Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 13, 1994 TAG: 9404120066
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Greg Edwards
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Selective Service headquarters, taking steps to hasten the delivery of young men to the armed services, ordered postponement of the drafting of all men 26 and over who were in war-important jobs, even those already ordered to report for induction. The delay would remain in effect until the drafting of men under 26 had been completed.
An American combat patrol blasting its way forward with hand grenades northwest of Padigilone gave the Allied forces their first gain on the Anzio beachhead in two weeks.
With the destruction of his 30th Nazi plane, Capt. Don S. Gentile of Piqua, Ohio, became the first American ace of the war to be formally recognized as having beat Capt. Eddie Rickenbacker's World War I record.
The Republican Party invited women for the first time to help frame its national platform. National Chairman Harrison Spangler recommended that each state select one man and one woman to serve on the platform-writing resolutions committee.
In an effort to heal the wounds in the Democratic Party, President Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote Sen. Guy Gillette, D-Iowa, congratulating him on his decision to run again for the Senate. Gillette was among party leaders whom Roosevelt had tried to purge in 1938 because of their opposition to his policies.
The Germans had employed five of their remote-controlled Goliath tanks at the Anzio beachhead with little success. All of the midget tanks, loaded with 130 pounds of high explosive, were blown up before they reached Allied lines.
Pvt. Lincoln Vest of the Terry's Fork section of Floyd County was reported killed in action in Italy. Another 12 Virginians were reported killed and 12 missing in action in various war zones around the world.
Marine platoon Sgt. Irvin C. Rogers of Saltville received his second commendation for action in battle, this time for his courage and leadership in leading a raider platoon to capture a strong Japanese position near Enogai, New Georgia.
Secretary of State Cordell Hull during an Easter Sunday radio address appealed to the American people not to let election year politics destroy the nation's unity and its effectiveness in world affairs. He called for a postwar policy of international cooperation to maintain the peace.
Gen. Charles De Gaulle fired Gen. Henri Honore Giraud as commander-in-chief of free-French forces, an act that Giraud bitterly opposed. Giraud said De Gaulle had acted contrary to French law.
The Red Army captured the Black Sea Port of Odessa after two days of fierce fighting.
Mexican President Manuel Avila Camacho was fired upon by a uniformed officer of his staff, but he captured the assailant himself and escaped with a bullet hole in his coat.
Under constant attack from the land and air, 40,000 Japanese on New Britain were retreating to Rabaul on the northeastern tip of the island for a final stand.
2nd Lt. Ernest Childers, 26, a sharp-shooting American Indian from Broken Arrow, Okla., received the Congressional Medal of Honor, only the second awarded so far in the Italian campaign. Although being treated for a fractured foot two weeks after Allied landings at Salerno, Childers killed 17 Germans while rescuing his pinned-down battalion.
The Army and Navy under executive order by President Roosevelt seized the plants of three war contractors, who had not paid wage increases approved by the War Labor Board. Meanwhile, United Mine Workers President John L. Lewis said miners were the victims of a conspiracy by Southern coal operators to rob them of $18 million in wages they had earned.
National D-Day Memorial Foundation is selling commemorative bumper stickers for $1 and enameled pins for $5 as fund-raisers. Write the foundation at 2551 Sweetbrier Ave. S.W., Roanoke, Va. 24015, or call 774-7045.
by CNB