Curated category
April 1945 in Europe
- Battle of Nuremberg (1945)The Western Allies crossed the Rhine River on the 8th of February 1945. German forces suffered heavy losses as American and British armies pushed eastward.
- East Prussian offensiveThe East Prussian offensive began on the 13th of January 1945 with a heavy preparatory bombardment. Soviet command structure placed the main thrust under…
- Spring 1945 offensive in ItalyOperation Grapeshot opened on the 6th of April 1945, when the 15th Allied Army Group unleashed a rolling artillery barrage against German positions along the…
- East Pomeranian offensiveThe East Pomeranian offensive was a Soviet Red Army campaign that changed the final shape of World War Two in Europe. From the 10th of February to the 4th of…
- Ruhr pocketThe Ruhr pocket ended with a field marshal shooting himself in a forest rather than face Allied captivity. In April 1945, some 317,000 German soldiers were…
- Death of Adolf HitlerAdolf Hitler died by his own hand in the Führerbunker in Berlin on the 30th of April 1945, as Soviet artillery shelled the city above him.
- Death of Benito MussoliniBenito Mussolini, the deposed Italian fascist dictator, was summarily executed by an Italian partisan in the village of Giulino di Mezzegra in northern Italy…
- Vienna offensiveJoseph Stalin reached an agreement with the Western Allies prior to April 1945 concerning the relative postwar political influence of each party in much of…
- Western Allied invasion of GermanyThe Western Allied invasion of Germany reached its decisive turning point on the 22nd of March 1945, when American troops crossed the Rhine under a bright…
- Battle of KönigsbergThe Soviet Stavka ordered the East Prussian offensive to prevent flank attacks on armies rushing toward Berlin. Joseph Stalin directed Marshal Konstantin…
- Elbe DayElbe Day, the 25th of April 1945, began with a small boat crossing a river in Germany. First Lieutenant Albert Kotzebue paddled across the Elbe near Strehla…
- Battle of BerlinAt 8:30 in the morning on the 22nd of April 1945, ninety-six shells fell on the centre of Berlin in the space of a few minutes.
- Capture of HamburgThe Western Front collapsed in the spring of 1945. Army Group B, led by Walter Model, fell to American forces near the Rhine River.