9. Edward ‘Mick’ Mannock, The Personal Diary of Major Edward ‘Mick’ Mannock (Neville Spearman, 1966), p. 105.
10. Mannock, op. cit., p. 143.
11. Jones, op. cit., p. 152.
12. Ibid., p. 153.
13. ‘HG’, RAF Occasions (The Cresset Press, 1941), pp. 4–6.
14. Ibid., p. 12.
15. Cecil Lewis, Sagittarius Rising (Greenhill, 1993), pp. 88–9.
16. Ibid., p. 137.
CHAPTER 6: THE THIRD SERVICE
1. Quoted in Barker, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 211.
2. Griffith, op. cit., p. 73.
3. Quoted in Johnson, op. cit., p. 98.
4. Quoted in Sir Maurice Dean, The Royal Air Force and Two World Wars (Cassel, 1979), p. 20.
5. Jones, op. cit., p. 59.
6. Marshal of the RAF, Sir Arthur Harris, Bomber Offensive (Pen and Sword, 2005), p. 17.
7. Quoted in Peter Kilduff, The Illustrated Red Baron: The Life and Times of Manfred von Richtofen (Arms and Armour, 1999), p. 118.
8. Ibid.
9. Ibid., p. 122.
10. Quoted in Steel and Hart, op. cit., p. 322.
11. Jones, op. cit., p. 154.
CHAPTER 7: JONAH’S GOURD
1. Dean, op. cit., p. 34.
2. Ibid.
3. Sir John Slessor, These Remain (Michael Joseph, 1969), p. 78.
4. Quoted in H. Montgomery Hyde, British Air Policy between the Wars 1918–39 (Heinemann, 1976), p. 49.
5. Ibid. p. 61.
6. Andrew Boyle, Trenchard (Collins, 1962), p. 361.
7. Royal Air Force Cadet College Magazine (September 1920), Vol. I, No. I.
8. Group Captain E. B. Haslam, The History of Royal Air Force Cranwell (HMSO, 1982), pp. 31–2.
9. Ibid., p.27.
10. Ibid. p. 28.
11. Tony Mansell, Flying Start: Educational and Social Factors in the Recruitment of Pilots in the Royal Air Force in the Interwar Years (History of Education, 1997), Vol. 26, No. I, p. 72.
12. Richmal Crompton, William and the Evacuees (London, 1940), p. 83.
13. Flight magazine, 24 December 1924.
14. John James, The Paladins: A Social History of the RAF up to the outbreak of World War II (Macdonald, 1990), p. 142.
15. Boyle, op. cit., p. 519.
16. Tom Moulson, The Flying Sword: The Story of 601 Squadron (Macdonald, London, 1954), p. 22.
17. Quoted in Squadron Leader Beryl E. Escott, Women in Air Force Blue (Patrick Stephens Limited, 1969), p. 27.
18. Sir John Slessor, The Central Blue (Cassell, 1956), p. 37.
19. Ibid., pp. 34–5.
20. Sir Arthur Harris, Bomber Offensive (Pen and Sword, 2005), pp. 19–20.
21. Ibid., p. 22.
22. Henry Probert, Bomber Harris: His Life and Times (Greenhill, 2003), p. 52.
23. Harris, op. cit., pp. 22–3.
CHAPTER 8: ARMING FOR ARMAGEDDON
1. Quoted in John Terraine, The Right of the Line (Hodder & Stoughton, 1985), p. 13.
2. Joubert, The Third Service, p. 91.
3. Ibid., p. 93.
4. T. E. Lawrence, The Mint (Jonathan Cape, 1955), p. 24.
5. Ibid., pp. 29–30.
6. Interview with author.
7. Paul Gallico, The Hurricane Story (Michael Joseph, 1955), p. 19.
8. Johnson, op. cit., p. 102.
9. Interview with author.
10. Joubert, The Third Service, p. 95.
11. IWM Sound Archive Recording 12028.
12. Montgomery-Hyde, op. cit., p. 410.
13. Peter Townsend, Time and Chance (Book Club Associates, 1978), p. 102.
14. Tim Vigors, Life’s Too Short to Cry (Grub Street, 2006), p. 78.
15. IWM Sound Archive Recording 12028.
16. Quoted in Richard C. Smith, Hornchurch Scramble (Grub Street, 2000), p. 51.
CHAPTER 9: INTO BATTLE
1. Guy Gibson, Enemy Coast Ahead – Uncensored (Crecy, 2003), pp. 34–8.
2. Harris, op. cit., p. 39.
3. Quoted in John Terraine, The Right of the Line: The Royal Air Force in the European War, 1939–45 (Hodder & Stoughton, 1985), p. 123.
