istoryworld
Events relating to europe
The first V-2 rocket lands on London, killing three people in Chiswick
The first of many thousands of war brides arrive in Canada, mainly from Great Britain
Bulgaria changes to the Allied side and Communists take control in Sofia
7500 British troops, trapped on the far side of the Rhine at Arnhem, are captured by the Germans
Hungary signs an armistice with the USSR
Athens is liberated and the Greek government-in-exile returns, with George Papandreou at its head
Tito and his partisans, with Soviet assistance, liberate Belgrade
Civil war breaks out in Greece between rival groups of partisans resisting demobilization
The Germans stage a counter-attack in the Ardennes region before being pushed back in the Battle of the Bulge
With Budapest still in German hands, the Soviets set up a provisional Hungarian government, at Debrecen
The Soviet army surrounds the Hungarian capital, Budapest
Harold Macmillan's responsibilties in Yugoslavia involve him, with others, in subsequently controversial decisions about the 'victims of Yalta'
After Soviet troops liberate Hungary, Raoul Wallenberg is abducted and vanishes
The Red Army liberates the surviving prisoners at Auschwitz, who include the Italian novelist Primo Levi
Gamal Abdel Nasser and army colleagues form a secret party, the Free Officers, to fight for an independent Egyptian republic
English painter Francis Bacon creates a sensation with his Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion
English author Nancy Mitford has her first success with the novel The Pursuit of Love
Benjamin Britten's opera Peter Grimes has its premiere in London, at the Sadler's Wells theatre
Jean-Louis Barrault directs and stars in the film Les Enfants du Paradis
Alexander Solzhenitsyn is sentenced to eight years in a Soviet labour camp for critizing Stalin in a private correspondence
Demonstrations in Algeria spark off an uprising against French rule, which is put down with the loss of perhaps 10,000 Muslim lives
Igor Stravinsky's Symphony in Three Movements, premiered in New York, derives from music written for or inspired by films
Achmed Sukarno makes a unilateral declaration of Indonesian independence, and leads the subsequent struggle against the Dutch
British chemist Dorothy Hodgkin describes the molecular structure of penicillin
Le Corbusier's use of béton brut (raw concrete) introduces Brutalism
