World War II Reporters and Photographers.
Latest hand-picked WWII news. See also: WWII Photographers, Female Combat Photographers, WW2 Photos, Pictures, Posters & Propaganda, WW2 Archives, WW2 Footage, Films.
Reporter who was sacked for defying the censors to break news of German WWII surrender receives apology from AP
In the final moments of World War II in Europe, AP correspondent Edward Kennedy gave his news agency perhaps the biggest scoop in its history. He reported - a full day ahead of the competition - that the Germans had surrendered at a former schoolhouse in Reims, France. For this, he was rebuked by the AP, and then fired. Kennedy had defied military censors to get the story out. Winston Churchill and Harry Truman had agreed to suppress news of the capitulation for 36 hours in order to allow Stalin to stage a second surrender ceremony in Berlin.
(dailymail.co.uk)
Female war correspondent Clare Hollingworth, who broke the story that WWII had started, has turned 100
British war correspondent Clare Hollingworth, who broke the story that the Second World War had started, has turned 100 in Hong Kong as her memoir nears completion. The veteran journalist, who witnessed the horrors of war in Vietnam, Algeria, the Middle East, India and Pakistan, is best remembered for her scoop on WW2 in 1939 when she was just a rookie reporter.
Read her interview here.
(abc.net.au)
Frank Fera tried to save famous war correspondent Ernie Pyle
Navy Boatswain 2nd Class Frank Fera famed World War 2 correspondent Ernie Pyle to stay off an area on the Island of Ie Shima, near Okinawa, where two Marines were wounded earlier on April 18, 1945. Fera had befriended Pyle several years earlier when the correspondent was aboard Fera's ship, then the USS Lyon (APA-31). "My commander ordered me to take this man to Oran, Africa. I didn't know who he was." Fera asked the man: "Who are you?" Pyle responded: "I am a reporter." Fera asked: "Do you know Ernie Pyle?" The reporter responded: "I am Ernie Pyle." From then, the two became friends.
(timesunion.com)
Reporter on her first assigment saw German Panzer Corps preparing to attack Poland
Just days before the start of World War II, a car crossed the border of Poland and Nazi Germany. Inside was a 26-year-old reporter who was about to break the scoop of the century - on her first assignment. All of a sudden Claire Hollingworth saw 65 German motorcycle dispatch riders, who overtook her car. Then she saw hundreds of battle tanks, armoured cars and field artillery – von Rundstedt's 10th Army and its Panzer Corps – in the valley below, waiting to attack Poland. She filed the story, that appeared on August 29, on The Daily Telegraph's front page, with headline: "1,000 tanks massed on Polish border. Ten divisions reported ready for swift stroke."
(telegraph.co.uk)
Weller's War: A Legendary Correspondent`s Saga of WWII on Five Continents
In an era when the value of "professional" journalism is being challenged, this book comes as a reminder of what an important part to our understanding of the world a great reporter can offer. George Weller was a foreign correspondent, who spent most of World War II reporting from different frontlines across the continents. Collected together by his son Anthony, Weller's War is an in-depth compilation of his dispatches, book extracts and short stories that range from his landing in Lisbon in 1941 to the fall of Japan in 1945. The power of Weller's reporting lies in his ability to express how the war felt on the ground to those fighting it.
(ft.com)
War correspondent Edmund Townshend was shot down on his first flight in an aircraft
Edmund Townshend, who has died at 96, was a war correspondent shot down over the battle of Arnhem on his first flight in an aircraft; he then dodged Nazi patrols for 4 days before reaching British lines. The Stirling bomber, No 190 Squadron's R for Roger, had just dropped its supplies to troops amid heavy flak, and Townshend was watching from the co-pilot's seat the parachutes floating down when he heard over the intercom: "Engineer officer, come forward and take a look at the port outer motor on fire." Soon "Bale out" order came and, Townshend found himself being bundled to the open hatch in the nose.