4. Sir Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany 1939–1945, Volume I: Preparation (HMSO, 1961), p. 144.
5. Laddie Lucas, Voices in the Air, 1939–45 (Arrow Books, 2003), pp. 39–40.
6. Brian Kingcome, A Willingness to Die (Tempus, 2006), p. 130.
CHAPTER 10: APOTHEOSIS
1. Colin Walker Downes, By the Skin of My Teeth (Pen and Sword Aviation, 2005), p. 7.
2. Cuthbert Orde, Pilots of Fighter Command (HMSO, 1942).
3. Air Chief Marshal Dowding, Despatch on the Conduct of the Battle of Britain (August 1941).
4. IWM Sound Archive 20468.
5. IWM Sound Archive 27074.
6. IWM Sound Archive 10152.
7. Quoted in Patrick Bishop, Battle of Britain: A Day by Day Chronicle (Quercus, 2009), pp. 77–8.
8. Quoted in Frank Ziegler, The Story of 609 Squadron: Under The White Rose (Crecy, 1993), p. 120.
9. Quoted in Patrick Bishop, The Battle of Britain (Quercus, 2010), p. 199.
10. Ten Fighter Boys, ed. Wing Commander Athol Forbes, DFC, and Squadron Leader Hubert Allen, DFC (Collins, 1942), pp. 94–5.
11. IWM Sound Archive Recording 26977.
CHAPTER 11: FLYING BLIND
1. Mass Observation Archive, Sussex University, 6/4/E.
2. Interview with author.
3. IWM Documents 92/29/1.
4. PRO AIR 14/2221.
5. Eric Woods, While Others Slept (Woodfield, 2001), pp. 57–8.
6. Webster and Frankland, op. cit., Vol. IV, p. 205.
7. Norman Longmate, The Bombers: The R AF Offensive Against Germany 1939–45 (Hutchinson, 1983), p. 133.
8. Webster and Frankland, op. cit., Vol. IV, p. 144.
9. Harris, op. cit., pp. 88–9.
10. Private papers of Group Captain J. B. Tait.
11. Interview with author.
12. IWM Documents 06/12/1.
13. Jim Auton, RAF Liberator Over the Eastern Front: A Bomb Aimer’s Second World War and Cold War Story (Pen and Sword, 2008), p. 1.
14. James Hampton, Selected for Aircrew (Air Research Publications, 2003), p. 122.
15. Auton, op. cit., p. 2.
16. Jack Currie, Lancaster Target (Goodall, 2004), pp. 9–10.
17. Probert, op. cit., p. 204.
CHAPTER 12: SEABIRDS
1. Winston Churchill, The Second World War (Cassell, 1948), Vol. III, p. 98.
2. Quoted in John Terraine, The Right of the Line (Hodder & Stoughton, 1985), p. 227.
3. Dean, op. cit., p. 158.
4. Private Papers of Group Captain Guy Bolland, Imperial War Museum Documents 12193.
5. Air Historical Branch /II/117/3(A).
6. Hugh Popham, Into Wind: A History of British Naval Flying (Hamish Hamilton, 1969), p. 148.
7. Ibid., p. 123.
8. Charles Friend, Only Friend Survived the War, unpublished manuscript, IWM Documents 2751.
9. Commander Charles Lamb, War in a Stringbag (Arrow Books, 1978).
10. Stephen Roskill, The War at Sea, Vol. I (Naval and Military Press, 2004), p. 301.
11. John Moffat with Mike Rossiter, I Sank the Bismarck (Corgi, 2009), p. 172.
12. IWM 2751.
13. Private Papers of Lieutenant Commander J. A. Stewart-Moore, IWM 91/291.
14. Interview with the author.
15. PRO ADM 205/ 56.
16. PRO ADM/ 43.
17. Sir John Slessor, The Central Blue (Cassell, 1956), p. 506.
18. No. 279 Squadron RAF Collection, Second World War Air Sea Rescue With Coastal Command, Imperial War Museum Documents 13705.
19. Ibid.
CHAPTER 13: WIND, SAND AND STARS
1. Arthur Tedder, With Prejudice: The War Memoirs of Marshal of the Royal Air Force Lord Tedder (Cassell, 1966), p.
47.
2. The War Diaries of Neville Duke, ed. Norman Franks (Grub Street, 1995), p. 2.
3. Ibid., p. 63.
4. Ibid., p. 73.
5. Laddie Lucas, Voices in the Air (Arrow Books, 2003), p. 222.
6. Ibid., p. 223.
7. Terraine, op. cit., p. 380.
8. Ibid., p. 383.
9. Sir Philip Joubert de la Ferté, The Forgotten Ones: The Story of the Ground Crews (Hutchinson, 1961), p. 182.
10. See Sir Philip Joubert de la Ferté’s The Forgotten Ones for further details.
11. Quoted in Patrick Bishop, The Battle of Britain, p. 204.
12. Joubert, op. cit., p. 151.
13. Squadron Leader Beryl Escott, Women in Air Force Blue (Patrick Stephens, 1989), pp. 97–8.
14. IWM Sound Archive 10221.
15. Quoted in Jeremy Crang, Come into the Army Maud: Women, Military Conscription, and the Markham Inquiry, Defence Studies, Vol. 8, Issue 3 (2008).
