10.34, Just who is on the Ropes and is the opponent on wobbly legs.
September 15th.
Day, Heavy attacks on London, broken up by Fighter Command. Highest German Losses since August 18th. Serious rethinking by German High Command.
Night. Main Target London. Heavy Damage.
Weather, Fair but cloud patches. Fine evening (1).
As usual the morning started with a series of reconnaissance flights normally at high altitude. This morning at least one of the Reapers sent in pursuit was successful and shot down an He 111 in the vicinity of Start Point. By eleven in the morning the CH stations were detecting the reflections from large formations over Calais and Boulogne. Eleven Group scrambled fifteen squadrons in response whilst as usual Twelve group sent three squadrons to patrol over Duxford and Debden airfields, whilst Ten group sent a couple to protect the cluster of aircraft factories to the south and west of London. This time there were no deceptions or other shenanigans as the entire huge formation of Luftwaffe aircraft made a be-line for London. Due to the time it took for such a large formation to get organised and sorted out at altitudes between sixteen thousand and twenty six thousand feet, Parks and the controllers at Uxbridge were able to marshal their squadrons and mount their defence. The confrontation commenced over mid Kent with two squadrons of spitfires attacking the high altitude escort of Me 109’s. then as they approached the River Medway three more squadrons of spitfires dove onto the remaining escorting fighters. As the formation approached the southern suburbs of London four squadrons of Hurricanes and one of Defiants confronted the bomber formation in a concerted attack, In all no less than twenty two squadron fighters engaged the German attack, the coup de grace as far as the cohesion of the bomber formations was the arrival of all four Polish squadrons as one single mass diving attack. The bombers jettisoned their loads willy-nilly over London and the southern counties as they turned and fled for the coast. There was a short respite for a couple of hours before the cathode ray tubes one again betrayed the activity over France that presaged another assault. The first reports came into Fighter Commands HQ about one o’clock but it took fully an hour before the attacking force flying in three waves started its foray across the Channel, Eleven Groups response was very much a repeat of the mornings operations. The German formation was attacked as soon as it crossed the coast and Parks fed more and more squadrons into the fray as the formation approached central London. Once again the four spitfire Squadrons from the PAC were held back and given time to get to altitude up sun so as to be decisive in their plunging attack. At some time every squadron in Eleven group was engaged as were two squadrons from Twelve Group and three from Ten Group. To complicate the picture further a formation of Heinkel 111’s from KG55 based in the region of Vilacoubly attacked Portland in Ten Group’s Bailiwick, with squadrons committed to the east in Eleven Group’s manor the controllers in the Middle Wallop sector were struggling to intercept this raid. A squadron flying from Filton did get there but only as the bombs were falling. A second squadron from Exeter was sent up the Channel in an attempt to intercept the returning bombers but only caught a single already damaged straggler sending it plunging into the sea. The daylight raids were not yet over as flying in low a formation of some twenty bomb laden Me 110’s from Gr.210 based at Denain in France made an attack on the Supermarine factory on the banks of the Itchen River at Woolston. No less than five squadrons of fighters were scrambled to intercept this raid before it hit such a vital target, a combination of the AA guns at Southampton and the Intervention of the first squadron of fighters prevent any bombs from hitting the intended target though the local area suffered greatly. There then issued a general chase as the fighters hotly pursued the now lighter Me 110’s as they fled for their home base, again only a solitary straggler was dispatched though several RAF pilots claimed probable’s and damaged targets.
Of all the mornings that Churchill could choose to visit Keith Park’s Eleven Group HQ at Uxbridge he had to chose today. Sitting on the glass fronted operation room balcony beside Parks, with a brandy glass in one hand and a cigar in the other Churchill was a keen observer of the mornings events. When in the midst of the first major attack of the day Churchill observed that all the lights were on, on the tote board he enquired of Parks where the reserves were, Churchill apparently was only momentarily taken aback by Parks terse response that there were none, (2) everything he had was up and fighting. Knowing the situation Churchill was impressed with the calmness of everybody in the command centre as they quietly got on with the task in hand, slowly the tote lights came back on as the squadrons refuelled and rearmed ready to scramble again. Here was shown to Churchill again another facet of the many who worked hard to keep the few in the fight and to make possible the countries very survival. After the wars end Churchill would write at length about this visit as an illustration of why the battle was won. Long after Churchill departed that day and through the night the work of Fighter Command continued unabated. London was again the focus of the main nights effort with over one hundred and eighty bombers being sent there in a continual stream through the dark hours. Night fighters were fed into this stream as frequently as the GCI/PPI stations could cope with. Elsewhere smaller raids on Liverpool, Manchester, Cardiff and Bristol kept the rest of the RDF stations and night fighter squadrons busy.
