Photograph: Herschel Grynszpan under arrest after shooting German diplomat Ernst vom Rath, Paris, France, 7 November 1938.
Herschel Grynszpan, whose Jewish parents were among those deported from Germany to Poland, shot the diplomat Ernst vom Rath at the German embassy in Paris. Grynszpan, a 17-year-old Polish Jew, shoots a German Embassy official in Paris. Grynszpan’s family is among those recently deported from Germany to Poland. His victim, Ernst vom Rath, lingers for two days, then dies.
Why Grynszpan, who had fled from Germany to France in 1936, chose vom Rath is not known with certainty, although he was upset over the news that his family was being deported from Germany back to Poland. As far as it can be established, Grynszpan and Rath did not know each other. Most accounts of the shooting state that Grynszpan did not ask for vom Rath by name but only asked to speak to a member of the diplomatic staff. The records were falsified in 1942, and the Germans spread propaganda that Grynszpan’s intention was to kill the Nazi ambassador, Count Johannes von Welczeck.
Grynszpan, who was immediately arrested and confessed, insisted his motives were to avenge the Jewish people for the actions already taken by the Germans. He had a postcard on him written to his parents that read, “With God’s help. My dear parents, I could not do otherwise, may God forgive me, the heart bleeds when I hear of your tragedy and that of the 12,000 Jews. I must protest so that the whole world hears my protest, and that I will do. Forgive me.”
Spanish insurgents capture Mora de Ebro. The port of Tarragona, 40 miles away, is bombed nine times through the night and morning. Republican warplanes carried out the Bombing of Cabra. Spanish rebel dispatches announced tonight the occupation of Mora de Ebro, main base of government forces on the west bank of the Ebro River in eastern Spain. The rebels said the town, which controls a highway and railway, running to the port of Tarragona 40 miles to the northeast, fell after a fierce, day-long battle. Two important bridges spanning the Ebro were reportedly cut. The rebels said government defenders retreated to the east bank of the river, leaving behind a large number of dead. A number of government prisoners were reported captured. The rebels reported they had virtually completely recaptured the west bank of the river, with the government forces split in two and all important rebel objectives reached.
Government troops remaining on the west bank were said to be isolated. The rebels reported they had recaptured about 60 square miles of territory in the bend of the river which had been elaborately fortified by the government. The entry of Mora de Ebro came fourteen weeks after government forces drove this important salient into the rebel lines with a surprise mid-July counterattack. The Spanish government reported its forces had launched a surprise counterattack thirty miles north of the Ebro battlefront, striking at rebel lines ten miles from Lérida. Rebels asserted, however, that the attack was thrown back with heavy losses. One thousand government prisoners were said to have been taken and 500 of the attackers killed. A rebel communiqué reported eighty-six civilians were killed and 117 wounded when nine government planes bombed Cabra, a town thirty-four miles southeast of Cordoba,
The government’s foreign minister charged today that Italians have formed a new division, known as the Green Arrows, to fight in Spain and that German naval bases aided the recent rebel attacks on government ships in the North Sea. Julio Alvarez Del Vayo told newspaper men the new Italian division was, in addition to increases in Italians, aiding the rebels which the government reported last week in a note to Great Britain. Rebel bombings spread terror in Tarragona, a seaport south of Barcelona. Nine times between 7 p. m. Sunday and noon today warplanes appeared. There were eight dead and forty wounded.
Italy organized the Milizia Artiglieria Contraerea, which were anti-aircraft and coastal artillery militia units.
Poland orders the suppression of rioting by ethnic Ukrainians in the Polish Ukraine. Polish officials in Lwow blame German agents for the disorders. They assert Germany is actively supporting the Ukrainian movement for an independent Ukraine state.
King George VI of Great Britain tonight formally accepted President Roosevelt’s invitation to visit the United States next summer. It was said the king will announce his decision in a speech from the throne at tomorrow’s opening of parliament. It was understood that in his reply to Mr. Roosevelt, the king referred to the invitation as a practical expression of good relations between the United States and Britain. King George and Queen Elizabeth will go to Washington, D.C., at the end of their Canadian tour for a short stay at the White House as the President’s guests.
On the eve of election wholesale election frauds were uncovered tonight in Tammany strongholds in New York as the voters prepared to cast their ballots for governor, two United States senators, and the rest of the state offices. The Tammany machine must roll up a huge vote in the city if Governor Herbert H. Lehman, seeking his fourth term, is to defeat District Attorney Thomas E. Dewey, the Republican nominee. Final test polls show Dewey ahead by a margin of around 100,000 votes. He will chalk up a big plurality over Lehman in the upstate districts.
