40th armies. June 30 – WWII: German forces of the 11th Army under General Erich von Manstein take Sevastopol, although fighting rages until July 4. The city is evacuated by the Soviets, some 90,000 prisoners are taken and von Manstein is promoted to Field Marshal. German forces of Panzer Army Africa under Erwin Rommel approach the Alamein positions, only 106 km from Alexandria. The Axis forces are exhausted and Rommel has supply problems, because the RAF attacks his supply lines. July July – The Holocaust: Inmates of Westerbork transit camp in the occupied Netherlands begin to be shipped to Nazi extermination camps. From now until 1944 around 107,000, mostly Jewish, from here will be killed. July 1–27 – WWII: First Battle of El Alamein: British forces prevent a second advance by Axis forces into Egypt. The 15th and 21st Panzer Divisions are halted and Erwin Rommel orders his forces to regroup. The panzer strength of the German Afrika Korps has been reduced to only 26 vehicles. July 3 – WWII: Guadalcanal, occupied only by aborigines, falls to the Japanese Naval construction force deployed to construct an airfield on the island. July 4 – WWII in the European Theater of Operations: Twenty-four ships are sunk by German bombers and submarines after Convoy PQ 17 to the Soviet Union is scattered in the Arctic Ocean to evade the German battleship Tirpitz. The United States Eighth Air Force inauspiciously flies its first mission in Europe, using borrowed British planes, and bombs targets in the Netherlands, such as De Kooy Airfield, attached to the Den Helder Naval Base. Three of six aircraft return; For this mission, Captain Charles C. Kegelman is the first member of the Force to be awarded the U.S. Distinguished Flying Cross. July 5 – German forces of the 4th Panzer Army under General Hermann Hoth reach the Don River near Voronezh and become embroiled in the battle to capture the city. July 6 – The Holocaust: Anne Frank's family goes into hiding in an attic above her father's office in an Amsterdam warehouse. July 7 – German forces of the 4th Panzer Army reach the outskirts of Voronezh, but the Soviet army mounts a successful counterattack that ties up Hoth's forces for days. July 8 – Turkish prime minister Refik Saydam dies while working in the office. For one day he is succeeded by Ahmet Fikri Tüzer. July 9 –