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

by Richard North

  It was a day to remember for Flight Lieutenant R. A. B. Learoyd, who gained a Victoria Cross – the first for Bomber Command – after bombing the Dortmund–Ems Canal in a Hampden. This raid was to have a significant effect. Causing a blockage of the canal, movement of motorboats from the Rhineland was held up, setting back invasion plans.37 As for those standing out under the night sky listening, something had changed. The drums had stopped.

  7.

  Eagle Attack

  From now till early next year, England’s will to resist must be broken, if not by a landing then by every other means. This most important task will take precedence over everything else. We are now entering into the decisive battle against England.

  Generaloberst Alfred Jodl, Chief of Operation Staff OKW, 15 August 19401

  With the peace initiatives apparently at an end, the preparations done and the waiting over, now came the battle. But this was not a normal joust, with clear objectives, a defined battlefield and a visible winner. In the shifting sky, not the generals but the clerks and statisticians decided the victors.

  DAY 35 – TUESDAY 13 AUGUST 1940

  This day was marked by the Daily Telegraph and Daily Express offering a similar diet of distortion and exaggeration, but with a new twist. Upping the “kill” to thirty-nine – as against the actual of twenty-eight – Fighter Command losses had been heavily discounted, from twenty-nine to nine. The statisticians had won another victory. George Orwell noted: “if the reports are true, the British always score heavily”. He wished he could talk to some RAF officer “and get some kind of idea whether these reports are truthful”.2

  The papers were also full of accounts from the previous day’s bombing. Unusually, the locations were named, with the fate of Portsmouth prominent in reports. The Express claimed: “Dockyard attack has little success”. But it noted that some houses and commercial properties were also hit. It told its readers: “Casualties in this area were very light, although several cases of fatal injury have been reported”. The Daily Mirror was more forthright, writing: “Two women – Mrs Robertson and her married daughter, Mrs Mann – were killed when their Anderson shelter was blown out of the ground”.

  This rare mention of casualties associated with an Anderson shelter contrasted with a report in the Yorkshire Post on a raid in “another South-East Coast town” (probably Gosport). Bombs wrecked a dance hall, a private garage and three cottages and a joinery works, said the paper, adding: “A man named Smith sheltering in a public building was killed. Eight people in an Anderson shelter in a garden where a bomb wrecked an outhouse escaped unharmed”.

  While the British public was digesting the morning news, two important events were under way. First, Göring launched his long-awaited Eagle Day. Secondly, considering his presence necessary for the opening of the air offensive, Hitler returned from his retreat in the Berghof to Berlin. He was to confer in the afternoon with Räder, who was insistent that the dispute over the invasion plan had to be resolved.3

  The launch of Eagle Day, meanwhile, was going badly awry, partly through incompetence, and partly through the unexpectedly poor weather which ruined any chance of a successful early start. But not until the first aircraft were airborne did Göring postpone the operation. Three bomber units missed the recall and ploughed on without their Me 110 escorts. In two separate formations, one was headed for the Coastal Command airfield at Eastchurch, the other for Odiham. A third element provided a diversion off Portland.

  Poor data from radar and the lack of strength confirmation from the Observer Corps led to insufficient fighters being scrambled. Eastchurch suffered as a result, very heavy bombing, causing considerable damage and destroying five Blenheims on the ground. Twelve personnel were killed and forty injured. Fighters then caught up with the Dorniers, shooting down four and damaging another four. To the west, the other bomber group, comprising Ju 88s, was engaged by fighters from three squadrons. The Germans never reached their targets. Neither did the Portland raid, which had kept its escort. It was intercepted with the loss of six, all within five minutes – a disaster on the scale of the loss of the RAF’s Defiants.