16. Joubert, op. cit., p. 150.
17. Private Papers of Mrs M. Brooks, Imperial War Museum Documents 2387.
18. Pip Beck, Keeping Watch (Crécy, 1989), p. 23.
19. Ibid., p. 25.
20. Quoted in Escott, op. cit., p. 238.
CHAPTER 14: NO MOON TONIGHT
1. Noble Frankland, Address to the Royal United Services Institution (December 1961).
2. The Second World War Letters of G. J. Hull, Imperial War Museum Department of Documents.
3. Ibid.
4. Don Charlwood, No Moon Tonight (Goodall, 2000).
5. Letters of Reg Fayers, IWM Department of Documents, 88/22/2.
6. Peter Johnson, The Withered Garland (New European Publications, 1995), p. 165.
7. Charlwood, op. cit., pp. 14–15.
8. Harry Yates, Luck and a Lancaster (Airlife Classic, 1999), p. 101.
9. Willie Lewis, Unpublished Memoir, IWM Department of Documents 67/28/1.
10. Webster and Frankland, op. cit., Vol. IV, pp. 432–3.
11. IWM Sound Archive 11587/4.
12. Webster and Frankland, op. cit., p. 440.
13. PRO AIR 14/357.
14. Harris, op. cit., p. 187.
15. Quoted in Lucas, op. cit., p. 388.
16. Currie, op. cit., p. 136.
17. PRO AIR 2.
18. Quoted in Lucas, op. cit., pp. 364–5.
CHAPTER 15: AIR SUPREMACY
1. AHB/II/117/10.
2. Duke, op. cit., p. 148.
3. Slessor, The Central Blue (Cassell, 1956), p. 578.
4. Quoted in Terraine, op. cit., p. 589.
5. Ibid., pp. 583–4.
6. Edward Lanchbery, Into the Sun (Cassell, 1955), p. 100.
7. Quoted in Richard Morris, Cheshire: The Biography of Leonard Cheshire, VCOM (Viking, 2000), p. 108.
8. Ibid. p. 148.
9. John Keegan, Six Armies in Normandy (Book Club Associates, 1982), pp. 14–15.
10. Quoted in Lucas, op. cit., pp. 406–7.
11. Lanchbery, op. cit., p. 143.
12. Quoted in Desmond Young, Rommel (Collins, 1950), p. 211.
13. Terraine, op. cit., p. 676.
14. Roy Lodge, unpublished memoir.
15. Terraine, op. cit., p. 686.
CHAPTER 16: JET
1. Morris, op. cit., p. 222.
2. W. A. Waterton, The Quick and the Dead (Frederic Muller, 1956), p. 35.
3. Walker Downes, op. cit., p. 152.
4. Ibid., p. 153.
5. Waterton, op. cit., p. 22.
6. Walker Downes, op. cit., pp. 200–205.
7. Daily Mail, ‘The Day Britain Was 15 Minutes From Triggering Nuclear Armageddon’ (26 September 2008).
CHAPTER 17: ‘FOX TWO AWAY!’
1. www.fast-air.co.uk, The Falklands Conflict.
2. Maxi Gainza, ‘Birds of a Feather’, Seven Days magazine, Sunday Telegraph (21 May 1989).
3. Commander Nigel ‘Sharkey’ Ward, Sea Harrier Over the Falklands: A Maverick at War (Cassell Military Paperbacks, 2000), p. 132.
4. Ibid., p. 156.
5. Ibid., p. 158.
6. Gainza, op. cit.
CHAPTER 18: PER ARDUA AD ASTRA
1. Air Chief Marshal Sir Stephen Dalton, The Utility of Air Power: The Royal Air Force’s Contribution to the Defence and Security of the United Kingdom (2010).
2. John Peters and John Nichol, Tornado Down (Penguin, 1998), pp. 4–6.
3. Ibid., p. 97.
4. Interview with author.
5. Interview with author.
Acknowledgements
This book has benefited from many conversations with many people over the years, some historians, some aviators with first-hand experience of the events described. I am particularly grateful to the late Peter Brothers, Eric Brown, Sebastian Cox, the late Billy Drake, the late Christopher Foxley-Norris, Lawrence Goodman, Tony Iveson and Rob Owen for helping me to at least partially comprehend what it is to fly in battle.
Wings has also been enriched by the work of many fine aviation historians. I am indebted to, among others, the late Ralph Barker, Joshua Levine, Nigel Steel and Peter Hart and John Terraine.
