Many Not the Few: The Stolen History of the Battle of Britain

by Richard North

  As the toll of RAF pilots and other aircrew lost at sea steadily mounted, belated moves were made to improve air–sea rescue. Then Deputy Chief of the Air Staff, Air Vice-Marshal Harris (in time, to take over Bomber Command), chaired an Air Ministry meeting with a view to setting up a formal service. The “skeleton” Coastal Command service would be combined with the boats of the Auxiliary Naval Patrol. RAF launches would be placed under the operational control of the navy, while the RAF would control air searches. The twelve Lysanders supposedly borrowed from Army Co-operation Command were kept on.11

  In Paris, German Army chief von Brauchitsch was still fighting his corner for a broad-front landing. He was trying to broker an agreement that an assault unit of about 7,000 men should be conveyed to the Brighton area in 200 fast motorboats and 100 motor sailing vessels. Support would be given by 4,500 men of the 7th Parachute Division, who were to take up blocking positions on the South Downs against expected British counterattacks.12

  DAY 45 – FRIDAY 23 AUGUST 1940

  Catching up on recent events, the War Illustrated magazine published a feature on what it described as the “first phase” of the “Air Battle of Britain”. This was taken to be 8–13 August, the opening shot being the attack on the “Peewit” convoy. The qualifier “Air” was still in common use, even by Churchill, acknowledging that the air fighting was only part of the wider battle.

  The Daily Express reported the bombardment of Dover. As German guns had fired, RAF bombers had roared into action. The paper’s reporter had seen “great red glows in the sky then, low down on the water line, fires that lit the French coastline”. Watching every flash over there, he wrote, “We decided the RAF boys were having a successful trip”. But no gun was ever damaged in an air raid. The bombing was singularly ineffective, while the guns proved virtually useless as anti-shipping weapons. Both sides overstated the capabilities of their weapons.

  A far greater cause of alarm in official circles was an attack on Convoy OA 203 in the Moray Firth, when the steamers Llanishen and Makalla were sunk by air-dropped torpedoes. When the New Zealand-owned RMS Remuera was also torpedoed three days later, the worst fears were realized. The Germans had developed a reliable air-launched weapon. No details of it were released to the media. Not even the War Cabinet was told.13

  In the War Cabinet this day, Duff Cooper made some progress in getting his “war aims” committee approved. The Cabinet agreed that there was a growing demand for “some statement of what we were fighting for”. We must make our aims clear, not merely to our own people, but also to the peoples of Europe whom we were trying to free. A time would come, members said, to “put across” our conception of the “new Europe”.

  Unusually, Churchill spoke to the item and his comments were also recorded in detail. Some of the points he thought should be included were that, in addition to the five Great Powers of Europe, there should be three groups of smaller states – in northern Europe, in middle Europe, and in the Balkans. He wanted them “linked together in some kind of Council of Europe”. There should be a court to which all justiciable disputes should be referred. Remarkably, he also suggested the establishment of an international air force.14

  Outside, one particular national air force continued its activities. Explosive and incendiary bombs, it was claimed, were dropped for the first time in the London area. There was some confusion about this as the main casualty was the Alcazar cinema in lower Edmonton. This was regarded as North London, but was administratively part of the Middlesex county area.15

  The Luftwaffe also mounted small-scale raids elsewhere. Single aircraft were sometimes deployed. This had the effect of keeping the RAF unsettled, forcing Fighter Command to fly 482 sorties for very little reward. After nightfall, twenty-two inland raids were counted, mainly directed at South Wales, Bristol, Birmingham and the north. In Bridlington, a café was hit trapping the people inside. Five German losses were recorded. One Hurricane was written off in a night raid on Croydon. Two others were slightly damaged. Bomber Command lost one aircraft as well.

  DAY 46 – SATURDAY 24 AUGUST 1940

  The weather had finally cleared enough to permit a relatively high level of air operations, although a morning haze delayed flying in some areas. It did not stop an early raid on Great Yarmouth.

