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WWII On This Day: January 16

What happened on January 16 during World War II? This date brings together 3 events from 1943 and 1945, with period photographs and links to the full operations documented across WW2 Theatres.

1943
Red Army soldiers carrying a Soviet flag through the ruins of Stalingrad in 1943.
Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R76619 · CC BY-SA 3.0 DE · Source
Battle of Stalingrad

Pitomnik is captured

On 16 January Soviet forces captured Pitomnik, the principal airfield inside the pocket. The field had handled transport aircraft bringing supplies and had also been the main point for flying wounded and selected personnel out of Stalingrad. Its loss forced surviving German aircraft and ground organisations toward Gumrak and smaller improvised landing areas. Landed supply became more difficult, aircraft turnaround deteriorated, and evacuation capacity contracted sharply. Operation Ring continued to push the perimeter eastward. The loss of Pitomnik therefore changed both the map and the pocket’s internal logistics: the remaining…

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1945
Men of the 101st Airborne Division moving toward Bastogne on 19 December 1944 as Allied reserves enter the Ardennes battle.
101st Airborne Division on the road between Bastogne and Houffalize, 19 December 1944 · US Army Signal Corps SC 329953 · NARA · Public domain · Source
The Battle of the Bulge

The junction at Houffalize

On 16 January patrols from First and Third Armies met near Houffalize, closing the gap between the Allied forces attacking from the northern and southern shoulders. The meeting did not trap the bulk of the German army in the western salient because the withdrawal ordered earlier had already removed much of it eastward. What it did was eliminate the geographic separation that had defined Allied command arrangements since December. Houffalize itself had suffered severe destruction from Allied bombing. The junction therefore carried two different meanings: operationally it marked the closing…

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Soviet armour advancing across Poland, January 1945.
Soviet armour in Poland, January 1945 · RIA Novosti archive · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Photograph pending verification
The Vistula–Oder Offensive

Harpe is removed

Hitler relieved Josef Harpe and placed Ferdinand Schörner in command of Army Group A. The change did not restore the front. Ninth, Fourth Panzer and Seventeenth Armies had already lost contact with one another across widening gaps.

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