The Battle of Britain

by Richard Overy

  6 AHB, ‘Battle of Britain: Despatch by Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, 20 August 1941’ (hereafter: AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’), p. 8.

  7 PRO CAB 120/294, Air Ministry report to War Cabinet, 24 June 1940; German losses in N. L. R. Franks, The Air Battle of Dunkirk (London, 1983), p. 194. British losses over Dunkirk totalled 177, including 106 fighters: see R. Jackson, Air War Over France May – June 1940 (London, 1974), p. 121.

  8 Lloyd George in G. Eggleston, Roosevelt, Churchill and the World War II Opposition (Old Greenwich, Conn., 1979), p. 130; Churchill speech in M. Gilbert (ed.), The Churchill War Papers, vol. 2 (London, 1994), p. 368.

  9 R. A. Callahan, Churchill: Retreat from Empire (Delaware, 1984), p. 79; P. Addison, ‘Lloyd George and Compromise Peace in the Second World War’, in A. J. P. Taylor (ed.), Lloyd George: Twelve Essays (London, 1971), p. 381.

  10 PRO ΡREM 7/2, letter from Foreign Office to Desmond Morton, 28 May 1940.

  11 PRO INF 1/264, Home Intelligence daily reports: 28 May 1940, p. 1; 31 May 1940, p. 1.

  12 Addison, ‘Lloyd George…’, pp. 365,378; A. Roberts, The ‘Hοly Fox’: A Biography of Lord Halifax (London, 1991), p. 243.

  13 PRO INF 1/878, War Cabinet conclusions, 18 May 1940, p. 3.

  14 PRO PREM 7/2, note from Morton to Churchill, 30 May 1940, enclosing note by Cadogan dated 25 May 1940.

  15 PRO INF 1/264, Home Intelligence daily reports, 17 June 1940.

  16 PRO INF 1/264, Home Intelligence daily reports, 17 June, 18 June, 20 July 1940.

  17 PRO AIR 9/447: War Ministry, Plans Division, ‘Eire’, 31 May 1940, pp. 1–3; COS meeting on home defence, 7 July 1940.

  18 PRO AIR 9/447, Air Ministry minute, 20 June 1940.

  19 PRO INF 1/849, Ministry of Information, Policy Committee: meeting of 8 July 1940, p. 2; meeting of 23 July 1940; meeting of 24 July 1940; INF 1/264, Home Intelligence daily reports, 20 July 1940. See too D. Cooper, Old Men Forget: The Autobiography of Duff Cooper (London, 1953), pp. 286–7.

  20 V. Cowles, Looking for Trouble (London, 1941), pp. 416–17.

  21 W. Boelcke (ed.), The Secret Conferences of Dr Goebbels (London, 1970), p. 60, meeting of 3 June 1940.

  22 H.-A. Jacobsen (ed.), Generaloberst Halder: Kriegstagebuch (3 vols, Stuttgart, 1963), vol. 2, pp. 30–31, entry for 22 July 1940.

  23 FCNA, pp. 110–11, ‘Conference with the Führer’, 20 June 1940; Jacobsen (ed.), Kriegstagebuch, p. 3, entry for 1 July 1940.

  24 ADAP, Serie D, Band X, p. 56, minute of state secretary, 30 June 1940.

  25 IWM, EDS collection, OKW Aktennotiz, ‘Chefbesprechung’, 12 June 1940.

  26 ADAP, Serie D, Band X: p. 105, Schulenburg to German Foreign Office, 5 July 1940; pp. 202–3, Prince Max von Hohenlohe to German Foreign Office, 18 July 1940; p. 216, Dublin Embassy to German Foreign Office, 22 July 1940.

  27 M. Muggeridge (ed.), Ciano’s Diary, 1939 – 1943 (London, 1947), p. 275, entry for 7 July 1940.

  28 FCNA, pp. 116–17, Directive 16, ‘Preparations for the Invasion of England’.

  29 M. Domarus, Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen 1932 – 1945 (3 vols, Munich, 1963), vol. 2, pp. 115–18; W. Shirer, Berlin Diary: The Journal of a Foreign Correspondent, 1934 – 1941 (London, 1941), PP. 355–8.

