Scramble: A Narrative History of the Battle of Britain

by Norman Gelb

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  Pilot Officer John Ellacombe

  When I went to bury Jim Johnston who’d been shot down, I took along Johnnie Comar, a Canadian who had trained with me. We flew to Hawkinge Aerodrome, where the local people had laid on a padre and a firing squad of six RAF airmen. While the good padre was saying the final bit of his service, we could hear a scream above and looked up and saw these Junker 87s heading down our way, shedding their bombs as they dived. The airmen disappeared in a flash. I told the padre to run like hell and Johnnie Comar and I jumped into the grave on top of Jim’s coffin, which still gave us four or five feet of slit trench. The whole place thumped and banged for about a minute. When it was quiet, we climbed out. We couldn’t see the padre. We couldn’t see the airmen. Even the gravediggers had disappeared. It was horrifying, that raid being mixed up with saying farewell to a friend.

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  Aircraftswoman Second Class Edith Heap

  The Germans made quite a mess of Debden before they were finished bombing it. There was one Scottish girl who was in the bath when a raid came in one time. She wasn’t sure what to do. So she let the water out of the bath, put on her tin hat and just sat there in the tub till the raid was over.

  When it was busy, it was chaotic in the Ops Room. On one particular day, when Winifred Butler and I were just coming on duty, the sirens went when we were on the other side of the parade ground. We ran like hares and shot into the Ops Room. I said to the girl I was going to relieve, ‘Right, give it to me.’ Winifred did the same. And the girls we were relieving stayed on to help.

  We didn’t worry about the bombing. We didn’t have time. We were too busy. All you’d think about was getting the aircraft up in the air to do something. But we knew the Ops Room at Detling airfield had received a direct hit.

  When you didn’t have your earphones on, you could hear what was happening in the air. That’s where I learned all my bad language. You could actually hear the battle taking place. It was awe-inspiring hearing the pilots call out to each other over the radio. ‘Look out! There’s someone behind you!’ ‘Break off!’ That sort of thing. It got fast and furious. We could hear it while we were plotting.

  There was an Irish girl — a plotter like me — who had hysterics when we were being bombed. We thought that was frightful that she wasn’t able to control herself. Poor girl. It showed a lack of understanding on our part. I understand now, but at the time we thought, ‘English people don’t behave like that.’

  We stayed on at Debden until they decided it was too dangerous because of the bombing. After Detling had been hit, they decided it was too much of a risk. So they moved the Ops Room off the station. They put it first in a wooden hut in a chalk pit not far away. We felt terribly brave at one point, because there was an unexploded German bomb on the road. The road was closed, but we had to go along it in a bus to get to our new Ops Room. We were soon moved again, to a school in Saffron Walden. The night after we moved, when it would have been my watch on duty, there was a direct hit on the chalk pit Ops Room.

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  Corporal Claire Legge

  We used to sleep with trousers and things beside the bed, absolutely ready. Normally, the air-raid warning went up in stages — ‘Prepare to take cover’, that sort of thing. On the morning we were bombed at Tangmere, the advance warning did come — ‘Prepare to take cover.’ That meant get up and put your clothes on. I was only half-way through when the call came, ‘Take cover! Take cover!’ There was absolute panic. We had one girl, a plotter, Hyacinth, who was tall and elegant. She used to walk around willowy, like a model on show. She decided, when ‘take cover’ was sounded, that she would take a bath. She always had a half water, half oil bath. Well, she was in her bath and wouldn’t get out. So another corporal, Frances Turner, and I had to physically take this blasted woman out of the bath and get her dressed. As a result, the first bomb had in actual fact fallen by the time we got into the shelter. Poor old Frances, she came in after me. I got in first and all the time she was pushing this woman down the stairs.

  We were in the shelter a long time. I was right by the entrance. One of the male sergeants from the plotting table came tumbling down the steps into the shelter in a most terrible state. ‘Oh my God,’ he said. ‘It’s awful up there.’ I gave him a swig of brandy from the flask my father had given me and which I always carried in my gas mask.

  I don’t think any of us felt frightened until suddenly a rumour went round that the trench had collapsed and somebody’s head had been severed by some wood or something right at the end of the shelter, which we couldn’t see from where we were because it went round a corner. In fact, it hadn’t really happened, but it made one feel a bit sick.

