Germany. Luftwaffe - The Battle of Britain: the jubilee history

THE

BATTLE OF

BRITAIN

THE

BATTLE OF

BRITAIN

THE JUBILEE HISTORY

RICHARD HOUGH
AND
DENIS RICHARDS

First published in Great Britain in 1989 and 1990 by Hodder and Stoughton
Re-printed in this format in 2007
PEN & SWORD AVIATION
an imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street
Barnsley
South Yorkshire
S70 2AS

Copyright Richard Hough and Denis Richards, 1989, 1990, 2007

ISBN 978 1 84415 6 573

The right of Richard Hough and Denis Richards to be identified
as authors of this work has been asserted by him in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical
including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and
retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing.

Printed and bound in Great Britain
By Biddies

Pen & Sword Books Ltd incorporates the imprints of
Pen & Sword Aviation, Pen & Sword Maritime, Pen & Sword Military,

Wharncliffe Local History, Pen & Sword Select,
Pen & Sword Military Classics and Leo Cooper.

For a complete list of Pen & Sword titles please contact
PEN & SWORD BOOKS LIMITED
47 Church Street, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, S70 2AS, England
E-mail: enquiries@pen-and-sword.co.uk
Website: www.pen-and-sword.co.uk

COLOUR PICTURES

BLACK AND WHITE PICTURES

Between pages 206 and 207

MAPS

LINE ILLUSTRATIONS

Careless Talk Costs Lives

Front page of the Daily Telegraph, 16 September 1940

F ifty years on is a good moment for reappraising, and where appropriate celebrating, any great event. Sufficient time has elapsed for it to be seen in historical perspective; nearly all the preserved documentation is usually available; and there are enough of the participants still alive to furnish detail and informed criticism.

There are two further reasons which apply especially in the case of the Battle of Britain. The first is that the passing years have only confirmed, what was hoped and thought at the time, that the Battle was one of the great turning-points in World War II a defensive victory which saved the island base and so, once Russia and the United States became involved, made future offensive victories possible. The second reason is that within these fifty years fresh generations have been born to whom much of the story is unfamiliar. There are indeed already many excellent books concerned with the Battle which they might read with profit, but as many of these are personal memoirs, or relate to particular episodes, or are intended mainly for the scholar or aficionado, it seemed to us that there was still a place for a new narrative intended for the general reader.

There are two points of emphasis within the book which may need explanation. The British victory resulted primarily from the fact that when the German threat materialised, there were the means to deal with it. How the RAF managed to survive at all in the 1920s, how an efficient air defence system was created over the years, how modern fighters were developed and brought into service, and how the strength of Fighter Command was painfully built up and preserved amid many competing claims, are therefore a substantial part of our story.

Similarly there is a perhaps unusual concentration within the Battle itself on seven of the sixteen weeks for which it officially lasted. The official duration, decided by the Air Ministry after the war, was based on the operations as seen from the British side and was promulgated primarily to define the limits within which aircrew would qualify for the Battle of Britain clasp. Nothing else would explain the choice of a sheer calendar date, 31 October, as the termination. But it seems to us that in as much as invasion was the proposed next step if the Luftwaffe succeeded, the heart and soul of the Battle was very much the period between the Eagle attacks in the second week of August and the closing days of September, by which time Hitler had postponed the invasion indefinitely and the British had sensed the relaxation of his preparations. We have accordingly treated these vital weeks in considerably greater detail than the fighting of July and October.