  30 Shirer, Berlin Diary, pp. 355–6.

  31 On Halifax see Roberts, ‘Holy Fox,’ p. 249; on Berlin see Shirer, Berlin Diary, p. 360.

  32 See J. Förster, ‘Hitler Turns East – German War Policy in 1940 and 1941’, in B. Wegner (ed.), From Peace to War: Germany, Soviet Russia and the World, 1939 – 1941 (Oxford, 1997), pp. 117–24; E. M. Robertson, ‘Hitler Turns from the West to Russia, May – December 1940’, in R. Boyce (ed.), Paths to War: New Essays on the Origins of the Second World War (London, 1989), pp. 369–75.

  TWO THE ADVERSARIES

  1 PRO AIR 22/72, Air Ministry weekly intelligence summary, report for 18 July 1940, p. 4.

  2 FCNA, pp. 124–5, ‘Conference with the Führer’, 31 July 1940.

  3 M. Dean, The Royal Air Force and Two World Wars (London, 1979), ΡΡ.100–101.

  4 Details in R. Wright, Dowding and the Battle of Britain (London, 1969), PP. 73–6,138–44.

  5 PRO PREM 3/29, summarized order of battle, 19 June 1940, 9 August 1940.

  6 AHB, ‘The Battle of Britain: A Narrative Prepared in the Air Historical Branch’, n.d., p. 574.

  7 PRO AIR 22/293, Cabinet Statistical Branch, ‘Statistics on Aircraft Production, Imports and Exports, Schedule D, Exports of Fighters’.

  8 PRO AIR 22/493, Schedule C, weekly imports April–November 1940.

  9 PRO AIR 8/372, War Cabinet conclusions, 22 May 1940; minute, Chief of Air Staff, 22 May 1940; Cripps to the War Cabinet, 26 June 1940.

  10 PRO AIR 16/365, ‘Fighter Command, Operational Strength of Squadrons and Order of Battle’.

  11 PRO AIR 22/262, ‘Daily Returns of Casualties to RAF Aircraft’, 25 June–29 September 1940.

  12 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’: p. 27; on self-sealing tanks, Appendix F. See too PRO AIR 16/715, HQ no. 24 Training Camp to HQ Fighter Command, 1 October 1940, ‘Notes of Conversations with Fighter Pilots’.

  13 PRO AIR 22/296, Cabinet Statistical Branch, ‘Personnel: Casualties, Strength, Establishment of the RAF’; W. Murray, Luftwaffe: Strategy for Defeat, 1933 – 1945 (London, 1985), p. 54; C. Webster and N. Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive against Germany 1939 – 1945 (4 vols, London, 1961), vol. 4, p. 501, Appendix 49 (xxviii).

  14 PRO AIR 8/463, Air Intelligence, ‘Present and Future Strength of the German Air Force’, November 1940.

  15 PRO PREM 7/2, Churchill to General Hastings Ismay, 26 June 1940; War Cabinet Polish Forces Committee, meeting of 1 July 1940; ‘Minute, Position of the Polish Air Force in England’, 30 June 1940. On efforts to find pilots, see AIR 6/70, Air Council minutes, 23 July, 6 August, 22 August 1940; AIR 19/162, Churchill to Sinclair, 12 August 1940.

  16 PRO AIR 22/296, ‘Casualties, Strength, Establishment of the RAF’; AIR 16/659: for Churchill’s comment see Churchill minute, 24 June 1940; for Ismay, Fighter Command to Ismay, 27 June 1940. It took only three minutes to refuel a fighter, but ten minutes to rearm it.

  17 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, pp. 11–12.

  18 PRO CAB 120/309, ‘Notes of Meeting, 16 September 1940, on Inland Looking’; on the Observer Corps see D. Wood and D. Dempster, The Narrow Margin: The Battle of Britain and the Rise of Air Power, 1930 – 1940 (London, 1961), pp. 153–8.

  19 S. Cox, ‘A Comparative Analysis of RAF and Luftwaffe Intelligence in the Battle of Britain, 1940’, Intelligence and National Security, 5 (1990), pp. 432–4; F. H. Hinsley et al., British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. 1 (London, 1979), pp. 177–82.

  20 Details in AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, p. 10. A ‘Purple’ warning was later added at night to warn services such as stations and docks to extinguish all work-essential lighting as an attacking force approached. Cooper’s remark in PRO INF 1/849, Policy Committee meeting, 1 July 1940. On anti-aircraft defences see B. Collier, The Defence of the United Kingdom (London, 1957), pp. 153–4.