(telegraph.co.uk)
Ukraine honours Welsh reporter Gareth Jones who exposed Stalin's starvation of millions
A Welsh journalist who told the world about Stalin's starvation of millions of Ukrainians in the 1930s has been honoured by the Ukraine government. Gareth Jones exposed the 1932-1933 Ukrainian famine caused by the Soviet leader's infamous 5-year plans. Millions of Ukrainians starved to death but the tragedy was suppressed. However Jones wrote about it, and was given the nation's Order of Merit at Westminster in London. Fellow reporter Malcolm Muggeridge was the other reporter to reveal the truth behind the country's enforced starvation and both are now worshiped in Ukraine.
(bbc.co.uk)
Sefton Delmer, the first British journalist to interview Hitler, later delivered war propaganda
Sefton Delmer outgunned his journalist rivals by getting to know Nazi leader Adolf Hitler as he rose to power – and then helped wreck the Nazi war effort with his propaganda tricks and deception. --- The radio station, the brainchild of Sefton Delmer, mixing music with seemingly positive items did not come from Nazi Germany. It was "black propaganda" designed to affect German morale and in reality came from a tightly guarded compound in Milton Keynes. The story of his brilliant battle over the airwaves in World War 2 is revealed in book "Churchill's Wizards" by broadcaster Nicholas Rankin.
(express.co.uk)
J.D. Vanderlaan was was armed with a typewriter, saw Japanese war crimes trials
After the Japanese had surrendered to General Douglas MacArthur and World War II had ended J.D. "Van" Vanderlaan found himself aboard a ship headed to the Philippines, where he was assigned to one of the 3 divisions tasked with catching and trying war criminals. "The apprehension division interviewed Americans who were held as POWs. The interrogation division interviewed Japanese POWs, and then there was the trial division." One of the most notable war crimes of the era was the Bataan Death March. The Beast of Bataan, Japanese General Masaharu Homma, was responsible for the deaths of almost 10,000 American and Filipino prisoners.
(mercurynews.com)
Victory over Nazi Germany was news worth repeating
In the rush to report first word that Nazi Germany had surrendered, the Clarksville Leaf-Chronicle, with complicity from the AP, couldn't say it often enough. Here are excerpts from May 7, 1945: "The war against Germany, the greatest in history, ended today with the unconditional surrender of the once mighty Werhmacht." The problem was that the leaders of the 3 major Allied powers needed time to make simultaneous declarations. But the world could not wait, and neither could the AP, which sent out a dispatch about the surrender, and as a result Allied commanders suspended the AP's filing rights.
(theleafchronicle)
Austrian newsstands selling papers published during the time of Nazi rule
Austrian newsstands are selling papers published during the time of Nazi rule, showing how press saw the era. An image of a procession of uniformed Nazis marching through the Austria's capital fills the front page of the Neuigkeits-Welt-Blatt above the headline "The 'Day of the Legion' in Vienna." "Everywhere heart-felt rallies were given for the legionnaires, the self-sacrificing pioneers of the National Socialist movement in German-Austria," the caption reads. The legionnaires had indeed had their day, as they could finally admit publicly to their loyalty to the previously banned Nazi party.
(dw-world)
WWII soldier Anthony Stanis offers new view on Ernie Pyle`s death
A risky order may have led to the death of WWII reporter Ernie Pyle, said Anthony Stanis, of the 305th regiment. On April 18, 1945 he was ordered to gather his men, as Col. Joseph Coolidge was going to take Pyle to see the 2nd Battalion fight in an attack he had ordered - not to find a new command post (the popular account). Stanis needed 4 hours to round up his men, but Coolidge gave him a "1-second order," so he only had a few of his men. Stanis didn`t like what Pyle was wearing: clean khakis (he was headed home). "Japs love any targets that look different." Stanis didn`t see Pyle with a helmet, although he could have had helmet with him.
(idsnews)
Wartime Columns of Ernie Pyle - Collection of World War II articles
For many journalists, Ernest Taylor Pyle, known as "Ernie," remains to be an icon of excellence decades after his death at the hands of a Japanese machine-gunner. For the last 10 years of his life he wrote feature columns 6 times a week, mainly for Scripps-Howard newspapers. As his fame grew during WWII, other newspapers published his articles. In 1944 Ernie Pyle won a Pulitzer Prize for his stories about the ordinary soldiers fighting in World War II. Here you will find a collection of his wartime columns in both written and spoken versions.