  But a greater disaster had befallen the RAF, a repeat of No. 107 Sqn’s grief. At half past eight that morning, twelve Blenheim IVs of No. 82 Sqn had taken off from RAF Watton in Norfork, headed for Aalborg airfield in northern Jutland. One turned back, reporting technical problems, leaving eleven to fly on at 8,000 ft in clear skies and brilliant sunshine, with no fighter escort. Through poor navigation, they made landfall thirty-five miles further south than intended, crossing over at Søndervig where they were instantly registered by German observers. The response was twenty-five Me 109s. When they had finished, flak took over. In minutes, the squadron had ceased to exist – its aircraft either smouldering debris or sunken wrecks. The damage to Aalborg airfield was negligible.4

  Into the afternoon, the weather had improved over England. Eagle Day was reinstated. Large-scale attacks were launched against Portland, Southampton, Portsmouth, Kent and the Thames Estuary. RAF fighters dealt with the first wave of Stukas but a formation of Ju 88s broke through to Southampton, causing serious damage and starting large fires in warehouses and docks. A small force of Ju 88s attempting to bomb Portland was thwarted by other fighters. Escorting Me 109s were put to rout, with three shot down.

  On the coast near Lyme Regis, a gaggle of Stukas headed for RAF Middle Wallop. It had become routine to send in Me 109s to flush out the fighters, but this went fatally wrong. The Messerschmitts had already turned back short of fuel, setting up another “Defiant moment”. Six out of nine Stukas were shot down, one was damaged and the rest forced to turn back.

  Other Stukas, failing to find RAF Warmwell, dropped their bombs on the Dorset countryside. Two staffel of Ju 88s searching for Middle Wallop had better luck. They happened on RAF Andover, HQ of Maintenance Command. Twelve bombs were dropped, damaging the station headquarters and officers’ quarters. One aircraft on the ground was damaged. Two people were killed. A force of Stukas then headed for the airfield at Rochester, where another failure of navigation had the landscape paying the penalty.

  A separate group of forty Stukas made for RAF Detling, about three miles north-east of Maidstone. They found it. No warning was given and surprised airmen failed to take cover. The CO and sixty-seven airmen were killed, the operations block was demolished, hangars were set on fire and other buildings destroying. Services were knocked out. Twenty-two aircraft were totally destroyed, some of them Blenheims bombed up ready for a mission.

  Through this period, the meeting between Räder and Hitler had gone ahead. The Grand Admiral said he recognized the justice of the Army’s demands, but could not meet them. The supply of reinforcements could not be accelerated, as further transports could neither be assembled nor accommodated in the invasion ports; and it was certainly not possible to provide additional transports for the landings in the Brighton sector and Lyme Bay. Sealion, he repeated, should only be attempted as a last resort if Britain could not be made to sue for peace in any other way. Hitler added to this: “An abortive venture would mean a great gain in prestige for England. One would have to wait and see precisely what effect intensive battles in the air would have on England”.5

  Meanwhile, to sow fear and apprehension, the German aircraft scattered 45 parachutes in various districts, including Scotland, Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Yorkshire. Two parachutists were reported to have been captured, one in civilian clothing. Eventually, the drops were found to be a “crude hoax”, calculated to cause alarm. The captured parachutists were spies.6

  By the end of the day, in its bid to make the invasion unnecessary, the Luftwaffe had flown 1,485 sorties over England, its largest number yet. It claimed seventy Spitfires and Hurricanes destroyed, plus eighteen Blenheims. Actual Fighter Command losses were fourteen, including one destroyed on the ground at Eastchurch, with 700 sorties flown. In total, including all Bomber Command casualties, losses numbered fifty. The Luftwaffe lost forty-seven.
In terms of aircraft, the Luftwaffe came off slightly better. But the British had at least contained their losses to three pilots killed out of thirteen fighters shot down, although two more had been seriously burned and were out of the fight. Five Me 109 pilots had been lost. Neither side had achieved a knock-out blow.