  21 PRO AIR 9/136, Air Ministry, draft memorandum, ‘Measures to be Taken in the Event of a German Invasion of England’, 29 October 1939, pp. 1–8.

  22 PRO AIR 16/212, Fighter Command operational instructions, 8 July 1940, pp. 1–8; operational instructions, 18 September 1940, pp. 2–4.

  23 PRO AIR 9/136, ‘Measures to be Taken…’, p. 2.

  24 PRO WO 199/22, report for GHQ Home Forces, 31 July 1940, prepared by Major-General B. Taylor; Commander, London area, to GHQ Home Forces, 24 August 1940. ‘Despatch’, p. 18.

  25 PRO PREM 3/88 (3), War Cabinet, COS memorandum, ‘Plans for Employment of Gas from the Air in Retaliation for its Use against Us by the Enemy’, 8 October 1940; AIR 9/136, Air Ministry memorandum, ‘Bomber and Fighter Efforts Available to Counter an Attempted Invasion’, 5 March 1941.

  26 PRO AIR 9/447, Air Ministry, Plans Division: draft directive to Air Officer Commanding in Ireland, 24 J
une 1940; ‘Minute from Director of Plans’, 2 June 1940.

  27 W. Green, Warplanes of the Third Reich (London, 1970), p. 544.

  28 The Rise and Fall of the German Air Force, 1933 – 1945 (London, 1983, reprinted from AHB narrative, 1948), pp. 75–6.

  29 Pre-war planning in National Archives, microcopy T177, roll 31, ‘Nachschubzahlen für Luftfahrtgerät’, 1 April 1938 (which estimated output of 1,753 per month on mobilization). Plans 15 and 16 in ΒΑ-MA, RL3 159, Lieferprogramm Nr 15,1 September 1939, and Flugzeug-Beschaffungs-Programm Nr 16, 28 October 1939. The 1940 plan in ΒΑ-MA, RL3162, Lieferplan Nr 18,1 July 1940.

  30 British figure from PRO AIR 22/293, ‘Statistics: Aircraft Production, Imports and Exports, Schedule B’ (production from 1 June to 30 September).

  31 D. Irving, The Rise and Fall of the Luftwaffe: The Life of Erhard Milch (London, 1973), p. 136.

  32 PRO AIR 16/635, HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 7 November 1940, ‘German Attacks on England 11 September–31 October 1940’, pp. 6–9.

  33 Murray, Luftwaffe, pp. 54–5; Webster and Frankland, Strategic Air Offensive, vol. 4, p. 501.

  34 PRO AIR 22/72, Air Ministry weekly intelligence summary, 8 August 1940, p. 3.

  35 PRO AIR 22/72, weekly summary, 15 August 1940, p. 4.

  36 AHB, ‘Battle of Britain’ narrative, Appendix 37, ‘German Views on the Battle of Britain’, p. 1 (based on interviews with Field Marshal Erhard Milch and General Adolf Galland).

  37 H. Trevor-Roper (ed.), Hitler’s War Directives 1939 – 1945 (London, 1966), pp. 74–9, Directive 16,16 July 1940; pp. 79–80, Directive 17, 1 August 1940. AHB, ‘The Course of the Air War against England’, translation of German AHB study, 7 July 1944, pp. 1–2.

  38 PRO AIR 40/2444, O. Bechtle lecture, ‘German Air Force Operations against Great Britain, Tactics and Lessons Learned 1940–1941’, 2 February 1944, pp. 2–4.

  39 E. Fröhlich (ed.), Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels: Sämtliche Fragemente (4 vols, Munich, 1987), vol. 3, pp. 264, 270, 271.

  40 Goebbels, Tagebücher, p. 277.

  THREE THE BATTLE

  1 PRO AIR 40/2444, Bechtle lecture, pp. 7–8.

  2 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, p. 5.

  3 PRO AIR 22/478, RAF Wireless Intelligence Service, daily summary, 13 August 1940. See too AIR 22/72, Air Ministry weekly intelligence summary, 15 August 1940, p. 1 – activity was ‘much higher than had been normal’.

  4 PRO AIR 16/432, report on enemy activity over Great Britain, 27/28 June 1940.

  5 C. Goulter, A Forgotten Offensive: Royal Air Force Coastal Command’s Anti-Shipping Campaign 1940 – 1943 (London, 1995), pp. 111–22.