  As so often, though, the Channel area became the focus of intensive activity. First, compact enemy formations, comprising some forty Dorniers and Ju 88s, bombed the residential area of Dover. As this was happening, another five formations – none of them less than twenty aircraft – crossed the coast at different points, intercepted only by two British aircraft. The raiders limited themselves to deep reconnaissance, dropping only a small number of bombs near Canterbury. Then another formation began to head towards the English coast. The main force, comprising more than twenty He 111s, skirted Dover, bombing Ramsgate and the local airport heavily. It was the town’s heaviest raid of the war, killing twenty-nine and injuring over fifty, ten seriously.16

  In what some say was a separate raid, RAF Manston was hit by about twenty Junkers bombers protected by a similar number of fighters. The airfield was badly damaged. Living quarters were wrecked, all communications were cut and a large number of unexploded bombs made the administration areas unusable. Effectively, the station had been rendered useless for operations other than serving as a forward refuelling airfield and an emergency landing ground.

  One of the units deployed from Manston was No. 264 Sqn, flying Defiants. By the end of the day, it had lost five aircraft with another seriously damaged. Three complete crews had been killed. One gunner died from his wounds. The squadron’s major losses occurred fending off a raid at their home base which, with North Weald, also received attention from the Luftwaffe. Concurrently with the south coast attacks, a large raid was despatched to targets north of the estuary. North Weald took 150–200 bombs from nearly fifty Dorniers and Heinkels, escorted by Me 110s. Living quarters were badly damaged, the boiler room was knocked out and nine people were killed. Ten were wounded.

  In what was to have serious long-term repercussions, squadrons from No. 12 Group, under the command of Air Vice-Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory, had been called upon to provide cover. But what became known as the Duxford Wing – comprising multiple squadrons assembled into one formation before being committed to battle – arrived too late to have any useful effect. The performance of the wing, and the very concept, was to fuel acrimonious and prolonged disputes in Fighter Command.17

  While sector stations were being attacked, an estimated at “fifty plus” raiders approached from the Cherbourg area. The main force skirted the Isle of Wight and made for Portsmouth at about 15,000, evading the British fighters ordered up to intercept. They had been wrongly positioned by their controllers.

  In the Prince’s Theatre, close to the centre of town, scores of children were settling down to a matinee. Tragically, the information provided by the radar station at Ventnor on the Isle of Wight had degraded, so the destination of the raid was not picked up and no warning was given. In the space of five minutes, the Germans dropped sixty-five 250kg and 500kg bombs. The theatre was all but reduced to rubble. Eight children were killed and seventeen were injured. Bombs fell indiscriminately on shops and houses across the southern half of the city. Many people were caught in the open unable to reach shelter. Several Anderson shelters were blown apart by the force of the explosions. A number of trench shelters suffered near-misses, and collapsed despite being reinforced with concrete slabs.18

  Then the bombers targeted the dockyard. The destroyer Acheron had her stern blown off. Two ratings were killed and three were wounded. The destroyer Bulldog, moored alongside, was damaged by splinters. Her commanding officer was mortally wounded. The French torpedo boat Flore suffered severe damage to its bridge from falling masonry. HMS Vernon, the Navy’s mine and torpedo centre, was badly damaged. By now, many had reached shelter – and did not get a chance to regret it. An air-raid shelter took a direct hit, killing 24 and wound
ing 42 dockyard workers. In all, from this raid, 143 city residents and workers died.

  Rumours about the widespread loss of life in the city and dockyards led to a belief, absurd though it might have been, that German aircrews were deliberately aiming their bombs at individual shelters. For some time afterwards, people were afraid to go into the shelters during alerts.19

  With nightfall, areas in London and suburbs were attacked. Bombing was also reported in Cannonbury Park, Highbury Park, Leyton, Wood Green, Stepney, Islington, Enfield, Hampton Court, Millwall and others. The bomb in the Hampton Court area completely destroyed a house. For the first time, the City of London was bombed. St Giles’ Church in Cripplegate, at the heart of the City, took a bomb in the forecourt. It did little damage but knocked the statue of Milton off its plinth. The poet was buried in the church and this event roused indignation worldwide.

