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WWII On This Day: June 18

What happened on June 18 during World War II? This date brings together 3 events from 1940, 1942 and 1944, with period photographs and links to the full operations documented across WW2 Theatres.

1940
German troops in northern France during the campaign of 1940.
Bundesarchiv Bild 101I-299-1808-10A · CC BY-SA 3.0 DE · Source
Battle of France 1940

Charles de Gaulle calls for continued French resistance

Charles de Gaulle broadcast from London on 18 June, calling on French soldiers, engineers and workers to continue the war alongside Britain and the resources of the French Empire. The appeal followed his departure from France as the Pétain government sought armistice terms. Its immediate audience was limited, but subsequent broadcasts and political organisation gave the date a central place in the history of Free France. The campaign had now produced competing claims about France's wartime future: the government seeking a ceasefire from Bordeaux and a movement abroad preparing to…

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1942
Food being delivered to besieged Leningrad by barge across Lake Ladoga, 1 September 1942. It illustrates the summer water-supply system that replaced the winter ice road.
Food being delivered to besieged Leningrad by barge across Lake Ladoga, 1 September 1942. It illustrates the summer water-supply system that replaced the winter ice road. RIA Novosti archive #310 / Boris Kudoyarov · CC BY-SA 3.0 Source
The Siege of Leningrad

A pipeline and power cables cross Ladoga

The fuel pipeline laid across Lake Ladoga began operating on 18 June 1942, reducing the volume of liquid fuel that had to be carried by boat or road. Engineers then laid underwater power cables from the Volkhov system; by September electricity from the mainland again reached Leningrad. Together the projects strengthened the city's industrial and military endurance during the second year of the blockade.

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1944
The British Army in Normandy, 1944.
The British Army in Normandy, 1944. IWM B 8146 · IWM Non-Commercial Licence Source
Operation Overlord

The turn north on Cherbourg

With the peninsula cut, VII Corps swung north with three divisions abreast towards Cherbourg. Montgomery issued a directive confirming the two-part shape of the campaign: take Cherbourg to get a port, hold the German armour in the east. German forces north of the cut had no line to fall back to and were being pressed into the fortified perimeter of the city itself.

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