  Before the day was out though, the RAF was to add what many regarded as another “own goal”, losing a Spitfire pilot on night flying practice. The use of Spitfires or Hurricanes as night fighters was proving fruitless. The handful of enemy destroyed was far exceeded by the accidental losses. In the dark, Defiants were better platforms. Blenheims were better than nothing, pending the arrival of Beaufighters. On the other hand, both Blenheim and Defiant were near useless during the day, yet were still used to fly day missions. Somebody was not thinking straight.7

  DAY 36 – WEDNESDAY 14 AUGUST 1940

  The previous evening, the London Evening News had reported on “one of the greatest aerial battles ever to take place”, its location “off the southeast and southern coasts”. There were fears that this was the opening stage of the invasion. But “well informed experts” had their doubts. Aware that the Luftwaffe was still only deploying a fraction of its strength, they believed the “change in tactics” was an attempt to “reconnoitre the strength of the RAF” before mounting even more vigorous air attacks. The Daily Telegraph conveyed the opinion of “authoritative quarters in London”, which said much the same thing.

  Harold Nicolson was not so sure. “We do not understand what is happening”, he confided to his diary. “The German attacks are more serious than mere reconnaissance, but not serious enough to justify the heavy losses they receive.” He was troubled by the German losses of “more than 100 pilots” the previous day. This was unsustainable, and they, “our experts”, no more than Nicolson, could make it out.8

  Not everyone was so gullible. Christopher Tomlin, another Mass Observation correspondent, wrote of his father being “dubious about RAF claims”. It is easy for a pilot to think he’s sent a machine down; the authorities only have the pilot’s figures to rely on. If the figures are true, Germany will soon stop sending bombers here as she can’t afford to lose them at that rate.9

  The Daily Express ran an article from Hubert Knickerbocker, star correspondent of the US-based INS agency. “Is it invasion or blockade?” he asked. “With 400 or 500 of his bombers and fighters attacking all along the Channel south coast of Britain today,” he wrote, “Hitler gave some evidence that he is trying, by his three-to-one superiority of numbers, to knock out the RAF before he attempts invasion.” But the star was not convinced. “There is plenty of other evidence that the current operations represent another step in the attempted blockade of these isles”, he suggested. “Today’s observed results do not encourage the belief that the Germans are going soon to be able to attain sufficient superiority in the air to attempt to launch vast landing parties from troop-carrying airplanes, gliders and parachutes.”

  To muddy the waters further, the paper had its own air correspondent, Basil Cardew, argue that the invasion “may come soon now”. In his view, there would be fighting on these shores, “maybe in quite short a time”. Cardew added: “The Germans know that the North Sea becomes too rough at the end of August for their shallow boats and in their neck-or-nothing gamble, they may be forced to act quickly”.

  The man on the spot was William L. Shirer. He was travelling courtesy of the Luftwaffe from Berlin to Ghent. His pilot had a little difficulty finding the camouflaged landing field. From the air, it looked “just like any other place in the landscape, with paths cutting across it irregularly as if it were farmland”. Aircraft were also hidden in camouflaged tents. So skilful was their construction, Shirer wrote, “that I doubt if you could distinguish one from above a thousand feet”. Arriving in Ostend, he looked in vain for the kind of barges and ships needed for an invasion. There were none in the harbour and only a few barges in the canals behind the town.10

  Coastal Command photographic reconnaissance aircraft and naval patrols had brought back the same detail as Shirer.11 Hiding aircraft at the edges of airfields was one thing. Concealing a 3,000-strong invasion fleet was quite another. An invasion was not imminent.

  In a move, the relevance of which was only later fully to emerge, the Naval Staff war diary recorded a conversation between Göring and Räder on the difficulties involved in a broad-front landing, and agreed between them that the landing should be restricted to the Dover Straits. The pair had met in Berlin in the Reich Chancellery, after a ceremony where Hitler was handing out the batons to his newly appointed field marshals.

  Hitler now seemed to be expressing open doubts about Sealion. Räder noted that he “does not propose to carry out an operation whose risk is too great: he advocates the view that the aim of defeating Britain is not dependent on the landing alone, but can be achieved in a different way”. Regardless of the final decision, Räder also noted, Hitler wished to keep up the threat of an invasion. Preparations, therefore, had to continue. After the formal conference, the Naval Staff sent a suggestion to Jodl to the effect that, if Hitler did not want to go ahead with the invasion, but wanted to keep up the fiction, “the retreat should be sounded” and a special deception operation set up.

