The Battle of Britain (39 page)

Monday, September 9:
Rain and thunder.

Day:
Ineffectual raids on Brooklands factory and London. Bombs jettisoned on residential areas in London and suburbs. Purley, Norbiton, Surbiton, Canterbury, Kingston, West Malling all bombed: Tangmere strafed.

Night:
London badly hit.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 19, Luftwaffe 28.

Tuesday, September 10:
Cloud and rain.

Day:
Tangmere strafed; West Malling slightly bombed.

Night:
London, south Wales, Liverpool area raided.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 0, Luftwaffe 3.

Wednesday, September 11:
Mainly fine.

Day:
Germans deferred intended invasion of England to 14th after RAF mauled attacks on London. Bombs on London, Hornchurch, Biggin Hill, Kenley, Brooklands, Eastchurch, Detling and Colerne.

Night:
London pounded. Merseyside, west and east England attacked. Mines off east and south coasts.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 25, Luftwaffe 21.

Thursday, September 12:
Poor.

Day:
Fairlight radar station slightly bombed.

Night:
London, Midlands, north-east, east, south-east England attacked lightly.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 0, Luftwaffe 4.

Friday, September 13:
Poor.

Day:
Bombs on London.

Night:
London again bombed.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 1, Luftwaffe 4.

Saturday, September 14:
Rain, clouds, thunder.

Day:
London attacked. Invasion delayed again to 17th.

Night:
London, Cardiff, Ipswich, Maidstone attacked.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 14, Luftwaffe 14.

Sunday, September 15:
Fair, becoming fine.

This date is observed annually as Battle of Britain Day. It was the third of the most critical days of the Battle, and the ultimately decisive one. The Luftwaffe was determined finally to break Fighter Command and the spirit of the civil population by the scale of its attacks that were intended to engage the RAF's dwindling numbers of defending aircraft and pilots, while raining an annihilating weight of bombs on London. The outcome was not the overwhelming of Great Britain, but the further frustration and final disillusionment of the Luftwaffe, which suffered its heaviest losses of the Battle.

Day:
Tremendous bombing of London rendered inaccurate by the fervour and passion with which the RAF's fighter squadrons waded into one huge enemy formation after another and dispersed it. The bombs struck, nonetheless, scattered widely over inner and outer London, bringing ruin to homes and death to their occupants. The capital was not the only target: Portland and Southampton were also attacked.

Night:
London badly hit. Lesser raids on Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Cardiff.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 27 aircraft (13 pilots), Luftwaffe 56.

Monday, September 16:
Cloudy, rain.

Day:
Little activity. London raided.

Night:
London strongly attacked; Bristol and Merseyside bombed.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 1, Luftwaffe 9.

Tuesday, September 17:
Poor.

Day:
Invasion postponed indefinitely. German fighter sweeps foiled.

Night:
London gravely hit; lighter raids on Glasgow and Liverpool.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 5, Luftwaffe 8.

Wednesday, September 18:
Squalls and bright intervals.

Day:
Thames Estuary bombed.

Night:
London and Liverpool area raided.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 12, Luftwaffe 19.

Thursday, September 19:
Wet.

Day:
Bombers over London and Thames Estuary.

Night:
Central London, Heston airfield and Merseyside attacked.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 0, Luftwaffe 8.

Friday, September 20:
Fair.

Day:
Luftwaffe fighter sweep over Kent.

Night:
London hit.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 7, Luftwaffe 8.

Saturday, September 21:
Fine.

Day:
Brooklands slightly damaged. London, Kenley, Hornchurch and Biggin Hill attacked.

Night:
London and Liverpool area raided.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 0, Luftwaffe 9.

Sunday, September 22:
Bad, becoming good.

Day:
A few enemy intrusions.

Night:
Heavy bombing of London.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 0, Luftwaffe 5.

Monday, September 23:
Fine.

Day:
Fighter sweeps over Kent.

Night:
London bombed.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 11, Luftwaffe 16.

Tuesday, September 24:
Hazy and foggy.

Day:
Attacks on Southampton and Tilbury. Galland scored his 40th victory – over the Thames Estuary – and was awarded the oak leaves to the Knight's Cross, the third German to be thus honoured. The predecessors were General Dietl (Army) and Galland's friend and fellow Geschwader Commander, Werner Mölders, who had scored his 40th kill three days earlier. Hitler accorded Galland a private audience when he decorated him.

Night:
Merseyside and London bombed.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 4, Luftwaffe 11.

Wednesday, September 25:
Haze over Channel, followed by cloud and bright intervals.

Day:
Raids on Plymouth and Bristol. Bristol Aircraft factory badly damaged and production set back for many weeks. Heavy casualties among personnel.

Night:
London, north-west England and north Wales bombed.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 4, Luftwaffe 13.

Thursday, September 26:
Fair.

Day:
Aircraft factory at Southampton devastated.

Night:
Raids on London and Merseyside.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 9, Luftwaffe 9.

Friday, September 27:
Fair.

Day:
Raids on London and Bristol thwarted.

Night:
London, Midlands and Liverpool area raided.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 28, Luftwaffe 54.

Saturday, September 28:
Fair to fine, but Straits cloudy.

Day:
Raids on London and Portsmouth largely foiled.

Night:
London savaged again.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 16, Luftwaffe 10.

Sunday, September 29:
Mostly fair.

Day:
Nuisance attacks on convoys and also east and south-east.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 5, Luftwaffe 10.

Monday, September 30:
Fair.

Day:
Fighter sweeps over south-east, some raiders reached London. Non-industrial town of Sherborne bombed when Luftwaffe tried to hit aircraft factory at Yeovil (error of 7 miles/11km) through cloud.

Night:
London, Bristol, Liverpool, eastern England battered.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 16, Luftwaffe 44.