  Anyway, when it was all over, out we came and you never saw such a mess in your life. The Germans had seemed to be going for Portsmouth and Southampton. We had got all our fighters up, ready and waiting over there, but instead of going there, the Germans did a turn and came straight for Tangmere. We had 1 hangar, 2 hangar, 3 hangar, 4 hangar and the Ops Room. They went bop, bop, bop, bop, and missed the Ops Room. How? God only knows. The hangars were flattened. There were mattresses all over the road — one of the hangars must have been a storeroom. There was a monumental mess.

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  Flight Lieutenant Bob Stanford-Tuck

  The single-storied mess at Martlesham was very old-fashioned, rather like a bloody great bungalow. My bathroom was on the outside wall. I’d been flying a bit the night before and I’d done one patrol early in the morning, got back and was in the bath when the sirens went.

  The German bombers came in and plastered our aerodrome. The stuff was really coming down. I jumped out of the bath and ran out through a side door to the nearest slit trench with just a towel round me. As I dived in, my towel came off and I was starkers, absolutely starkers, taking a header into that slit trench. There must have been about fifteen WAAFs in there. I landed on top of them without a stitch of clothing on. Most of these young WAAFs were our waitresses in the mess. In the days afterwards, everytime I walked into the dining room, you could see them all giggling away. I got used to it after a bit.

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  Assistant Section Officer Molly Wilkinson

  We were ordered to evacuate our station at dawn and dusk every day because the German raids were so bad. They’d sound a hooter and all personnel who were not involved in flying left the base for about an hour at those two times. That was when the Germans chose to come in because it was difficult to see them then, with dawn breaking or dusk falling. I used to go with Basil Embry, the station commander. He had what is now called an estate car. He would have a machine-gun. As we got off the base, outside the gates, he’d say, ‘Right, we’ll stop here. You get down in the ditch.’ And he’d set up his machine-gun on top of his car and wait for the Germans to fly over. He’d shoot at them. I don’t think he had any success. But he was a real fighting man.

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  Gunner Robert Angell

  To try to bring down the attacking German bombers, we had three-inch anti-aircraft guns down at Dover, within sight of France. Those guns were of First World War vintage. They were so old it was said they had to be drawn from the Imperial War Museum in London. Along came August and the first waves of German bombers came over. At that time, nobody in the country had seen aircraft in such numbers. It was phenomenal to us and, at Dover, we were the first to see them. You’d hear their distant drone and then there they were, all in perfect formation. It was an amazing sight and even more amazing when the formations grew bigger and bigger.

  The joke was they were flying at — I can’t remember exactly — maybe 23,000 feet. The range of our guns was 16,000 feet! It was hopeless. We could do nothing but watch them going over. To where? We knew not. It all seemed terribly remote. Heinkel 111s. Dornier 17s. The fighters which escorted them gradually came out of range and peeled off to come back. Sometimes they’d have a little sport around Dover. There were about sixteen barrage balloons on wires protecting the harb
our, to prevent low level bombing attacks. The German fighters would swoop down on them on their way back to their bases, fire bursts of machine-gun fire and down the lot. It was like a game — could they down all sixteen barrage balloons with three aircraft? When they did, they came within range of our guns; for about two or three minutes all hell was let loose around Dover. These characters roared in and shot down the barrage balloons, which produced the most marvellous fireworks display, while all the guns in the harbour let fly, including our First World War Lewis machine-guns. It really was pandemonium.

  Occasionally, one of those German fighters would give off smoke and go off in the distance and we’d claim a victory. It seemed like a game — nothing like war. It wasn’t until we read it in the papers the next day that we learned that the bombers had been heading for the airfields.

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  Prime Minister to Secretary of State for Air, Chief of the Air Staff and Secretary to the War Cabinet

  29 August 1940

  I was much concerned on visiting Manston Aerodrome yesterday to find that although more than four clear days have passed since it was last raided the greater part of the craters on the landing ground remained unfilled and the aerodrome was barely serviceable. When you remember what the Germans did at the Stavanger aerodrome and the enormous rapidity with which craters were filled I must protest emphatically against this feeble method of repairing damage. Altogether there were one hundred and fifty people available to work, including those that could be provided from the Air Force personnel. These were doing their best. No effective appliances were available, and the whole process appeared disproportionate to the value of maintaining this fighting vantage ground.