  The Navy had not yet got its way. Far from any agreement having been reached over the dispositions of forces, von Brauchitsch had been assured that “sufficient” forces would be landed in the disputed Brighton sector. But Hitler was wavering. He ordered Jodl to examine the possibility of landing those forces without heavy equipment, just in case a full landing could not be protected.12

  However, a record of the Führer’s political thoughts had also been kept by Field Marshal Wilhelm von Leeb, the general who had commanded Army Group C and broken through the Maginot line. In his diary, von Leeb had Hitler ruminating about the reasons why Britain would not make peace. Probably, there were two, he said. First, she hopes for US aid, but the USA cannot start major arms deliveries until 1941. Secondly, she hopes to play Russia off against Germany.

  But, he continued, Germany was not aiming at the destruction of England. Germany’s victory would make the situation more difficult for England, benefiting Japan in East Asia, Russia in India, Italy in the Mediterranean and America in world trade. This was why peace was possible with Britain – but not while Churchill was prime minister. Therefore, Hitler said, we must wait for results from the Luftwaffe, and possible new elections.13 He was banking on regime change to pave the way for peace negotiations.

  The public, of course, had no means of knowing what was going on – any more than did the militaries on either side, sometimes even about the dispositions of their own forces. But ordinary people were also being fed a daily diet of propaganda. For instance, as regards the air war, the Daily Express had told its readers that sixty-nine enemy aircraft had been downed the previous day. It also told them that thirty German airfields had been hit. There was not the slightest hint of the disaster at Aalborg. The airfield was claimed as one of the successful targets.

  Silence had not been an option. Lord Haw-Haw had already announced the loss of No. 82 Sqn. Damage limitation demanded a response, and it was skilfully done. And there was evidence that it was working. Home Intelligence was finding that the equivocation and indifference of early July had gone. The upbeat news of the exploits of the RAF and its “successes” was strengthening public confidence. Morale was high.

  After its efforts of the previous day, the Luftwaffe flew just a third the number of sorties, putting up 91 bombers and 398 fighters. Even then, the raids were slow to start and, when they did, the focus was again on Dover and Kent airfields. Just after midday, 80 Stukas flew towards Dover, escorted by as many Me 109s. Four squadrons of British fighters intercepted and, for a short while, there were over 200 aircraft fighting over Dover. The Stukas sunk the Goodwin lightship and the Messerschmitts shot down nine of Dover’s barrage balloons. Two British pilots were lost in the Channel.

  While the D
over scrap was going on, a dozen Me 110 fighter bombers slipped through to attack RAF Manston, demolishing four hangars and destroying three Blenheims on the ground. Revenge was swift. Squadron personnel shot down a raider with a Hispano 20mm cannon. Another was brought down by a Bofors gun manned by Anti–Aircraft Command. At Middle Wallop, Heinkels bombed a hangar and offices. Three airman ran to close the hangar door in an attempt to protect the Spitfires inside. They were caught by a 500kg bomb which brought the massive doors down on them, killing them outright. Two Spitfires managed to take off and shoot down one of the intruders.

  RAF Andover was attacked again. About fifteen bombs were dropped. A transmitter was destroyed, killing a civilian radio operator. Corporal Josephine Robins, a Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) telephone operator, was in a dug-out which took a direct hit, killing two men and injuring others. Despite dust and fumes filling the shelter, she calmly gave first aid to the injured and helped with their evacuation. She was awarded a Military Medal, one of only six WAAFs to be so honoured.

  In the two days of Eagle Attack, Fighter Command had lost ten front-line fighter pilots. And this day saw No. 145 Sqn relieved and moved to Drem, in Scotland. From May, only six of the original pilots had survived. The squadron was down to its last eight serviceable aircraft. Fighter Command had lost eight aircraft on the day, plus the three Blenheims on the ground. Bomber Command lost a Hudson, three Blenheims and two Whitleys bringing the total RAF losses to seventeen, as against Luftwaffe’s twenty-two.