The bombs the Luftwaffe was dropping on London had increased in size since the first deliberate raid on September 7, when the heaviest used had weighed 110lb (50kg). Now 1,100, 1,650 or 2,200lb (500, 750 or 1,000kg) high-explosive bombs burst among the inhabitants, combined with incendiaries, as before.

The RAF had no operational purpose-designed night fighters yet. The Defiants had suffered such appalling casualties that they had been withdrawn from front-line service by day in August. They were now beginning to equip night fighter squadrons, but still lacked airborne radar. For the time being the eyes of a single-seater pilot or a Defiant pilot and air gunner had to suffice, to spot a hostile bomber's exhaust flames or discern its silhouette against the clouds. Night fighter squadrons flying Blenheims were experimenting with the first – erratic, temperamental - radar sets to be fitted in aeroplanes. Searchlights were the best help available to those who hunted in the dark, until they had mistakenly illuminated friend in mistake for foe and invited a burst from a raider's guns. But their limit was 12,000ft (3,660m) and most hostiles flew higher. Close control from ground radar stations was operating by this time, but it was rough and ready and a reliable radar set in the aircraft was essential for the last stage of an interception; but only the Blenheims had one, and dependable it was not.

The RAF made unrewarding attempts to use a new weapon effectively. This consisted of a bomb suspended beneath a parachute by 2,000ft (610m) of piano wire. A special flight of obsolete Harrow bombers converted for the purpose released these in the path of incoming raids, but lack of success soon led to the abandonment of this bizarre practice.

Tuesday, October 1:
Cloudy but fair.

The first raid, at 0700hrs, heralded a change of enemy policy. Goering had decided to use his bombers mainly by night and to send out Bf 109s each carrying a 550lb (250kg) bomb and Bf 110s carrying up to four of these by day. They came in formations of 50 to 100, flying high. Throughout the Battle, the RAF's severest tactical handicap had been lack of time to make altitude. When radar reported an approaching raid over the French coast and fighters scrambled to deal with it, they would have to climb away from it while gaining height, or they would have flown under it and been shot down themselves. This disadvantage became greater when German fighter-bombers climbed quickly over their own territory and arrived over England at a greater height than the day bombers used to.

Day:
Raids on London, Portsmouth, Southampton, mostly by fighter-bombers, frustrated. Intruders over Scotland.

Night:
Bombs on London, Manchester, Liverpool areas.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 4, Luftwaffe 6.

Wednesday, October 2:
Fine.

Day:
Fighter-bombers between 20,000 and 30,000ft (6,100-9,145m) attacked Biggin Hill and London continuously from 0930 to 1300hrs.

Night:
Starting at 1915hrs, 180 bombers, of which 100 concentrated on London, crossed the English and Scottish coasts. Manchester, Aberdeen and the vicinities of airfields at Northolt, Hornchurch, Kenley, Hendon, Brooklands, Eastchurch, Redhill, Usworth and Duxford were hit.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 1, Luftwaffe 17.

Thursday, October 3:
Rain. Visibility over England down to 500 yards (460m).

Day:
Previous night's raids continued until 0615hrs. Fighter-bombers, singly and in pairs, attack RAF stations at Cosford, Tangmere and Cardington, and also Thames Haven, Cambridge, Leamington, Bedford, Worcester, Reading, and the de Havilland aircraft factory at Hatfield.

Night:
London bombed.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 0, Luftwaffe 9.

Friday, October 4:
Mist and rain by day, fog at night.

Day:
A succession of some 70 German fighter-bombers singly and in pairs attacked London, Canterbury and other Kent towns and two convoys off Kent.

Night:
London and Liverpool attacked.

Aircraft losses:
RAF 3, Luftwaffe 12.

Hitler still deluded himself that Operation Sealion, the invasion of England, was practicable. His Navy wanted him to call it off and the Luftwaffe admitted that, with the deteriorating British weather, they had abandoned all hope of destroying the RAF in the air or on the ground. Their bomber crews were having to find their way through thick cloud. In recent months so many crews experienced in blind flying had been killed over Britain or been taken prisoner that there was an urgent need for replacements. But many of the Ju 52s used by the blind-flying training schools that had been borrowed to transport troops for the invasion of Holland and Norway had been lost, which delayed and reduced the output of new crews.

German fighter pilots' morale was affected by the compulsion to operate as fighter-bombers with a load that made their Bf 109s sluggish. Also, as Goering never admitted any responsibility for failure, but always blamed his pilots and crews, it was now their turn to incur his venom. They complained to one another that they were reduced to being what General Galland described as ‘stopgaps and scapegoats'.

‘We fighter pilots looked on this violation of our aircraft with great bitterness,' he says. ‘The fighter-bombers were put into action in a great hurry. There was hardly time to give the pilots bombing training. The Bf 109 carried a 500lb (227kg) bomb. The Bf 110 carried two of them plus four 100-pounders (45kg). No great effect could be achieved with that. Even less so because the fighter pilots were annoyed at carrying cargo and were glad to get rid of the bombs anywhere.'

Throughout the Battle of Britain, Dowding, Park, Leigh-Mallory, Saul and Brand understood the psychology of their pilots and treated them accordingly, whereas Goering had no understanding at all of how to handle his.

Park issued a directive to counter the enemy's new tactic, from which the following excerpts are most relevant. ‘With the prevailing cloudy skies and inaccurate heights given by RDF the group controllers' most difficult problem is to know the height of incoming enemy raids. Occasionally reconnaissance Spitfires and Hurricanes from Hornchurch or Biggin Hill are able to sight and report the height and particulars of enemy formations. Moreover the special fighter reconnaissance flight is now being formed at Gravesend (attached to No. 66 Squadron) for the purpose of getting information about approaching enemy raids.'