WHAT ALL HAPPENED APRIL TO MAY 1942
Find out what all happened April to May 1942

World War II: In the aftermath of the Battle of the Coral Sea, Task Force 16 heads to Pearl Harbor. (19. May 1942)

Mexico enters World War II on the side of the Allies. (22. May 1942)

World War II: in the United States, a bill creating the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) is signed into law. (15. May 1942)

The Holocaust: 1,500 Jews are sent to gas chambers in Auschwitz. (12. May 1942)

The Steel Workers Organizing Committee disbands, and a new trade union, the United Steelworkers, is formed. (22. May 1942)

French prisoner of war General Henri Giraud escapes from his castle prison in Festung Königstein. (17. April 1942)

Pierre Laval becomes Prime Minister of Vichy France. (18. April 1942)

World War II: The Japanese take Bataan in the Philippines. (8. April 1942)

World War II: Ted Williams of the Boston Red Sox enlists in the United States Marine Corps as a flight instructor. (22. May 1942)

Benxihu Colliery accident in Manchukuo leaves 1549 Chinese miners dead. (26. April 1942)

World War II: The Thai Phayap Army invades the Shan States during the Burma Campaign. (10. May 1942)

William Faulkner's collections of short stories, Go Down, Moses, is published. (11. May 1942)

World War II: The Battle of the Coral Sea begins with an attack by aircraft from the United States aircraft carrier USS Yorktown on Japanese naval forces at Tulagi Island in the Solomon Islands. The Japanese forces had invaded Tulagi the day before. (4. May 1942)

Holocaust: The SS murders 588 Jewish residents of the Podolian town of Zinkiv (Khmelnytska oblast, Ukraine). The Zoludek Ghetto (in Belarus) is destroyed and all its inhabitants murdered or deported. (9. May 1942)

World War II: The U.S. tanker Virginia was torpedoed in the mouth of the Mississippi River by the German U-Boat U-507. (12. May 1942)

World War II: 1000 British bombers launch a 90-minute attack on Cologne, Germany. (30. May 1942)

World War II: The Doolittle Raid on Japan. Tokyo, Yokohama, Kobe and Nagoya are bombed. (18. April 1942)

World War II: in retaliation for the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, Nazis in Czechoslovakia kill over 1,800 people. (28. May 1942)

World War II: In Poland, the Majdan-Tatarski ghetto is established, situated between the Lublin Ghetto and a Majdanek subcamp. (19. April 1942)

World War II: The Battle of Bataan/Bataan Death March – United States forces surrender on the Bataan Peninsula. The Japanese Navy launches an air raid on Trincomalee in Ceylon (Sri Lanka); Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Hermes and Royal Australian Navy Destroyer HMAS Vampire are sunk off the island's east coast. (9. April 1942)