Because the British traditionally do not dramatise a situation, the average RAF fighter pilot felt no personal hatred for his enemies in the air. Animosity was directed at the machines they flew whose intrusion over Britain was resented as an intolerable insolence. Similarly, German pilots regarded the RAF as opponents in a lethal sport, not detested foes; but the differentiating truth remains that they were in the wrong and Britain and her allies, defending their countries, were in the right.
Life for both sides ran on much the same lines. Whether operating from bases in Germany or, after the conquest of the Low Countries and France, from airfields in the Pas de Calais, the daily routine was basically the same for German fighter pilots as it was for British. They rose at first light, they were released at dusk and in the intervals they waited at dispersals to be sent into action. On small French aerodromes the crew room was a tent, the aircraft were dispersed under camouflage netting, among trees where possible, and meals were eaten out of doors. Men passed the time by reading, playing cards or board games, sleeping and leg-pulling. As the British squadrons in France had done, the Germans either lived under canvas or in billets with local families; they set up their messes in huts on the airfield or hotels.
At the end of a hard day a German fighter pilot sought relaxation in the nearest town’s restaurants, dance halls and cinemas. Female company was not hard to find. Politically, France was divided and lethargic. In general, the Nazis were not unpopular. The French Army and Air Force had been soundly defeated and earned contempt. Success and the power it bestowed exerted a strong attraction. Healthy, uninhibited, dashing young German airmen, under orders to be on their best behaviour towards the race they had beaten, and with money to burn, had the magnetism of a conqueror, to which Frenchwomen were not immune. The German bomber crews shared this existence from the beginning of the Blitzkrieg on France until the end of the Battle of Britain, because they were carrying out the assault and the fighters were present only to defend them.
Leutnant Kurt Ebersberger, of II/JG26, who later commanded a Staffel, 4/JG26, has provided an excellent description of the life of a fighter pilot during the early days of the assault on France. He refers to a comrade, Leutnant Otto-Heinrich Hilleke, who was killed in action on June 26: ‘We miss his humour and harmonica playing.’ (In this form of musical diversion there was a sharp difference between what was acceptable in a German officers’ mess and a British; in the latter a mouth-organ was definitely not considered an officer-like instrument). Ebersberger recalls, ‘Often when we were at Chicore, our second base in Belgium, after dinner in our handsome Château, with a bottle of good burgundy at hand, Hilleke used to play for us. We would discuss the events of the day and air fighting as well as many matters that were not connected with the Service. Anything unpleasant was dismissed with a joke, so that we were always in a happy and confident mood. We were at ease and out of sight of higher authority. When we felt like it we went out roaming the district.’
Next morning they were out at dispersals at first light once again to escort bombing raids on Boulogne, Calais and Dunkirk. ‘Going back and forth we saw below us the widespread fighting in Flanders, burning towns and villages, flames at the mouths of heavy guns which were often a signpost for us when returning with our last drop of petrol. Until Dunkirk fell we flew almost every day with our bombers as they attacked ports, fuel tanks and ammunition dumps along the coast. The British began to embark their troops and ship them back to their island.’
On most days they made contact with Spitfires and Hurricanes. ‘It didn’t suit the British that we interfered with their withdrawal plan.’ That must be the prize platitude of the campaign. ‘We were often outnumbered, which didn’t bother us in the slightest.’ And that must be the most unconvincing boast; the Luftwaffe consistently outnumbered the RAF. ‘The Gruppe commander flew in the lead with “Hinnak” (Hilleke’s nickname) near him. They were the first to engage the enemy and had a stack of victories. Hinnak was our most successful pilot and hasn’t yet been overtaken.’ His score was 21 when he was shot down. ‘We often heard him say something jocular on the radio, to make everyone feel relaxed.
‘The most memorable experience we had was the first time we took off from Chicore to rendezvous with a bomber formation. The weather was atrocious and we hadn’t the slightest idea of our whereabouts. The bombers were above cloud and couldn’t see us. We were flying so slowly that it seemed we were almost at a standstill. Presently we saw water below. We were over the Channel. Hinnak called, “We’re flying against England!” and burst into the England Song. This was the popular song whose first line was “Wir fliegen gegen En-ge-land”. They had to keep a close watch on their petrol consumption and on the radio somebody asked, “Can everyone swim?” It was the sort of quip that would equally have amused their opponents. Then they saw Dover and “. . . great was the delight at being over England for the first time”.’