Even before nightfall the evening papers, especially those in London where trumpeting the success of the RAF that day, claiming no less than two hundred and one enemy aircraft destroyed that day. Sir Phillip was well aware how inflated these figures were and divided them by three to get the expected number of confirmed downed aircraft and by half if being optimistic. Whichever way you cut it, to Sir Phillip losses of around seventy at the low estimate and one hundred at the optimistic end would to Sir Phillip seem unsupportable even by the Luftwaffe. The figures of the losses to Fighter Command where in Sir Phillips opinion a far more important measure of how the day went. Here they were quite encouraging, Twenty aircraft had been lost with twelve pilots saved. The savagery of the days fighting was encapsulated in the returns from one of the PAC squadrons at Duxford, at nightfall on the fifteenth of September they had only four operational spitfires, by dawn, with herculean efforts by the ground crews and fitters no less than a dozen aircraft were ready on the flight line. Such mini—miracles were being repeated in hangers all over Fighter Command and with those aircraft coming from the factories and repair shops the numbers were being maintained. Here the ATS was doing sterling work and due to the sheer pressure of numbers female pilots were now delivering frontline fighters to squadrons within the combat zone. The coolness, composure and complete professionalism of these women pilots was being noted by many including the Ministry of Information who were quick to grab the opportunity of some uplifting propaganda for the consumption of the general public.
(1) Daily summary quoted verbatim from the The Narrow Margin by Derek Wood and Derek Dempster
(2)This is as OTL
September 16th.
Day, Goering confers on losses of the 15th. Policy changes. Park Changes tactics. Only slight air activity.
Night. Continuous attacks on London. Smaller raids Merseyside and midlands.
Weather. General rain and cloud. (1)
The Luftwaffe high command had had high expectations of successfully breaking the defence of fighter command on the fifteenth as a result of the intelligence analysis of their perceived success on the twelfth. Instead of delivering the expected ‘Coup de Grace’ the Luftwaffe had suffered the highest losses since the 11th of August. No less than sixty four aircraft had failed to return to their bases and another dozen had been either wrecked or written off upon landing. As to the number damaged that was still being assessed, as aircraft were brought into the hangers and stripped down to reveal the true extent of the damage incurred. Having been led to believe that the RAF was almost bereft of fighters the anger of the surviving bombers crews was barely hidden as they described to the intelligence officers the appearance of multiple supposedly non existent fighter squadrons to sew death and mayhem within the ordered formations stacked up and flying blithely across the English skies. Some German pilots pointedly suggested to their intelligence officers if they truly believed that the RAF Squadrons they claim had been destroyed no longer existed then perhaps they would like to come along on the next mission and experience the effect of these supposable non existent fighters for themselves.
Goering addressed the gathering of Luftflotten and Fliegerkorps commanders he had called together. Berating the assembled men for the failure of their forces to destroy what he called the final reserves of the RAF. Goering reiterated the belief that Fighter Command was feeding new pilots and aircraft into the battle, Whilst in actuality they were facing the same force but using changing tactics under Park’s direction. Goering ordered that smaller bomber formations with even heavier fighter escorts and these escorting fighters primary task was not to defend the bombers but to destroy the last reserves of the British fighter force. Goering told the assembled officers that in four or five more days the RAF would be a beaten and spent force. Goering continued by instructing that only when perfect weather conditions existed were mass formations to be used. Attacks on the British aircraft production factories were also to be intensified. He finished his tirade by stating that if his orders were followed then operation ‘Seelowe’ would be rendered unnecessary as the British would seek an armistice. Finally acknowledging how tired the aircrews were he reiterated that the exhaustion of the British pilots must be worse.
