The Battle of Britain
10
th
July to 31
st
October 1940
The Battle of Britain was a major air campaign fought over southern England in the late summer of 1940.
After
the
evacuation
of
the
British
Expeditionary
Force
from
Dunkirk
and
the
Fall
of
France,
Hitler
needed
to
gain
air
superiority
over
the Channel in preparation for an invasion of Great Britain.
The
German
high
command
recognised
the
logistical
difficulties
of
a
seaborne
attack
and
its
impracticality
while
the
Royal
Navy
controlled
the
English Channel and the North Sea.
"What General Weygand called the 'Battle of France' is over.
I expect that the ‘Battle of Britain’ is about to begin."
Churchill. 18 June 1940
Hermann
Göring,
the
former
WW1
fighter
ace,
Hitler’s
Deputy
who
was
in
charge
of
the
Luftwaffe
(the
Gernam
airforce),
boasted
that
“my
Luftwaffe
will
bring
England
to
her
knees”
..
and
make
the
Invasion
Plan
(Operation
Sea
Lion)
a
relatively
bloodless
success
..
and
Hitler,
believing
him,
sat
back and waited for it to happen .. ..
Those involved
The various stages of the battle
Preparation Britain began the war with several secret weapons: RADAR - the ability to bounce radio waves off incoming aircraft and measure the size of formations, their height and distance: thousands of OBSERVER CORPS stations which continued to trace enemy planes after they had crossed the coast: FCHQ Fighter Command Head Quarters, buried 80 feet underground at Bentley Priory which coordinated the incoming intelligence and ordered the appropriate Squadrons into the air to intercept enemy bombers and fighters at the correct height and location (the “Dowding system”); & ULTRA the intelligence stream from Bletchley Park obtained from intercepts from the Enigma Code, giving insight into German High Command tactics and intentions. Combat 26 June – 16 July : Störangriffe (" nuisance raids "), small-scale, scattered, probing attacks both day and night, with armed reconnaissance, mine-laying sorties and, from 4 July , daylight Kanalkampf (" the Channel battles ") against shipping. 17 July – 12 August : daylight Kanalkampf attacks on shipping intensify and there are increased attacks on ports and coastal airfields, together with night raids on RAF bases and aircraft-manufacturing factories. 13 August – 6 September : Adlerangriff (" Eagle Attack "), the main assault; an attempt to destroy the RAF in southern England including massive daylight attacks on RAF airfields followed, from 19 August , by heavy night bombing of ports and industrial cities including suburbs of London. 7 September – 2 October : the Blitz commences, main focus is now day and night attacks on London. 3–31 October : large scale night bombing raids, mostly on London; daylight attacks now confined to small scale fighter-bomber Störangriffe raids luring RAF fighters into dogfights.
United Kingdom
Royal Air Force
Canada
Royal Canadian Air Force
1,963 serviceable aircraft
Casualties and losses:
1,542 aircrew killed
422 aircrew wounded
1,744 aircraft destroyed
14,286 civilians killed
20,325 civilians injured
Germany
Luftwaffe
Italy
Corpo Aereo Italiano
2,550 serviceable aircraft
Casualties and losses:
2,585 aircrew killed or missing
925 captured
735 wounded
John Gillespie Magee
An Anglo-American aviator and poet who served in the Royal Canadian Air Force, which he joined before
the United States entered the war.
He died in a mid-air collision over Lincolnshire in 1941.
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed and joined the tumbling mirth of sun-split clouds and done a hundred things you have not dreamed of ..
wheeled and soared and swung high in the sunlit silence.
Hov’ring there, I’ve chased the shouting wind along and flung my eager craft through footless halls of air .. ..
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue.
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace where never lark or ever eagle flew and,
While with silent, lifting mind, I’ve trod the high un-trespassed sanctity of space;
Put out my hand .. .. and touched the face of God.
The Spitfire Prelude
Organist, Andrew Unsworth, performs "Spitfire Prelude" by Sir William Walton (1942) - arranged by Dennis Morrell.
“Never, in the field of human conflict, was so much, owed by so many, to so few”
was
a
wartime
speech
made
by
the
British
Prime
Minister
Winston
Churchill
on
20
August
1940.
The
name
stems
from
this
specific
line
in
the
speech
which
refers
to
the
ongoing
efforts
of
the
Royal
Air
Force
pilots
who
were
at
that
time
fighting
the
Battle
of
Britain,
the
pivotal
air
battle
with
the
German
Luftwaffe.
A
few
months
later,
with
the
battle
won
and
German
plans
postponed,
the
Allied airmen became known as
"The Few"
.
