Battle of Britain by Christer Bergström

Author:Christer Bergström
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Military / World War II
ISBN: 9781612003641
Publisher: Casemate / Vaktel Forlag
Published: 2015-09-19T04:00:00+00:00

29 August 1940

After these raids the German bomber crews were allowed a day’s rest on 29 August. Instead, Generalmajor von Döring, Jafü 2, sent out his now significantly strengthened fighter force on free hunting sweeps across southern England. Again, they managed to trick 11 Group into order up a few squadrons. Led by the courageous Squadron Leader Peter Townsend the pilots of 85 Squadron did not let themselves to be deterred by inferiority of numbers and altitude. Instead, they turned their Hurricanes skywards and began the slow climb to get to a formation of over one hundred Bf 109s high above them. It was Major Günther Lützow’s JG 3, and the small band of old Hurricanes should have been an easy target when most of JG 3 dived to ‘wipe the floor with the Tommies’. Two Hurricanes were hit and their pilots forced to bail out, but for the rest of the clash the RAF pilots quite sensationally gained the upper hand. When JG 3 eventually limped back across the Channel, six of its Bf 109s had been shot down and two more were so battered that they crashed in France. II./ZG 26 ‘Horst Wessel’ performed far better in their engagement with No. 610 Squadron, which led to at least two Spitfires being shot down for no German losses.

As soon as Park realized that there were only German fighters in the air, he called his airmen back. However he felt a growing confidence, so when the next great German fighter sweep was reported a few hours later, he took up the challenge and again 85 Squadron was scrambled, along with 501 and 603 squadrons. But this time the RAF pilots also met significantly more experienced German units – I./JG 26 under Hauptmann Rolf Pingel and I./JG 51 under Oberleutnant Richard Leppla, both prominent aces.

After the initial skirmish, 603 Squadron’s Pilot Officer Richard Hillary found to his horror that he had lost the rest of his squadron. Fortunately, shortly afterwards he caught sight of 501 Squadron’s Hurricanes and joined their formation. Hillary wrote afterwards:

‘I learned within a few seconds the truth of the old warning “Beware of the Hun in the Sun”.

I was making pleasant little sweeps from side to side, and peering earnestly into my mirror when, from the sun and dead astern, bullets started appearing along my port wing.’ 243

Hillary managed to bring his bullet-riddled Spitfire down in a belly landing in a cornfield near Lympne. Meanwhile the German fighter pilots shot down four more RAF planes against the loss of two of their own. Hauptmann Pingel himself got two of the German victories. One of those he shot down was Flight Lieutenant John Gibson, 501 Squadron’s ace with eight victories, who had recently had his 24th birthday. He had just brought down one of I./JG 26’s Bf 109s when Pingel dived down and set fire to his Hurricane. Gibson bailed out and landed in the water about three kilometres off the coast, where he was picked up by a motorboat.

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