  6 PRO AIR 9/447, Air Ministry, Director of Plans, memorandum, ‘Employment of the Air Striking Force’, 8 July 1940.

  7 Webster and Frankland, Strategic Air Offensive, vol. 4, pp. 118 – 24.

  8 PRO AIR 22/296, ‘Casualties, Strength and Establishment of the RAF’. In mid-August the deficiency of bomber pilots reached a peak of 219; the highest deficiency of fighter pilots was 181 on 24 August.

  9 PRO AIR 16/432, Home Security intelligence summary, 31 July/1 August.

  10 PRO AIR 16/216, HQ 11 Group to all Group controllers, 19 August 1940.

  11 AHB, ‘Course of the Air War…’, p. 2; FCNA, p. 128, OKW directive, 16 August 1940.

  12 AHB, ‘Battle of Britain’ narrative, Appendix 8 III, ‘Table of Chief Attacks on Airfields and RDF Stations’, pp. 1–9.

  13 AHB, ‘Battle of Britain’ narrative, Appendix 34 II, ‘Fighter Command Aircraft Destroyed or Damaged on the Ground’.

  14 This paragraph and following account in PRO AIR 16/635, ‘Notes of Damage and Repairs at Certain Fighter Aerodromes’, 21 September 1940.

  15 PRO AIR 16/216: HQ 11 Group to all Group controllers, 19 August 1940; telegram from 11 Group HQ to all airfields, 20 August 1940.

  16 AHB, ‘Battle of Britain’ narrative, Appendix 8 III.

  17 Jacobsen (ed.), Kriegstagebuch, vol. 2, p. 81, entry for 30 August 1940; Rise and Fall, p. 85.

  18 PRO AIR 22/293, Schedule E, ‘Number of Aircraft in Storage Units’; PREM 3/29 (3), summarized order of battle, 6 September 1940; AIR 16/635, Fighter Command HQ, operational strength, 1 September 1940.

  19 PRO AIR 22/262, ‘Daily Return of Casualties to RAF Aircraft’, 25 June–29 September 1940.

  20 Rise and Fall, pp. 82–3; see too O. Groehler, Geschichte des Luftkriegs (Berlin, 1981), p. 272, for figures on aggregate German losses.

  21 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, pp. 21–4.

  22 J. Colville, The Fringes of Power: 10 Downing Street Diaries 1939 – 1945 (London, 1985), p. 227, entry for 20 August 1940. Colville confessed in a footnote that he did not even notice the sentence when he sat listening to the speech. The invention of the remark can be found in J. Winant, A Letter from Grosvenor Square: An Account of a Stewardship (London, 1947), pp. 29–30.

  23 Gilbert, Churchill War Papers, pp. 693–4, speech to the House of Commons, 20 August 1940.

  24 Cowles, Looking for Trouble, pp. 424–6.

  25 N. Nicolson (ed.), Harold Nicolson: Diaries and Letters 1939 – 1945 (London, 1967), p. 111, entry for 7 September 1940.

  26 PRO AIR 8/315, Chief of the Air Staff, ‘Analysis of the G. A. F. Personnel Losses, July–October 1940’; AIR 22/72, Air Ministry weekly intelligence summary, report for 12 September 1940, p. 3; A. Galland, The First and the Last (London, 1955), p. 34.

  27 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, p. 20.

  28 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, p. 24; PRO T265/19, Treasury Inter-Service Committee, meeting of 3 October 1940 for final decision; AIR 16/635, HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 7 November 1940, ‘German Attacks on England 11 September-31 October’, p. 14.

  29 PRO AIR 16/635, HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 12 September 1940, pp. 6–7; Dowding to Air Ministry, 22 September 1940, ‘German Attacks on England 8 August–10 September’, pp. 1–2. See too AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, pp. 18–19.

  30 IWM, EDS documents, AL 1492, OKW Aktennotiz, 20 August 1940.

  31 PRO AIR 40/2444, Bechtle lecture, p. 4; K. Maier, ‘Die Luftschlacht um England’, in Das deutsche Reich und der zweite Weltkrieg, vol. 2 (Stuttgart, 1979), p. 386. See too J. Ray, The Night Blitz 1940 – 1941 (London, 1996), pp. 97–102.

  32 Jacobsen (ed.), Kriegstagebuch, p. 100, entry for 14 September 1940.

  33 Goebbels, Tagebücher, p. 313.

  34 PRO AIR 9/447: COS meeting, ‘Bombardment Policy’, June 1940; Air Ministry, Director of Plans, memorandum, 8 July 1940.