Scores of bench warrants, secretly issued by magistrates, were placed in the hands of police who attempted to serve them on men and women charged with illegal registration in seven Manhattan assembly districts. Those served by the police were arraigned in the magistrates’ courts of the respective districts. Illegal registration is a felony, carrying a possible prison sentence of up to five years on conviction. The violators were in addition to persons indicted in election fraud cases last Thursday and did not include 300 persons already named on the challenge list at District Attorney Dewey’s office. The Honest Ballot association, a nonpartisan organization, has estimated there are 50,000 false registrations in New York City and has taken steps to prosecute 500 persons against whom evidence is available.
Two California politicians sue Harper Knowles for libel because of statements he made before the Dies Committee on Un-American Activities, claiming they were influenced by the Communist Party.
The twenty-first birthday of the communist government of the Soviet Union was observed here today in a reception at the Soviet embassy. During the day President Roosevelt sent a message of congratulations to Moscow on the event. “Upon this national anniversary please accept my felicitations and sincere good wishes for the well being of the people of your country,” said the President’s message to “His Excellency, Mikhail Kalinin, President, All Union Central Executive Committee. Moscow, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.”
The reception at the Soviet embassy was “in celebration of the twenty-first anniversary of the great October socialist revolution.” It was attended by many officials high in the Roosevelt administration. Throughout the day congratulatory messages were received at the embassy. Constantin A. Oumansky, counselor and chargé d’affaires, and Mrs. Oumansky presided at the embassy reception in the absence of Ambassador Alexander Troyanovsky and Mrs. Troyanovsky. Not since the first official reception held here under the Soviet regime by Ambassador and Mrs. Troyanovsky on April 10, 1934, when the old Russian embassy was reopened under a new flag, has an occasion been so thoroughly celebrated.
A federal judge permanently enjoins Mayor “Boss” Hague of Jersey City from forbidding the CIO or ACLU to meet in his city.
Ford and Chrysler Motor Companies promise specific reforms in their financing policies, in return for consent decrees dropping anti-trust suits against them.
Fred Haney is signed to manage the St. Louis Browns.
Klementi E. Voroshilov, Soviet commissar for war, concluded an address at a military review celebrating the 21st anniversary of the communist regime today with a warning to Japan that the next “impudent attack” may bring invasion by the Red Army. The war commissar spoke from the top of the tomb of Nicolai Lenin, from which Dictator Josef Stalin and other Soviet leaders reviewed a pageant of armed power which rolled across Red Square.
Referring to Japan as “our restless and witless neighbor,” Voroshilov said Japanese generals had made an “impudent armed sally” at Changkufeng, on the Siberian border, last July and August. “They displayed their obstinacy and flung large forces of their best troops against the Red Army and despite this were completely routed and suffered a debacle. If the object lessons taught in the vicinity of Lake Khasan [Changkufeng] are insufficient… we must tell them: Gentlemen, whatever you received at Lake Khasan are only ‘flowers,’ and the real ‘fruits’ are still to come.”
Japan forms and capitalizes the North China Development Company to rebuild China. The United States sees this as a rebuke to its October 6 protest.
Japan files a protest, saying a British ship opened fire with machine guns on Japanese troops who were fighting guerrillas. The incident occurred last month, on the Yangtze River.
Two Royal Air Force bombers fly from Egypt to Australia, setting a new distance record of 7,162 miles. Two of the three Wellesley aircraft that had taken off from Ismailia, Egypt two days prior reached Darwin, Australia, breaking the world’s absolute distance record.
Japan suffers a series of earthquakes, two estimated in the 7.6 range, starting on the evening of November 5 through today.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 154.91 (+2.79).
Born:
Jim Kaat, MLB pitcher (Hall of Fame, inducted, 2022; World Series Champions-Cardinals, 1982; All-Star, 1962, 1966, 1975; 25 MLB seasons; Washington Senators, Minnesota Twins, Chicago White Sox, Philadelphia Phillies, New York Yankees, St. Louis Cardinals), in Zeeland, Michigan.
Jake Gibbs, MLB catcher (New York Yankees), in Grenada, Mississippi.
Billy Majors, AFL defensive back (Buffalo Bills), in Lynchburg, Tennessee (d. 1965).
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