KNIL Soldiers with Captured Japanese Flag

Image size: 1600 x 1121 pixel. 583 KB

Date: Sunday, 1 March 1942
Place: Koningsplein Station, Batavia, Dutch East Indies
Photographer: Unknown

Mix Soldiers (European and locals) of the 10th Battalion / 1st Infantry Regiment / 1st Infantry Division of K.N.I.L. (Koninklijk Nederlandsch-Indisch Leger) after the retreat from Zuid-Sumatra at the Koningsplein Station in Batavia on 1 March 1942. Despite this retreat the soldiers pose triumphantly with a Japanese flag seized between Palembang and Oosthaven. The soldier on the right is wearing the K.N.I.L. helmet with emblem manufactured at Verblifa. The rest of the soldiers are wearing the K.N.I.L. helmet without emblem manufactured at Milsco. At that time, the battalion was commanded by Major de Vries; the regiment was commanded by Colonel Struivenberg; the division was commanded by Major-General W. Schilling, and the overal K.N.I.L. forces was commanded by Lieutenant-General Hein Ter Poorten.

Source :

"The Dutch Steel Helmet 1916-1946" by Kevin de Joode

https://www.kaskus.co.id/thread/54091a8dbecb17e1358b456d/order-of-battle-knil-saat-menjelang-invansi-jepang-ke-hindia-belanda/

Indian Sailor Begs for Water After his Ship was Sunk

Image size: 1600 x 1442 pixel. 496 KB
Date: Friday, 16 January 1942
Place: Off the Sumatra coast, Indian Ocean
Photographer: Frank Noel

Indian sailor begs for water after his ship was sunk in the Indian Ocean. This photo was taken by photographer Frank "Pappy" Noel. Noel was in Singapore at the time of the Japanese attack and is able to board a British vessel, S. S. Jalarajan (5,102 tons displacement) of the Scindia Steam Navigation Company which leaves for Calcutta, India. About 270 miles (434.5 kilometers) west of Sumatra, the ship was attacked by Imperial Japanese Navy submarine I-65 (later I-165). Five crewmembers were killed. Noel and the others take to lifeboats, where they drift for five days. Two days after the sinking his lifeboat encountered another lifeboat, also victims of the Japanese. The men asked for water but Noel's boat had none. The men were rescued and taken to Sumatra and Noel was able to get out before the Japanese captured the island. He won the Pulitzer Prize for photography in 1943 for this image. Thousands of men, women and children in hundreds of cargo ships and small craft sought to escape the advancing Japanese, fleeing from Java, Sumatra and Singapore. Japanese submarines, surface ships and aircraft sank many of them. Historical research reconstructing the transits and losses of these vessels is ongoing; many of the ships were lost with no record of their transit. Bodies washed up, one as far away as Christmas Island. Other Allied soldiers and civilians who survived being sunk were captured as prisoners of war or executed by the Japanese. 

Source:

http://www.worldwar2database.com/gallery3/index.php/wwii1142

U-861 at Trondheim Submarine Base

Image size: 1600 x 963 pixel. 468 KB
Date: Thursday, 19 April 1945
Place: Trondheim, Sør-Trøndelag county, Norway
Photographer: Unknown

Monsoon boat U-861 was in rather battered condition when it sailed into the submarine base in Trondheim, Norway, on 19 April 1945. Behind the boat lay a 13 ½ week trip home following its departure from the base in Surabaya (Java, Indonesia) on 15 January the same year. The big Type IX D2 boat had departed Kiel on its first sortie on 20 April 1944 under the command of Ritterkreuzträger (Knight’s Cross wearer) Kapitänleutnant Jürgen Oesten. Initially assign to an area of operations off the Brazilian coast and then the east coast of Africa, U-861 sank four ships totaling 22,040 GRT and damaged the 8,139 ton tanker “Daronia” before arriving at the island base of Penang (Malaysia) on 23 September 1944. By then the boat had been at sea for five months! The U-boat stayed in Penang until 1 November 1944, undergoing necessary maintenance and allowing the crew time to rest. On 1 November U-861 left Penang for Surabaya, arriving there on 5 November after a stop in Singapore. The boat remained there until it left for Germany on 15 January 1945. It carried a load of vital war materials, for example molybdenum ore, which was stowed in zinc containers in the ballast keel, and raw rubber. Armament was limited to two torpedoes for self defense. The safe return of the boat was the first priority, not the destruction of enemy shipping. This was jeopardized during the final phase of the journey when U-861 ran into pack ice south of Greenland. The resulting “sheet metal damage” was minimal, however, and thanks to the experience of the captain and crew the boat reached its destination albeit with just 800 liters of diesel in its fuel bunkers! Note the repainted area around the Panther emblem. Georg Högel’s book “Embleme, Wappen, Malings” depicts the emblem as a panther climbing a globe. According to Jürgen Oesten, the globe was never part of the emblem. Part of the word “Lekas” is visible on the conning tower. The word is Malay in origin and means “fast”.

Source:

"U-Boot im Focus" magazine 2nd edition - 2007

Coast Guard LST Follows LCIs to Cape Sansapor

Image size: 1600 x 1253 pixel. 774 KB
Date: Saturday, 29 July 1944
Place: Cape Sansapor, Vogelkop Peninsula, New Guinea
Photographer: Photographer's Mate First Class Harry R. Watson

At the end of July 1944, US Army General Douglas MacArthur sent an amphibious expeditionary force to Cape Sansapor, New Guinea. By doing so he made a 200-mile jump from his previous most advanced position. The Coast Guard-manned LSTs 18, 22, 26, 66, 67, 68, 170, 202, 204 and 206 all took part in the landings and the follow-up activity. The Coast Guard-manned frigates Bisbee, Coronado, Eugene, Gallup, Glendale, Long Beach, San Pedro and Van Buren performed offshore patrols during the landings. MacArthur's planners sped up the operations in New Guinea, bypassing Japanese strongholds. Cape Sansapor was selected because of its ability to support Tank Landing Ships (LSTs). Here elements of the US Army's 6th Infantry Division, their anti-aircraft guns manned in case of air attack, follow in the wake of Infantry Landing Craft (LCIs) to the Vogelkop Peninsula. 

Source:

NARA (National Archives) Record Group 26: Records of the U.S. Coast Guard, 1785 - 2005 (ARC identifier: 355). Series: Activities, Facilities, and Personalities, compiled 1886 - 1967 (ARC identifier: 513164). NAIL Control Number: NWDNS-26-G-2839

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Columns_of_troop-packed_LCIs_trail_in_the_wake_of_a_Coast_Guard-manned_LST_en_route_for_the_invasion_of_Cape..._-_NARA_-_513184.tif

http://www.worldwar2database.com/gallery3/index.php/wwii1049