Hilleke’s sense of humour was also typical of fighter pilots the world over. On another sortie across the Channel when the formation had momentarily scattered under attack, a voice on the radio was heard saying plaintively, ‘Wait for me to catch up, I’m all alone.’
‘You’re not alone,’ Hilleke retorted immediately. ‘There’s a Spitfire on your tail.’
On June 3 there was a big raid on Paris. In the morning they flew to an aerodrome half-way to the target and refuelled. At about 1400hrs they were ordered off and, ‘glowing with ardour, we started our engines’. Luftwaffe formations came from all directions. ‘It was an impressive sight.’ Hilleke’s aircraft developed trouble and he had to turn back, as did Ebesberger shortly before reaching Paris. The latter says that when they discussed the mission that evening they were all astonished by the paucity of defending fighters and anti-aircraft guns.
A few days later they moved to Le Touquet. ‘It was an incomparable moment when we were all sitting together on the terrace of our hotel, to see the sun sink into the sea. Hardly had we settled down than we were off inland again; the next day we found ourselves on a big clover field at Bois Jean, south of Montreuil. At Le Touquet we had installed ourselves in big tents captured from the British. A pleasant camp life soon established itself. Our quarters lay a good distance from the airfield. In the evenings after dark the British flew regularly over the aerodrome on their way south to the Front. We tried a couple of times to take them by surprise, but never succeeded because of the thick haze.
‘Our most enjoyable flights were along the steep coast from Dieppe to Le Havre with British or French warships going to and fro beneath us. On the way back we would fly low over the beaches all the way from Le Touquet and French people peacefully swimming would point at us. How fast we went and what a row we made. Unfortunately we went swimming only once, on our second free day since May 10. All the essential servicing of the aircraft was done in the morning, then we all crammed into vehicles and went off to lie on the beach. During such hours one forgot the war.’
From Le Touqet and Bois Jean they moved to Morgny, 43 miles (70km) north of Paris. The airfield, says Ebersberger, was the usual sort of place, but with a little contrivance soon became most comfortable. They lived in a château belonging to the Comte de Fabymasnille, a grand place set in a huge estate. The German Army had crossed the Seine but there wasn’t much employment for the Staffel. Soon after, the French capitulated and it returned to Germany. ‘We would rather have attacked England immediately, but orders are orders.’
Oberst Josef Priller, known as ‘Pips’, who in turn commanded No. 1 Staffel and No III Gruppe of JG26 before commanding the Geschwader itself, and was credited with 101 victories, described life on the Channel coast as ‘readiness and sorties’. Fighter pilots existed in a state of uncertainty greater than any experienced by ground troops. A soldier in the front line could foretell by numerous signs if and when an enemy attack were imminent. When he was to make an attack, he was told in advance the exact time that he would do so. A fighter pilot had to be ready to take off at once with virtually no warning before the order came. In the summer months, these conditions prevailed for three quarters of the 24 hours in every day. The weeks and months passed in this manner with seldom a short break on a rare quiet day. Even during the Battle of Britain, when most of his time in the air was spent escorting bombers, the pilot had to be prepared to fend off an enemy air raid at any moment.
The Gruppe to which at that time Priller’s Staffel belonged moved to the Calais area on July 22, 1940. He says that after the turbulent air operations in France an even harder period began for the Luftwaffe pilots on airfields along the Channel. It was the height of summer, which meant 16 to 18 hours of daylight and for fighter pilots as many hours of alertness, and hasty take-offs to repel expected attacks or to cover their own bombers. Moving such a large formation with all its technical equipment was arduous, but by the 25th it was fully operational and flying over England. It lost two of its number near Margate and three near Dover that day. It was noteworthy, he points out in apparent complaint, that the Luftwaffe fighters were not only under extreme pressure, severely stretched and fighting over hostile territory, but also were faced by the entire British Empire plus a large number of Czechs, Poles and Frenchmen.
When escorting bombers over England, he alleges the Messerschmitts were constantly meeting large formations of Spitfires and Hurricanes numbering 20, 40 and even 60, coming at them from all directions. Dowding and Park would have been gratified to know that this was the impression given by the small number of defending fighters they were eking out.
After taking part in a few sorties, Staffel and Gruppe commanders quickly formed a clear picture of the enemy, Priller recounts. Squadrons, flights and sections were led by experienced pilots who were highly competent and keen, while the rest were novices who still had a lot to learn. The Luftwaffe fighters’ tactic, like the RAF’s, was to split up the opposing formation as quickly as possible. The south of England was strongly defended, Priller records, especially around London, and repeats that the Germans were on most occasions assailed from all sides by large numbers of fighters.