  A large fire was started at Fore Street spreading to London Wall. Neill Warehouse, West India Dock was badly damaged by fire. In the early hours, the Imperial Tobacco factory and Carter Patterson’s works in Goswell Road were also fired. Two hundred pumps were mobilized but, with several unexploded bombs reported, the area had to be evacuated and kept clear until midday on 25 August.

  Seemingly at random, other suburbs were raided: Malden, Coulsdon, Feltham, Kingston, Banstead and Epsom. In Birmingham, the Nuffield and Dunlop Factories were bombed just after midnight. The Castle Bromwich Spitfire factory at Erdington was hit, and so was the Moss Gear Company. The main railway line was knocked out between Cardiff and west Wales after a train was bombed at Cardiff. A gun site at Datchet, Buckinghamshire, was bombed and ammunition blown up. Residential areas in Hull were hit and RAF Driffield was bombed again. Further north still, bombers hit Leeds. Two houses were wrecked and a Sunday school damaged. Bombs were also dropped in nine north-eastern locations, including Newcastle and West Hartlepool. Minelaying was reported off Flamborough Head.

  This day was regarded by many as the start of the third phase of the Battle of Britain, when the Luftwaffe concentrated on eliminating Fighter Command. Between 24 August and 6 September, the “scales tilted against Fighter Command”, Churchill later wrote: “During these crucial days the Germans had continuously applied powerful forces against the airfields of South and South-east England. Their object was to break down the day fighter defence of the capital, which they were impatient to attack”.20

  Fighter Command lost twenty-three aircraft on the day, including two Hurricanes shot down by “friendly” anti-aircraft fire. Remarkably, only four pilots were killed or missing. Two were seriously injured. Four “twins” were lost, bringing total losses to twenty-seven. The Luftwaffe lost thirty-two aircraft, including twenty-four Me 109s. Twelve of their single-engined fighter pilots were killed, missing or taken captive. The balance of advantage went to the RAF. But for the Defiant losses, it would have been even more favourable. However, for two air armies supposedly locked in a fight to the death, the losses were not extravagant.

  DAY 47 – SUNDAY 25 AUGUST 1940

  “The City Bombed” blared the banner headline in the Sunday Express. In a “midnight raid” the sky over London had been “lit up by fire”. The thud of a “screaming bomb” had been heard by watchers round St Paul’s. The papers also recorded, “500 raiders attack Portsmouth”, alongside the other Sundays, most of which retailed the Air Ministry claim that forty-five Luftwaffe aircraft had been downed. The New York Times argued that an invasion was less likely now, “particularly in view of the approach of autumn weather”. That paper held that the results of months campaigning were inconclusive but it seemed “probable” that the Germans had lost a lot more aircraft than the British – perhaps in the ratio of two or even more to one.

  Express columnist George Slocum had interviewed a neutral diplomat, just back from Vichy France – giving a valuable insight into enemy perceptions. The diplomat had expected to find the skies over Britain black with German warplanes, with his aircraft from Lisbon landing at an airport completely destroyed. He been told before he had left that Britain was starving, that the Navy had been sunk, the Air Force obliterated and the factories in flames. Panic was supposed to reign in the country and Britain was on the point of surrender.21

  Meanwhile, another newspaper carried a large advert for War Bonds, with the pull-quote from the Prime Minister: “Never in the field of human conflict …”.22 A legend was in the making.

