The Hardest Day... how a titanic clash in the air turned the tide of WW2
Eighty years ago today, in the skies over south-east England, the heroes of the RAF obliterated Hitler’s invasion plan
less successful. Faced by powerful defensive resistance from ground crews and fighters of 32 and 610 squadrons, the bombers mostly dropped their loads in open areas or woods.
In stark contrast to Kenley, no buildings were destroyed.A couple of other nearby bases at West Malling and Croydon suffered minor damage from secondary raiders, but the first attempt to obliterate Fighter Command’s capacity around southern London had failed.
The second wave of Luftwaffe attacks began at 2.30pm, focused on a series of targets in Hampshire and West Sussex, namely the radar station at Poling, and RAF airfields at Gosport, Thorney Island and
Ford.
It was the largest single concentration of German aircraft unleashed so far in the Battle of Britain, comprising 157 Messerschmitt fighters and 109 Stukas, the infamous cranked wing dive-bomber that had wreaked havoc across Europe since the beginning
FIRE POWER: British troops scan the skies for Luftwaffe aircraft as a Kent farmer gathers his hay. Below, Keith Park of the war. With its siren – known as the “Jericho trumpet” – that wailed during a vertical descent, the aircraft had become a terrifying symbol of Nazi Blitzkrieg. But the Stukas met their match in Fighter Command on the Hardest Day. Although some of them were able to hit their targets, especially the Poling radar station which was put out of action (though a mlobile radar station was soon up and running), the cost was heavy, with 16 of them destroyed.
Such losses were unsustainable, and the Stuka did not appear again in the Battle of Britain.
Attacks on Gosport and Ford inflicted considerable damage. But throughout the afternoon’s melee over the South Coast, the Germans suffered heavy punishment.
Even the renowned Messerschmitt 109 fighters, the equal of the Spitfire in speed and manoeuvrability, could not easily escape.
Bob Doe of 234 squadron recalled chasing a stricken 109 which was desperate to get back to France across the Channel. “His engine had stopped. His hood had come off, his wheels had come down and the thing was falling to pieces.” Soon the aircraft plunged into the sea. The third and final raid of the day, made at 5.30pm, involved 51 Heinkel bombers and 58 Dorniers, all with heavy fighter escorts.The targets were RAF bases in Essex at North Weald and Hornchurch, but thick cloud cover and the strength of the fighter defences meant the quest was fruitless.
EVEN worse, during the retreat, a number of Germans were shot down, among them the fighter ace Horst Tietzen, who had been credited with an astonishing 20 victories during the Second World War. Killed in combat over the Thames Estuary, his body later washed up in Calais.
His demise was a fitting symbol of how badly the Luftwaffe had missed its objective. During the action on the Hardest Day, the Germans lost 69 aircraft, had 94 airmen killed and another 40 taken prisoner.
Fighter Command’s losses totalled just 38 planes with 11 deaths among its pilots. For the first time since the start of the war in September 1939, the Reich’s war machine had proved fallible.
“This represents the heaviest defeat the enemy has yet suffered at the hands of our fighters and ground defences,” exclaimed the Daily Express.
The mood of growing confidence, combined with gratitude to the RAF, was captured two days later by Churchill in one of his most resonant wartime speeches, when he said that “never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few”.
The Battle of Britain continued for almost another month but victory eluded the Luftwaffe. On September 17, Hitler decided to postpone Sealion indefinitely.