My task has been made much easier by the enthusiasm, cheerfulness and professionalism of the Atlantic team. To Toby Mundy, Angus McKinnon, Ian Pindar, Margaret Stead and Orlando Whitfield, my heartfelt thanks.
Index
Aboukir, 257, 259
Accart, Jean, 315
aces, 72, 100, 133
Aden, 151, 343
Admiral Scheer, 176
aerial combat, 69, 94
Aermacchi planes, 349
aero-modelling clubs, 14
Aeronautical Research Committee, 218, 329
Afghanistan, 10, 151, 309, 358, 365
Agedabia, 262
Air Board, 85
air control, 308
Air Ministry, 129, 135, 147, 153, 219, 239, 272, 332
and Battle of Britain, 189, 192
and jet engine development, 329
and lack of moral fibre, 300
and rearmament, 158, 162, 165, 168, 171
and strategic air campaign, 213, 280
air raids, 79, 126
see also Blitz, the; strategic air campaign
air shows, 14
air speed records, 331
air superiority, 113, 303, 322
Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA), 274
aircraft carriers, 122, 124, 240, 350
aircraft identification, 58
aircraft production, 92, 113, 126, 128, 193, 204
airmail services, 30
airships, 19, 38, 117
see also Zeppelins
Alam el Halfa, battle of, 270
Albatros biplanes, 78, 94, 100, 106
Alexander, Albert, 252
Alexandria, 246, 257
American Civil War, 19
Amiens, 43, 110
Antelat, 263
anti-aircraft fire, 58, 69
Anzio, 305
Ar Rumaylah airbase, 362
‘Archie, Certainly Not!’, 59
Ardennes offensive, 322
Argentine air force, 349
Armstrong Whitworth Siskin, 150
Armstrong Whitworth Whitley, 167, 181, 212, 221
Army Air Corps, 369
Arrarás, Juan, 5
Arras, 76, 101
artillery, spotting for, 17, 57, 62, 64
Asdic, 234
Atkinson, Ron, 277
Auton, Jim, 223
Auxiliary Air Force (AAF), 147
Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS), 273
Aviatik reconnaissance planes, 70
Avro 504, 46, 52
Avro Anson, 235
Avro Lancaster, 168, 212, 220, 229, 231, 280, 287, 291, 294, 312, 314, 321, 326
Avro Manchester, 168, 229
Avro ‘tractor’ planes, 48
Avro Vulcan, 341, 346, 348, 350
Avro York, 335
B
aldwin, Stanley, 156
Balfour, Harold, 125, 301
Ball, Albert, 30, 94, 96, 102, 105, 110, 112, 133, 142, 184
balloons, 17, 19, 25, 36, 61, 117
Bamberger, Cyril ‘Bam’, 196
Bann, Eric, 202
Barlow, Keith, 42
barrage balloons, 93
Barton, Paul, 351, 353
Barton, Pam, 274
Batt, Gordon, 202
Battle of Britain, 8, 33, 36, 67, 145, 148, 187, 216, 233, 357
three phases of, 197
Battle of France, 67, 190, 210
Battle of Jutland, 118
Battle of the Atlantic, 119, 216, 232, 254
Battle of the Marne, 50
Battle of the Somme, 95, 97
battleships, 22, 116, 124
Bay of Biscay, 253
Bayly, Gordon, 46
Beamont, Roland, 310, 316
Beatty, Admiral Sir David, 118
Beaverbrook, Max, 193
Beck, Pip, 276
Belgian air force, 180
Bensusan-Butt, David, 216, 230
Benzie, Nichol, 366
Berlin, 286, 289, 295, 299, 309
Berlin airlift, 335
biplanes, stability of, 25, 35
Birmingham, 218
Bishop, Ernest, 260
Bismarck, 247
Black Buck raids, 346, 350
Blackburn Skua, 172, 242
Blériot, Louis, 17
Blériot aviation school, 30
Blériot monoplanes, 11, 49
Blitz, the, 204, 210, 217
Blundstone, Patrick, 89
Bodie, Crelin ‘Bogle’, 203
Boeing B-29 Superfortress, 327, 340
Boeing C-17 Globemaster, 368
Boeing E-3 Sentry, 367
Boelcke, Oswald, 75, 95, 102, 104, 133
Boer War, 36, 93, 127
Bolland, Guy, 236
Bolzan, Danilo, 7
Bomber Command, 34, 153, 174, 235, 253
aircrew selection, 223
and area bombing, 216
bombing data, 215, 229
briefings, 288
casualties, 176, 293, 325
concentration principle, 228
conditions, 283
crewing up, 226
and Normandy landings, 310, 320
Pathfinder Force, 223, 281, 294
and precision bombing, 217, 280
relief missions, 326
routine, 288
social composition, 222, 226
strategic air campaign, 181, 209, 279, 323
target marking, 312
thousand-bomber raids, 228, 279