The result of this was that the Luftwaffe high command ordered the fighters to fly even closer escort on the bombers. This would of course curtail the initiative of the fighter pilots to manoeuvre for advantage before engaging attacking fighters.
It was not just Goering who was making use of the bad weather to take stock. Park took this opportunity to issue another fighting instruction to his controllers, this was no 11 so far in the series. Despite the success on the 15th Parks was still concerned that two many interceptions were not being made. So at the start of the instruction he listed a series of faults that hindered successful interception.
- Individual Squadrons Failing to rendezvous.
- Single squadrons being detailed to large raids.
- Paired squadrons being rendezvoused to far forward and too low.
- High flying massed formations of German fighters attracting most of the Group whilst bombers got through.
- Delays in vectoring of paired squadrons on to raids by Group controllers
- Errors in sector reports on pilot and aircraft effective strengths. (1)
- Failure by Group and Sector controllers to pass control of squadrons to GCI/PPI stations for direct vector instructions.
- Having set out the problems Park then laid out a series of measure in the form of instructions intended to solve these problems. The first of these instructions was that the squadrons based at Hornchurch and Biggin Hill would fight in pairs and their principle target would be the high escort. In low cloud or overcast conditions the rendezvous of squadrons into pairs should take place at altitude and well in front of the enemy formation. If the skies were relatively clear then the squadrons would come together below cloud base and climb together as required.
- Secondly if for any reason the raid track was uncertain the squadrons were to be assigned short patrol lines, if possible with two squadrons very high and another pair at between 15,000 and 20,000 feet.
- The third instruction was regarding how to counter High-flying German fighter diversions, Park instructed that several pairs of squadrons would be vectored towards the fighters, at the same time ample Defiant and Hurricane squadrons would be paired up and instructed to orbit sector airfields ready for vectoring onto any bomber formations that followed the fighters.
- The Fourth instruction was for the squadrons at Tangmere and Northolt were to form three squadron strength wings and to be principally vectored onto the second and third waves of any attack which tended to contain the bulk of the enemy bomber force. When time permitted Parks would by this means give his controllers a big wing to attack mass enemy formations when they were detected. (2)
- Due to the inclement weather on the 16th of September there was by recent standard little air activity and many RAF squadrons were able to stand down, Those squadrons that were scrambled to intercept the few bombing raids that headed for east London were relatively successful. Ten Luftwaffe aircraft were destroyed for the loss of two aircraft and one pilot.
- London was once more the principle target for the night time bombers with some one hundred and seventy five sorties made on the capitol. It was not only the RAF night fighters who took their toll, tonight the Balloon barrage had a rare success and the AA guns around London also added to their tally. Other targets attacked to included Liverpool again and Bristol.
- With the invasion expected any day Sir Phillip was growing more and more convinced that Portal was too busy playing politics with Bomber Command. Whilst Maritime Command were hitting the concentration of barges in the channel ports almost every night the bulk of Bomber Command were still being directed at strategic targets such as Berlin and Ruhr. Whilst bombing Berlin made for good headlines in the British press and proved popular with the public who wanted the Germans to get some of their own treatment, it would have very little effect on the immediate prosecution of the war. Whereas hitting the barges in the channel ports actually had a double impact upon the German war making capability. Not only did the loss of the barges effect the Germans ability to stage an invasion but also according to the ‘Department of Economic Warfare’ the need to replace those lost barges with more taken from the waterways of Germany and the occupied countries was and would have an increasing effect on the German war economy and it’s transport of essential food and fuels. In fact the effect on German production of the loss of barges was much greater than that currently being caused by a few bombs being scattered virtually at random across the Reich. A recent deciphered signal had indicated the scale of the problem facing the Nazis when the German Naval High Command had complained that the loss of no less than eighty barges on the night of the 14th of September was serious and that their replacement was vital for the invasion sea lift capacity, yet the powers that be in Berlin were resisting the release of any more barges. (1) Daily summary quoted verbatim from the The Narrow Margin by Derek Wood and Derek Dempster. (2) Keith Park’s Instruction adapted form OTL as quoted in The Narrow Margin by Derek Wood and Derek Dempster