  35 PRO AIR 40/2444, Bechtle lecture, p. 5; AIR 22/72, Air Ministry weekly intelligence summaries, 8 August, 12 September 1940.

  36 PRO AIR 16/635, HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 12 September 1940, p. 5.

  37 Goebbels, Tagebücher, p. 315, entry for 9 September 1940.

  38 Shirer, Berlin Diary, pp. 381, 384.

  39 Goebbels, Tagebücher, p. 296, entry for 27 August 1940; Shirer, Berlin Diary, p. 384.

  40 Maier, ‘Luftschlacht’, p. 405.

  41 PRO AIR 16/432, Home Security intelligence summaries, reports of operations, 24/25 August, 25/26 August, 28/29 August.

  42 PRO AIR 16/635: HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 7 November 1940, pp. 1–5; HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 12 September 1940, pp. 4–6; AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, pp. 11–12.

  43 PRO AIR 16/635, HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 7 November 1940, pp. 3–4,12.

  44 Bekker, Luftwaffe Diaries, p. 226; Collier, Defence of the United Kingdom, pp. 244 – 5.

  45 FCNA, pp. 133–5, ‘Conference with the Führer’, 6 September 1940; p. 136, Naval Staff memorandum, 10 September 1940. Maier, ‘Luftschlacht’, pp. 386–7.

  46 Jacobsen (ed.), Kriegstagebuch, vol. 2, pp. 98–9, entry for 14 September 1940.

  47 FCNA, pp. 136–9: ‘Conference with the Führer’, 14 September 1940; OKW directive, 19 September 1940; OKW directive, 12 October 1940. Jacobsen (ed.), Kriegstagebuch, vol. 2, p. 99.

  48 FCNA, p. 137, memorandum
from Admiral Raeder, 14 September 1940; Jacobsen (ed.), Kriegstagebuch, vol. 2, p. 100; Maier, ‘Luftschlacht’, pp. 390–91.

  49 L. E. O. Charlton, War over England (London, 1936), pp. 158–81.

  50 PRO INF 1/264, Home Intelligence daily reports, 27 June 1940.

  51 PRO INF 1/264, reports for 28 June, 6 September 1940.

  52 PRO INF 1/264, report for 23 August 1940.

  53 J. Langdon-Davies, Nerves versus Nazis (London, 1940), pp. 7, 14, 17–18.

  54 PRO INF 1/264, Home Intelligence daily reports, 6 September 1940.

  55 PRO INF 1/264, reports for 9,10 September 1940.

  56 G. Orwell, ‘War-time Diary: 1940’, entry for 25 October 1940, in The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters (4 vols, London, 1968), vol. 2, pp. 427–8.

  57 PRO INF 1/292 Part I, Home Intelligence weekly reports, report for 30 September–9 October, p. 1.

  58 Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 1, pp. 172–3,184–5.

  59 PRO AIR 16/356: Air Ministry to Dowding, 1 August, 27 August 1940; cypher messages, Fighter Command, 7 September, 22 September, 24 September, 13 October, 25 October.

  60 PRO INF 1/283, Ministry of Information newsletter, ‘Questions the Public Are Asking’, 23 September, 9 October; Cowles, Looking for Trouble, p. 446.

  61 Orwell, ‘War-time Diary: 1940’, p. 394·

  62 PRO INF 1/292 Part I, Home Intelligence weekly report, 4 November–11 November 1940, pp. 1–2; INF 1/849, Ministry of Information Policy Committee, meeting of 4 June 1940, p. 1.

  63 AHB, Dowding ‘Despatch’, Appendix C.

  64 AHB, ‘Course of the Air War’, p. 3.

  65 PRO AIR 22/263, ‘Daily Returns of Casualties to RAF Aircraft’, 29 September 1940–31 January 1941; AIR 16/635, HQ 11 Group to HQ Fighter Command, 7 November 1940, ‘German Attacks on England 11 September–31 October 1940’, pp. 6–12; German figures in Groehler, Geschichte des Luftkriegs, p. 272.

  66 Maier, ‘Luftschlacht’, p. 392; Groehler, Geschichte des Luftkriegs, p. 270.

  67 Goebbels, Tagebücher: p. 429, entry for 12 December 1940; p. 410, entry for 24 November; p. 420, entry for 5 December 1940.