  Raids on this day targeted RAF Warmwell, Weymouth and the naval base at Portland, with a sizeable raid developing over Kent around six in the evening. One of the day’s losers was Sgt Mervyn Sprague, a No. 602 Sqn Spitfire pilot – one of two from the squadron shot down by Me 110s. Both were unhurt but Sprague had the distinction of being rescued from the sea by a Walrus aircraft. This was almost certainly one of “Digger” Aitkin’s rescues, and probably one of his last. Sprague was not to be so lucky next time.23

  As the sun went down, the minelayers came out to seed coastal waters with their deadly loads. The bomber fleets thundered inland, and over sixty-five individual raids were plotted. Bombs fell in forty places, including Coventry. The most significant raid was on Britain’s second city, Birmingham. The bombers targeted the Market Hall in the area now known as the Bull Ring. About 145 high explosive (HE) bombs were dropped (56 unexploded), with at least 110 incendiaries. Numerous districts were hit. Twenty-nine people were killed, six of them workmen repairing a gas main when a delayed action bomb exploded. Several factories suffered direct hits and severe damage was caused. The ICI Witton plant was damaged, as was a printing works and shops, together with an engineering works and many residential properties.

  The prohibition on naming bombed cities was still holding, and certainly in the case of Birmingham. Press reports referred to a “Midland Town” which, combined with the deliberate policy of talking down the damage, kept this major raid out of the public consciousness. That hopelessly distorted the perception of events.24 Far from devoting most of its strength to destroying the RAF, the Luftwaffe’s daytime activities had been relatively modest compared with the night raids. The Luftwaffe was moving to night bombing, with the emphasis on civilian targets, reaching inland as far as the northern city of Leeds, where three people were killed – exactly the policy Göring had announced on 19 August.25

  Bomber Command was going in the opposite direction. Authorized personally by Churchill in retaliation for the bombing of London, it launched its first raid on Berlin. A mixed force of eighty-one aircraft took part, comprising Wellingtons, Hampdens and Whitleys. Industrial and commercial targets were specified but dense cloud hampered their accurate identification. Bombs fell on residential areas. Six Hampdens did not return. Four Blenheims had also been lost during daylight operations and Fighter Command had suffered seventeen losses. Total RAF losses for the day, therefore, amounted to twenty-seven – for the second day running – and six more than the twenty-one sustained by the Luftwaffe. On aggregate count, the Germans had emerged the victors.

  DAY 48 – MONDAY 26 AUGUST 1940

  Shirer was in Berlin to experience the RAF’s work, describing it as the “first big air-raid of the war”. “The concentration of anti-aircraft fire was the greatest I’ve ever witnessed,” he wrote, “but strangely ineffective.” “The Berliners are stunned,” he added. “They did not think it could happen. When the war began, Göring assured them it couldn’t”. The Berliners are a “naïve and simple people”, Shirer remarked. “They believed him”.26

  In London, despite Churchill’s attempt to kick it into touch, the matter of “war aims” had not gone away. A letter signed by H. G. Wells and other notables, issued by the left-wing “Union of Democratic Control”, was in circulation and the text was published in the morning’s Guardian. The signatories did not expect a detailed peace settlement but, they said, the general principles “on which a durable peace could be founded can and should be stated”.

  Very few people realized quite how desperate the war at sea was becoming. The day before
, the Admiralty had warned operational units of its suspicions that acoustic mines were being used. And now the Germans made a second successful airborne torpedo attack on Allied shipping, with the sinking of the Remuera, twelve miles north of Peterhead. That, however, was only one element of an alarming day. The Remuera was part of Convoy HX.65A which had already had a rough time. Attacked by U-boats the previous day, U-48 had sunk the tanker Athelcrest and the steamer Empire Merlin. U-124 then sunk the convoy commodore’s ship, the Harpalyce, and the steamer Firecrest. The steamer Stakesby was damaged. Well over a hundred sailors lost their lives, including Commodore Washington, the convoy commander.

  When the U-boats left off, the aircraft took over. The convoy was attacked by four He 115s and eight Ju 88s. Not only had they sunk the Remuera, the steamer Cape York was so badly damaged that she sunk under tow. A shattered City of Hankow managed to limp back to port.27

  None of this made the newspapers, the press being dominated by the soap opera of the air war. And the major news was the overnight bombing of Berlin. The Daily Mirror noted the irony. While Hitler’s bombers had been making another raid on the “London area”, RAF bombs had been shaking the German capital. Berliners hurrying to their shelters soon after midnight heard heavy explosions as bombs burst to the north-west.