  All craters should be filled within twenty-four hours at most, and every case where a crater is unfilled for a longer period should be reported to higher authorities ... After the craters had been refilled camouflage effort might be made to pretend they had not been, but this is a refinement.

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  Air Commodore Gerald Gibbs, Senior Staff Officer, 11 Group

  We had trouble with the civilian labour employed to repair runways and so keep our vital airfields in action at this critical time. Every time there was an ‘alert’ at some of these airfields, the labour would go into the shelter and refuse to carry on. Victor Beamish, that fine character, killed a little later ... tried everything with them — blandishments, exhortation, rewards, insults, all to no avail. They said this was a free country and they weren’t going to work. Victor pointed out that it wouldn’t be a free country much longer if we didn’t get the airfield going, but no good. We put parties of our airmen on the job.

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  Air Vice Marshal Keith Park

  When the German air force had concentrated on bombing my fighter aerodromes, I got such little help from the Air Ministry to repair the bomb damage that I had to borrow some thousands of troops from the British army to fill bomb craters and keep the aerodromes serviceable. For doing so, I was severely criticized by the Air Ministry at the time for accepting army assistance. Had my fighter aerodromes been put out of action, the German air force would have won the battle by 15 September.

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  E.B. Sharpley, Town Clerk, Stoke-on-Trent

  To Major General Sir Robert Gordon-Finlayson, Officer

  Commanding Western Command

  As you may possibly be aware, for some days past now we have, in this area, been having air raids. Enemy planes have commenced their raids at 10.00 p.m. and have stayed in the area in some cases for several hours. On no occasion has there been, so far as we are aware, the slightest attempt to interfere with their presence or operations, and it is difficult to come to any other conclusion than that the enemy must know that there are, in this area, no defences, and is taking advantage of it. Cannot some steps be taken to afford to the area some degree of protection, even though that degree is a small one?

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  Sir Charles McGrath, Clerk of the Peace, West Riding of Yorkshire

  To Air Chief Marshal Dowding, 2 September

  You will have received a report of the enemy air attack on Bradford and the extensive damage done to industrial, shop and house property in the centre of the city. I spent some hours there yesterday and was informed that the Fire Brigade, Rescue and Repair Parties and other Civil Defence services and Home Guard behaved splendidly. But there was grave concern about the complete absence of any air defence. There are no anti-aircraft guns guarding the city and during the protracted time that the enemy took to deliver his attack — roughly from 10.30 on the Saturday night to 4.00 on the Sunday morning — there was no interference whatever by our air force and the enemy was left to have it all his own way. That this is a ‘people’s war’ has become commonplace, and the people are told that we cannot lose the war unless the civilian population lose their nerve. The morale of the people of Yorkshire is very high, but the absence of protection from air attacks puts an added strain on them, and they would be considerably heartened and enabled to view a continuance of the nightly air attacks with more composure if they could be assured that measures will be taken to defend them from the enemy by adequate ground and air defences.

  Letter marked by Dowding’s office, ‘Routine reply despatched.’

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  Fighter Command Headquarters

  Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding wishes to state that he is in receipt of numerous communications from public bodies, industrial firms and private individuals, containing criticisms of the defence, particularly at night, and suggestions for improvement.

  While such communications are carefully perused and receive detailed consideration, Sir Hugh regrets that the very great pressure on his duties precludes his entering into correspondence with individuals. He would, however, offer the following general comments:

  i) The limited defence resources of the country must be concentrated on decisive points.

  ii) Not every aeroplane heard at night is necessarily hostile. Successful night interceptions are not infrequent, and efforts to effect night interceptions are never relaxed.

  iii) Neither side is at present capable of putting a stop to night raiding on the part of the other.

  iv) Scientific advances give promise of a greatly increased percentage of successful night interceptions before very long.

