Dashed left edge = started before September 1941 ·
Dashed right edge = ongoing beyond September 1941
Events in September 1941 18
1869 – 1941Hans Spemann (1869-1941)Died 9 September 1941, aged 72Hans Spemann was a German embryologist who discovered embryonic induction and the organiser effect. He won the 1935 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
1941Dwight D. Eisenhower in the Louisiana ManeuversHis planning in the largest US army exercise to date wins him promotion and a post in the War Department.
1941Battle of KievThe largest encirclement in military historyGerman armies encircled the Soviet Southwestern Front east of Kyiv, and the city fell on 19 September. More than 600,000 Soviet soldiers were taken prisoner.
1941Anglo-Soviet invasion of IranBritain and the USSR secure Iran's oil and supply routesBritish and Soviet forces invaded Iran to secure its oilfields and a supply corridor to the Soviet Union. Reza Shah abdicated on 16 September in favour of his son Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
1941Roald Dahl is invalided homeBlackouts and severe headaches from the crashHe was sent back to Britain and posted to a training camp at Uxbridge.
1941The Copenhagen meeting with BohrWhat was said has been argued over ever sinceThe friendship did not survive it. Michael Frayn built a play out of the three possible versions.
1941Jews in Germany ordered to wear the yellow starPolice decree requires the Star of David badgeA Reich police decree required Jews in Germany aged six and over to wear a yellow Star of David marked "Jude" in public. It took effect on 19 September, weeks before mass deportations to the east began.
1941First Zyklon B gassing at AuschwitzSS tests poison gas on prisonersIn the basement of Block 11 at Auschwitz, the SS killed around 600 Soviet prisoners of war and 250 sick prisoners with Zyklon B. The gas was later used for mass murder at Auschwitz-Birkenau.
1941 – 1944Siege of Leningrad begins872-day siege — 1 million civilians dieThe German siege of Leningrad began on September 8, 1941, and lasted 872 days until January 27, 1944. Approximately one million Soviet civilians died from starvation, disease and bombardment.
1941Siege of Leningrad beginsGerman and Finnish forces cut off the cityThe capture of Shlisselburg on 8 September severed Leningrad's last land link with the rest of the Soviet Union. The siege lasted nearly 900 days, and around a million civilians died, most of them from starvation.
1941 – 2011Dennis Ritchie (1941-2011)Died 12 October 2011, aged 70The American computer scientist created the C programming language and co-created the Unix operating system at Bell Labs. His work underpins much of modern software and computing infrastructure. He died at his home in New Jersey shortly after the death of Steve Jobs, which drew comparatively little public attention.
1941Otis Redding born in Dawson, GeorgiaRaised in MaconGrows up in Macon, singing in church.
1941 – 2002Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002)Died 20 May 2002, aged 60The American paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould proposed, with Niles Eldredge, the theory of punctuated equilibrium, which holds that species change in rapid bursts rather than gradually. His monthly essays in Natural History magazine, collected in books such as The Panda's Thumb, made him one of the best-known science writers of his time. He taught at Harvard and fought a long battle with cancer.
1941Pentagon construction beginsGround broken for the US War Department headquartersConstruction of the Pentagon began in Arlington, Virginia, to bring the scattered War Department together in one building. It was finished in January 1943 and was the largest office building in the world.
1941 – 2026David Clayton-ThomasDavid Clayton-Thomas (born David Henry Thomsett, 13 September 1941, Surrey, England — died 25 June 2026, Toronto, Canada) was the Canadian singer and songwriter who fronted Blood, Sweat & Tears at the peak of their fame, lending his husky, soulful tenor to some of the most distinctive recordings of the late 1960s. He wrote 'Spinning Wheel,' one of three BS&T songs to reach No.2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1969. The band's self-titled 1968 album won the Grammy for Album of the Year — beating the Beatles' Abbey Road. He was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. His story — from English-born juvenile delinquent who found a guitar in a jail cell to rock superstar to lifelong working musician — is one of the more remarkable in Canadian music history.
1941David Clayton-Thomas born in Surrey, England — wartimeDavid Henry Thomsett is born on 13 September 1941 in Surrey (Kingston upon Thames), England, at the height of World War II. His father is a Canadian soldier; his mother an English music student who met his father while entertaining troops. The wartime circumstance of his birth — England under the Blitz, a Canadian soldier, a musical mother — sets up the transatlantic identity that will define his career. He will spend his life between Canada and America, never quite belonging entirely to either.
1941 – 2026Umberto Bossi (1941-2026)Died 19 March 2026, aged 84Italian politician who led the Northern League from 1991 to 2012, campaigning for autonomy for the north of the country.
1941Babi Yar massacreNearly 34,000 Jews murdered outside KyivOver two days, Einsatzgruppe C and its auxiliaries shot 33,771 Jewish men, women and children in the Babi Yar ravine on the edge of Kyiv. It was one of the largest single massacres of the Holocaust.