1944

**1944** (MCMXLIV) was a leap year starting on Saturday in the Gregorian calendar.

## 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)