(indiana.edu)
Death photo of WWII reporter Ernie Pyle turns up - Historians surprised
The man in the photo is wearing Army fatigues, boots and helmet, folded hands holding a military cap. Except for a trickle of blood, he could be sleeping. This is not just another fallen GI; it is Ernie Pyle, the most famous WWII correspondent. Now the unpublished photogprah has showed up, 63 years after Ernie Pyle was killed by the Japanese, reminding the world of a war correspondent who told the story of a war from the foxholes. Professor James E. Tobin, author of a biography "Ernie Pyle`s War," and professor Owen V. Johnson who collects Pyle-related letters, said they had never seen the picture. The negative is long lost, and only a few prints exist.
(nydailynews)
Bill Boss, last of CP's Second World War correspondents, dies at 90
Pierre Berton called him one of the toughest war correspondents he ever knew. Gerard William Ramaut (Bill) Boss, known by his wire initials "bb" to generations of Canadian Press reporters and editors, died at 90. Bill Boss was the epitome of foreign correspondents, who roved the world's hotspots in goatee, khakis, silk scarf and black beret. He was among the elite of World War 2 reporters, ranking alongside the likes of Ross Munro, Bill Stewart, Matthew Halton, Peter Stursberg and Charles Lynch. "Bill Boss is the last of the generation of Canadian Press correspondents from WWII."
(canoe)
New Book Features Life of WWII Correspondent William McDougall
William McDougall was a war correspondent who was taken prisoner in World War II. That story became personal when he was captured and spent 3 years in POW camps in the Philippines. He drew pictures, produced a newsletter and kept diaries. Through witnessing death, his faith deepened there. He promised the Lord, "If I Get Out Alive." That's the title of a book that Gary Topping compiled from McDougall's writings.
(ksl)
American correspondents helped change U.S. public opinion (Article no longer available from the original source)
Before he was able to persuade the U.S. to come to Britain's aid during the darkest days of World War Two, British PM Winston Churchill waged a canny campaign to influence the American journalists in England. The stories those journalists wrote spurred the American public to favor activism, as "City at War: London Calling" documents. "City at War" offers footage of war-ravaged London, bombed in May 1941, as its citizens descend into subways at night. The program delivers a rare glimpse of Franklin D. Roosevelt propelling himself between railings in order to walk; it also includes audio of Edward R. Murrow's wartime reporting.
(southbendtribune)
An exhibition records the words of World War II correspondents
When Kenneth Slessor was appointed Australia's official war correspondent in April 1940, he received a letter from the Department of Information: "Please note that we now lay claim to the typewriter which you use to be handed to the Commonwealth at the end of the war to be placed in the national collection of war relics and records. We have the one which Dr Charles Bean used in the 1914-1918 war, so yours will be in good company." Garrie Hutchinson, who has published an anthology of Australian war correspondence "Eyewitness", conceived the exhibition as a tribute to the generation of Australian journalists who covered World War II.
(theage)
A Writer at War: Vasily Grossman with the Red Army 1941-1945 (Article no longer available from the original source)
Grossman chronicled the War in a set of Notebooks, which have now been translated. It is a collection of accounts of soldiers` lives, written by a man who witnessed at first hand the panic retreat in 1941, the defence of Moscow, the battle of Stalingrad and Kursk, and finally the Russian advance into Third Reich. The Notes are antidote to the censured histories and the decades of propaganda that the Red army was prepared for the nazi invasion. "2 May 1945: The day of Berlin`s capitulation. A monstrous concentration of impressions. Fires, smoke... Corpses squashed by tanks. Almost all of them are clutching grenades and sub-machine guns in their hands..."
