl Harbor. The Allied nations and USA declare war on Japan.

13^th December Edward King's letter to his father expresses outrage at the attack by Japan.