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  Mrs H. E. Miles

  War Journal, 4 September

  There was an air raid today just as we were sitting at lunch. The charwoman and I went down to the cellar and invited the postwoman (who was calling at that moment for ten shillings due on a big parcel from America of Guava jelly, tins of soup and ten pounds of sugar) to come down also. R. stood by the open front door and was amazed at the speed of the dogfight. One plane came down on Netley Heath. We saw the smoke coming out over the hill. Later, R. went up there and a Canadian soldier told him how they went to secure the airmen, as it was quite near their camp. Apparently some of the crew were blown to smithereens and a hand of one of the Hun fliers was proudly carried round the tents by a French Canadian soldier, on show. How terribly sad — how often had that boy’s mother held his hand tenderly!

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  War Cabinet Minutes

  4 September

  The importance of adequate sleep should be emphasized. The people should be told that it was up to them to see that the enemy did not succeed, by sending over a few planes each night, both in directly holding up production and in affecting it indirectly by depriving workers of their sleep ... The ‘red’ warning should be given sparingly at night, the ‘purple’ warning being used to ensure the adoption of essential safety measures.

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  Ruth Roberts

  My daughter Susan, who was about five at the time, was playing with her little friend, Katie, outside our house in Nether Wallop when Southampton, which was about twenty miles away, was attacked by German bombers. I remember Katie stopping playing and asking in awe when she heard the explosions, ‘Was that thunder?’ Susan said, ‘Don’t be silly. That’
s only bombs.’

  Our black spaniel, Donald, gave us early warning. He could hear the planes coming towards us before we could and would run upstairs to hide under the bed.

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  Frank Banham, Air Raid Precautions Officer, Gillingham, Kent

  7 September

  Following any enemy raid, there is a definite probability of unexploded bombs being present. It has to be assumed, for the purposes of public safety, that they are all of the delayed action type.

  For this reason, it is necessary that the area around any unexploded bomb should be kept clear for at least eighty hours, preferably longer. On open ground, the position of an unexploded bomb is quite often marked by a clean round hole a foot or more across, depending on the size of the bomb, with no sign of any crater or discoloration due to smoke and fumes, but identification is far less simple if the unexploded bomb falls on buildings, pavement and so on.

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  Mrs Gwladys Cox

  War Diary, 6 September, 10.00 a.m.

  During this morning’s raid at 9.00 a.m., we watched an air battle in the sky to the northeast, over Hampstead and Camden Town. Not a plane was to be seen, but remarkable tracings, straight lines, curves, spirals, all twisting and turning in the sky, marking the swift passage of aircraft in battle. The heating and cooling of the air caused by the progress of fast planes is said to produce these vapour trails — a really beautiful and symmetrical pattern was made on this occasion.

  9.45 p.m. A raid is on, the alert having sounded during the nine o’clock news. We feel it risky to retire, if you can call it that, so sit in the drawing room reading and writing, listening for guns and crashes. This is the fourth alert since breakfast. It has been a marvellously fine day, very hot, but not oppressive. Jane rang up to inquire, ‘How are we enjoying life?’ She said a bomb had fallen in the Harrow Road, at the end of her road, last night. She heard the plomp!

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  Housewife Magazine

  Have you packed a kitbag or basket ready to take into the shelter with you, along with your gas mask, when the sirens sound? It is a good plan to have ready: 1) some cotton wool for swabbing cuts; 2) absorbent gauze for dressing a cut; 3) a kitbag to hold all these oddments; 4) a triangular bandage in case of fractures; 5) safety pins; 6) sal volatile; 7) tannic acid jelly for treating burns; 8) sticking plaster; 9) bleach ointment for blister gas casualties; 10) small bandages; 11) boric lint for application to wounds; 12) scissors; 13) elastoplast dressings; 14) ear plugs to deaden noise (cotton wool does just as well); 15) iodine; 16) a metal mirror and comb; 17) a bottle of antiseptic; 18) a pencil for use in making a tourniquet; 19) a jemmy (a useful tool in case of the door jamming, or if there is some debris to clear); 20) toys for the children; 21) a reliable torch (include a spare battery as well); 22) chocolate; 23) chewing gum to soothe the nerves of smokers who must not smoke in the refuge room. Some cold food and something to drink might also be added to this list.