WW2
Your World War II Resource
  Biographies
MDSWW-- The Macmillan Dictionary of the Second World War
OCWW2--The Oxford Companion to World War II
OEGWW2--The Oxford Essential Guide to World War II
PWE: The Pacific War Encyclopedia
RMEWW2--Rand McNally Encyclopedia of World War II
WAWW2--The World Almanac of World War II
WW2AVE--World War II: A Visual Encyclopedia
WW2AW--World War II: America at War, 1941-1945
WWWW2: Who was Who in World War II
Benes, Eduard
(1884-1948) President of Czechoslovakia from 1935 until 1938, when he resigned as a protest of the Munich Pact, which began the dismantling of his country by Germany. He then went to the United States, where he lectured at the University of Chicago. When the European War began, he founded the Czech National Committee in France. After the fall of France in June 1940, he moved to London and set up a provisional government, which the Allies recognized. He organized guerrilla resistance and negotiated a Czech-Soviet mutual friendship treaty. Following the liberation of Czechoslovakia in May 1945 he set up a provisional government in Prague. He authorized the forcible expulsion of Germans and Hungarians from what had become again Czech territory, and nationalized banks, coal mines, and major industries. He was elected president in 1946 and served until 1948, when he resigned after Soviet-backed Communists took over the government. [WW2AW]
Bennett, Air Vice-Marshal Donald
(1910-1986) Bennett was an Australian-born RAF officer. In April 1942 he was given command of No. 10 Squadron and while active over Norway he was shot down. He managed to escape to neutral Sweden and after a short period in jail he returned to England. In August 1942 he set up the Pathfinder Force to guide strategic bombers over Germany; this force consisted of two types of aircraft, the finders and the illuminators. The finders found the target area and dropped flares over an area of ten miles radius. The illuminators pinpointed the target area and dropped a concentration of flares over it which gave the following Bomber Force adequate lighting for their operations. Bennett set up the Light Night Strike force of Mosquito bombers and continued to play a vital role in the strategic bombing offensive over Germany. [WWWW2]
Beria, Lavrenty
(1899-1954) Beria was head of the Soviet Intelligence, NKVD, during World War II. He did not have a particularly high standing within the Communist Party organization but Stalin appointed him member of the GKO and he took part in the day-to-day running of the war. Through his intelligence network he often gave Stalin more up-to-date information on activities on the front than front commanders were able to. He was also in charge of partisan activities behind German lines and his units used terror tactics to make the civilian population undertake anti-German action. His NKVD men also ran the prisoner of war camps. [WAWW2]
Bernadotte, Count Folke
(1895-1948) Swedish Red Cross official who acted as a contact between German and Allied officials during the war. Bernadotte, a diplomat and vice president of the Swedish Red Cross, helped to arrange an exchange of disabled British and German prisoners of war, and in the final months of the European war worked to aid the plight of concentration camp victims. He succeeded in keeping 423 Danish Jews alive through much of the war by persuading the Germans to keep them in the so-called "model ghetto" at Theresienstadt, Czechoslovakia. He then got them returned to Denmark just before the war ended. In other negotiations, Bernadotte worked with SS chief Heinrich Himmler, who, hoping to negotiate an end to the war, doled out concessions that saved the lives of many prisoners. In April 1945, Bernadotte carried a surrender offer from Himmler to Allied officials, who turned it down. On Sept. 17, 1948, Bernadotte was assassinated by Jewish terrorists in Palestine while working as a mediator for the United Nations. [WW2AW]
Bernhard, Prince of the Netherlands
(1911-2004) Bernhard was the German-born husband of the Dutch heiress to the throne, Juliana. He had married her in 1937 and renounced his German citizenship. After the German invasion of the Netherlands in 1940 his family left for Canada but he stayed behind and joined Dutch troops fighting in Zeeland. He left for Britain and trained as a pilot in the RAF. In November 1940 Queen Wilhelmina appointed him liaison officer between British and Dutch forces and during the war he was promoted to Lieutenant General and also Rear Admiral. In August 1944 he visited Dutch troops in Normandy and in September he was appointed Commander in Chief of the Netherlands Forces of the Interior. He set up temporary headquarters in Belgium to direct partisan activities, crossed the Albert Canal on 10 September 1944 and returned to the Netherlands secretly. After the war he received national acclaim for his leadership of the partisans. [WWWW2]