1944

1944 (MCMXLIV) was a leap year starting on Saturday in 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.

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	19th century – 20th century – 21st century
Decades:	1910s  1920s  1930s  – 1940s –  1950s  1960s  1970s
Years:	1941 1942 1943 – 1944 – 1945 1946 1947

1944 in other calendars

Gregorian calendar	1944 MCMXLIV
Ab urbe condita	2697
Armenian calendar	1393 ԹՎ ՌՅՂԳ
Assyrian calendar	6694
Bahá'í calendar	100–101
Balinese saka calendar	1865–1866
Bengali calendar	1351
Berber calendar	2894
British Regnal year	8 Geo. 6 – 9 Geo. 6
Buddhist calendar	2488
Burmese calendar	1306
Byzantine calendar	7452–7453
Chinese calendar	癸未年 (Water Goat) 4640 or 4580     — to — 甲申年 (Wood Monkey) 4641 or 4581
Coptic calendar	1660–1661
Discordian calendar	3110
Ethiopian calendar	1936–1937
Hebrew calendar	5704–5705
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	2000–2001
- Shaka Samvat	1865–1866
- Kali Yuga	5044–5045
Holocene calendar	11944
Igbo calendar	944–945
Iranian calendar	1322–1323
Islamic calendar	1363–1364
Japanese calendar	Shōwa 19 (昭和１９年)
Javanese calendar	1874–1875
Juche calendar	33
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 13 days
Korean calendar	4277
Minguo calendar	ROC 33 民國33年
Nanakshahi calendar	476
Thai solar calendar	2487
Tibetan calendar	阴水羊年 (female Water-Goat) 2070 or 1689 or 917     — to — 阳木猴年 (male Wood-Monkey) 2071 or 1690 or 918

Events

• January 4 – The Battle of Monte Cassino begins.
• January 5 – Murder of Danish playwright Kaj Munk
• January 17 – British forces, in Italy, cross the Garigliano River.
• January 17 – Meat Rationing ends in Australia
• January 20 – The Royal Air Force drops 2,300 tons of bombs on Berlin; the U.S. Army 36th Infantry Division, in Italy, attempts to cross the Rapido River.
• January 22 – Allies begin Operation Shingle, the assault on Anzio, Italy. The U.S. Army 45th Infantry Division stand their ground at Anzio against violent assaults for 4 months.
• January 27 – The two year Siege of Leningrad is lifted.
• January 29 – The Battle of Cisterna takes place.
• January 30 – United States troops invade Majuro, Marshall Islands.
• January 31 – American forces land on Kwajalein Atoll and other islands in the Japanese-held Marshall Islands.

Births

• January 9 - Jimmy Page, English guitarist (Led Zeppelin)
• February 23 – Johnny Winter
• March 1 - Roger Daltrey, English singer (The Who)
• March 28 – Ken Howard (d. 2016)
• April 7 – Gerhard Schröder
• April 9 – Leila Khaled
• May 8 – Gary Glitter
• May 14 – George Lucas
• May 19 – Peter Mayhew (d. 2019)
• June 4 - Michelle Phillips, American singer and musician (The Mamas & the Papas)
• July 13 – Ernő Rubik
• July 19 - Tim McIntire (d. 1986)
• August 21 - Peter Weir, Australian director
• September 10 – Judit Pogány, Hungarian actress
• September 18 - Veronica Carlson, British actor (d. 2022)
• October 9 - John Entwistle, English bass guitarist (The Who) (d. 2002)
• October 24 – Ray Downs
• November 2 - Michael Buffer, American ring announcer
• November 2 - Keith Emerson, English keyboardist (Emerson, Lake & Palmer) (d. 2016)
• November 10 - Sir Tim Rice, English lyricist
• November 25 – Ben Stein

Deaths

• 7 January 1944 – Lou Henry Hoover, First Lady of the United States
• 21 July 1944 – Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, German army officer
• 14 October 1944 – Erwin Rommel, German army officer
• 26 October 1944 Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom Princess Henry of Battenberg youngest daughter and youngest child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Saxe - Coburg and Gotha

New books

• An American Dilemma – Gunnar Myrdal
• Au rendez-vous allemand – (To the German Rendezvous) – Paul Éluard
• A Bell for Adano – John Hersey
• Beyond the Palisade (poetry) – James K. Baxter
• The Book of Imaginary Beings – Jorge Luis Borges
• Book of Naturalists – Charles William Beebe
• The Case of Mrs. Wingate – Oscar Micheaux
• Dangling Man – Saul Bellow
• The Dawn Appears – Annie Greene Nelson
• Friday's Child – Georgette Heyer
• The Golden Fleece – Robert von Ranke Graves
• The Horse's Mouth – Joyce Cary
• Johnny Tremain – Esther Forbes
• The Lost Weekend – Charles R. Jackson
• Our Lady of the Flowers – Jean Genet
• The Razor's Edge – W. Somerset Maugham
• The Tall Book of Nursery Tales – Feodor Rojankovsky
• Terras do Sem Fim (The Violent Land) – Jorge Amado
• Thou That Dwellest in the Gardens – Hayyim Hazaz
• Two Frontiers (poetry) – Edwin James Bradley

Nobel prizes

• Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, Joseph Erlanger, American doctor, (1874-1965), and Herbert Gasser, American doctor (1888-1963)