(b-s)
Welsh journalist who exposed horrors of Stalin
A young Welsh journalist Gareth Richard Vaughan Jones who exposed the man made famines of the Stalinist Government and was later murdered by Japanese bandits was honoured with the the unveiling of a plaque. Traveling in Soviet Ukraine he wrote a number of articles about the man-made famine orchestrated by Stalin in what had been the "breadbasket of Europe." Many millions perished even as the Soviet authorities denied that a famine was raging, and continued to export grain. They were joined in their cover up by some Western journalists, including the now notorious Walter Duranty of The New York Times.
(newswales)
Guernica honours Times man for telling its story
George Steer, the journalist for The Times whose report of the German bombing of Guernica outraged the world, is honoured in the Basque town where the massacre happened. Exactly 69 years after the Luftwaffe Condor Legion squadron attacked the civilian population of the Basque town on a busy market day, a bronze bust of Steer will be unveiled and a street named after him. Steer was among the first journalists to reach Guernica just hours after more than 1,600 civilians were killed by the bombing and subsequent firestorm on April 26, 1937.
(timesonline)
The Flying Typewriters - William Warren Wade
William Warren Wade was a war correspondent during WWII. Long before journalists were embedded with troops, he was among a group of 8 distinguished reporters selected in 1943 to fly with the 8th Air Force on bombing missions over Europe. The group was initially called "The Legion of the Doomed" and "The Flying Typewriters," but the reporters eventually settled on "The Writing 69th." Although the Writing 69th reporters were scheduled to fly on several missions each, the program came to an abrupt end when a reporter died in a midair explosion after his plane was attacked by German fighters.
(sfgate)
Out of the ruins of Stalingrad - Life and Fate
Through the winter of 1942-43, Vasily Grossman reported from the craters and cellars of the Stalingrad front line as the besieged Russians turned the tide and encircled Hitler's forces. His writings made him a national icon. After the German surrender, Grossman rode west with the Red Army, providing the first and most authoritative eyewitness report from Treblinka. In May 1945 Grossman was at the Brandenburg Gate as Berlin fell. In Hitler's bunker he pocketed stationery from the Führer's own desk for souvenirs.
(guardian)
Life after wartime - Photos and writing reveal the emotions (Article no longer available from the original source)
John Swope's photos and writing reveal the emotions of the victors and the vanquished in post-WWII Japan. WWII ended Aug. 15, 1945, when, reeling from the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Emperor Hirohito announced Japan's surrender. Two weeks later, the U.S. Navy, deployed its first boat to the Japanese shore to begin the liberation of prisoners of war. Among the handful of officers aboard this boat was photographer John Swope. Swope's record of this landing and of the three weeks he spent touring camps around the country are resurfacing now in an exhibition at the UCLA Hammer Museum — "A Letter From Japan: The Photographs of John Swope."
(calendarlive)
Media baron Maxwell was investigated for war crime
Media baron Robert Maxwell was under investigation for war crimes just before he mysteriously drowned while yachting in the Atlantic. Detectives were getting ready to interview Maxwell about an allegation that he killed an unarmed German civilian in 1945 while he was a captain in the British army. In a letter to his wife Maxwell recounts how he summoned the town's mayor, whom he told to go back and tell the soldiers to surrender or face destruction. The letter said the mayor returned to say the soldiers agreed to the demands. Maxwell wrote: "But as soon as we marched off, a German tank opened fire on us. Luckily, he missed, so I shot the mayor and withdrew."
(guardian)
Newly donated papers shed light on Murrow war broadcasts
The WWII radio broadcasts of Edward R. Murrow are now regarded as high points in the history of journalism, vivid examples of how the spoken word can bring home events of infinite horror and complexity from thousands of miles away. But when it came to preserving Murrow's scripts from that time, few people had the foresight or the luck to think of history. Some materials were lost when the Germans bombed CBS offices in London. When war came, he immortalized himself for his detailed, emotional radio broadcasts from London during the German air raids, with bombs often exploding in the background.
(frankwbaker.com)
See also:
WWII Photographers
Female Combat Photographers
WW2 Photos, Pictures
Posters & Propaganda
WW2 Archives
WW2 Footage, Films.