Helluva invention. It was vitally needed as the Japanese were in possession of almost all major Pacific ports with dry dock facilities.
According to the caption it is USS Idaho entering the dock.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.etherington/frame.htm
April 3rd, 1943 (SATURDAY)
UNITED KINGDOM: Focke-Wulf FW190 fighter bombers raid Eastbourne and strafe streets crowded with shoppers.
NORTH AFRICA: Lieutenant G. F. Barnes, a Londoner, drove into the German lines after a British infantry raid in the Medjez area and, helped by the Germans, evacuated a seriously wounded man and his two dead companions.
The raiding force had reached its objective and was about to withdraw with prisoners when the Germans suddenly counter-attacked. The action was seen by Lieutenant Barnes, a regimental medical officer, who was a little over a mile away. He jumped into an ambulance and flying the Red Cross pennant, made for the German positions.
He was about 20 yards from the enemy positions when the German beckoned him to come behind their lines. A German officer approached and, after exchanging salutes, Lieutenant Barnes indicated that he wished to take back the crew of a knocked-out Bren-gun carrier.
The German officer ordered his men to place the members of the crew on stretchers and carry them to the ambulance. With the officer at the wheel, the ambulance was driven back a short distance and the wounded soldier, whose injuries included a broken leg, was attended to. The Germans showed a scrupulously correct attitude to the British Red Cross men.
Shortly before Lieutenant Barnes drove off on his errand of mercy the enemy had opened mortar fire on positions near the ambulance, which was standing head-on to the German lines. The Red Cross symbols on its sides could therefore not be seen and it was mistaken for a military vehicle. Another ambulance was placed in position where the Germans could see the symbols. The mortar fire ceased. - Reuter.
Manchester Guardian
(Despatch from the Northern Tunisian Front)
TUNISIA: Ninth Air Force B-25’s the bomb El Maou Airdrome in the Sfax area during the night of 2/3 April. P-40’s fly fighter-bomber missions north of Gabes.
Northwest African Air Force fighters strafe tanks and trucks at Kebira and Jabal Nasir Allah, and claim 13 Junkers Ju-87s downed in aerial combat over Djebel Berda. B-25s bomb the airfield at Sainte-Marie du Zit. Western Desert Air Force light bombers hit motor transport and gun positions north of Oued el Akarit. (Jack McKillop)
BURMA:17 Tenth Air Force B-25 Mitchells, operating in 2 forces, bomb the Myitnge bridge, scoring hits on both approaches. (Jack McKillop)
BISMARCK ARCHIPELAGO: Fifth Air Force B-17s attack shipping and the airfield at Kavieng on New Ireland Island sinking a transport while single B-24 Liberators bomb Kavieng and damage a heavy cruiser and a destroyer. (Jack McKillop)
NEW GUINEA: Fifth Air Force A-20 Havocs hit Kitchen Creek while single B-24s bomb Korindindi. (Jack McKillop)
PACIFIC OCEAN: Two USN submarines sink a fleet tanker and a submarine chaser. The latter vessel is sunk by USS Pickerel (SS-177) which is subsequently sunk off northern Honshu, Japan. (Jack McKillop)
U.S.A.: Actor Conrad Veidt dies in Hollywood of a heart attack. Veidt played Major Heinrich Strasser in the film “Casablanca” and died without knowing how great the film would be rated in future years. (Jack McKillop)
Aircraft carrier USS Chapin Bay (CVE-63) is renamed USS Midway. (Dave Shirlaw)
ATLANTIC OCEAN: German submarine U-156 sinks an armed US tanker off Key West, Florida. (Jack McKillop)
The compassion shown by the Germans to the British medical officer was fairly commonplace in Africa; by both sides. These niceties were not observed on the Eastern Front, nor by the Japanese. American corpsmen learned to go into battle without their Red Cross insignia and armed. The Japanese deliberately targeted them.
I had assumed, without checking, that Dick Jensen was an invented character for the movie Patton. Sad to learn it was based on an actual officer and true story.
Helluva invention. It was vitally needed as the Japanese were in possession of almost all major Pacific ports with dry dock facilities.
According to the caption it is USS Idaho entering the dock.