Date in year · 1944 · The 1940s

August 5, 1944

On August 5, 1944, world War II: At least 1,104 Japanese POWs in Australia attempt to escape from a camp at Cowra, New South Wales; 545 temporarily succeed but are later either killed, commit suicide, or are recaptured. Kathy Acker, Philip Jackson, James Heckman would arrive in the same year.

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1944

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Featured · August 5, 1944

World War II: At least 1,104 Japanese POWs in Australia attempt to escape from a camp at Cowra, New South Wales; 545 temporarily succeed but are later either killed, commit suicide, or are recaptured.

Japanese people are people or ethnic groups identified with the Japanese archipelago. 1% of the population of the country of Japan. 9 million Japanese people are residents of Japan, and there are approximately five million members of the Japanese diaspora, known as Nikkeijin (日系人).

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Around 1944

The year in brief

1944 (MCMXLIV) was a leap year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1944th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 944th year of the 2nd millennium, the 44th year of the 20th century, and the 5th year of the 1940s decade.

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What happened

On August 5, 1944

1944 World War II: At least 1,104 Japanese POWs in Australia attempt to escape from a camp at Cowra, New South Wales; 545 temporarily succeed but are later either killed, commit suicide, or are recaptured.

Japanese people are people or ethnic groups identified with the Japanese archipelago. 1% of the population of the country of Japan. 9 million Japanese people are residents of Japan, and there are approximately five million members of the Japanese diaspora, known as Nikkeijin (日系人).
1944 World War II: Polish insurgents liberate a German labor camp (Gęsiówka) in Warsaw, freeing 348 Jewish prisoners.

Type of detention facility

A labor camp or work camp is a detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor as a form of punishment. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons. Conditions at labor camps vary widely depending on the operators.
1944 World War II: The Nazis begin a week-long massacre of between 40,000 and 50,000 civilians and prisoners of war in Wola, Poland.

1944 extermination of civilians by Nazi forces in Wola, Warsaw, Poland

The Wola massacre was the systematic killing of between 40,000 and 50,000 Poles in the Wola neighbourhood of the Polish capital city, Warsaw, by the German Waffen-SS, Ordnungpolizei, the Azerbaijani Legion, Sicherheitdienst and the SS-Sonderregiment Dirlewanger, which took place from 5 to 12 August 1944. The massacre was ordered by Heinrich Himmler, who directed to kill "anything that moves" to stop the Warsaw Uprising soon after it began.