His memory does not seem to be entirely accurate for his statements do not conform exactly with British records, which include diagrams made at the time showing the tracks of enemy incursions and of the fighters that went up to intercept them. However, from the cockpit of a Bf 109 the impressions of a pilot who was of necessity highly apprehensive of the Spitfire, which he had learned in the most unpleasant way was more than a match for his own aircraft, were understandably different from those of anyone studying archives many decades later. From the cockpit of any aircraft in contact with the enemy there always seemed to be a frightening number of them around and a lot more flak sites than had been mentioned at briefing. The problem, as Priller says, was to take evasive action without being scattered far and wide.
‘When a Staffel broke and the foursomes and pairs separated in violent twisting and turning, the character, pluck and training of the German fighter pilots was revealed,’ Priller writes and later admits: ‘In such confused fighting, the claims for aircraft shot down and the loss ratios on both sides are misleading.
‘It was no easy task over England in August 1940. Sometimes the youngsters were the victims of their inexperience and over-enthusiasm. There were times when we heard a plea from someone who was confused and disoriented, and nothing could be done about it. I remember one occasion when a lad who hadn’t, as we used to say, tasted much English air, lost sight of our formation after some frenzied twisting and turning about the sky. But we could see him: he had dived steeply and was over the outskirts of London. He should have stayed with the Staffel instead of chasing off on his own. When he grasped the situation he called for help: “Come quickly! I’m on my own over London.”
‘He hadn’t called in vain. By return post, as it were, his Schwarm leader, whom he couldn’t see but who could see him clearly and had followed astern and above him, gave the comforting message: “Hang on a second and you’ll have a couple of Spitfires behind, then you won’t be alone any longer.” Therewith the Schwarm leader, who had indeed seen the enemy and for that very reason had remained higher, successfully attacked one of the Spitfires. The other half-rolled and dived away.’ One has to conclude that the second Spitfire had run out of ammunition.
Priller laments that it was not only the enemy with which the German fighter pilots had to reckon when far from base. ‘It often happened, particularly over the Channel, that the unpredictable weather cooked up some nasty surprise. Fighter aircraft had a relatively short range and sometimes had barely enough fuel left to get them home. In settled weather, one could calculate with reasonable accuracy how much to keep in hand for the return leg, but those conditions seldom prevailed in the operational zone.’ Even in neighbouring areas the weather could differ considerably. When it was fine over an airfield near Boulogne, it might have changed by the time the fighter reached Calais, 18 miles (30km) away, and made landing impossible.
‘A Gruppe in our Geschwader experienced an example of this one day when tricky weather during the morning enforced an urgent change in the planned operations. In the afternoon the sun came out and this Gruppe was ordered to take off. It penetrated about 30 or 40 miles (50 or 60km) deep into England, “free hunting”, which meant looking for enemy aircraft, and low-level attack. On the way back they found that suddenly the whole French coast had become covered with cloud and fog. No fewer than 11 machines were reported missing. During the course of the evening 10 others turned up one at a time. They had had to go separately far inland to look for somewhere to put down. Most of them had eventually found an airfield but one had had to make a belly landing.’
Pilots on a fighter Staffel lived on their nerves to the same extent as those on an RAF fighter squadron. Both were subject to the sudden harsh blare of loudspeakers ordering them to scramble, but on a German airfield at the Channel coast these seemed to be even more intrusive than on the British aerodromes. The immediate effect was the same: a racing pulse, fear that had to be stifled instantly, and, for some, an irresistible urge to retch or vomit before sprinting to their aeroplanes.
One German pilot’s recollection of the call to arms on a typical summer’s day describes the ubiquitous means by which the summons came. ‘They were everywhere, the loudspeakers: in the mess, naturally, in the crew room, in the sleeping quarters, on the trees around the airfield. Even in the lavatories. No one within the precincts of the aerodrome could escape their din. They didn’t say anything welcome but they said it loudly and made the buildings shake.’
For the most part, the first sounds were the rasping of the officer on duty in the Operations Room testing his microphone, which brought the ground crews to their feet. In the mess, cards were flung down on the table, spoons were let fall into soup plates, chairs were overturned. But sometimes the message was an anticlimax: ‘Loudspeaker test. Report back if understood.’ With customary Teutonic thoroughness this was repeated several times a day, to check that no corner of the establishment failed to hear every broadcast. Mostly the words that echoed about the camp were the equally familiar, ‘Attention! Attention! Action alarm!‘
This anonymous pilot reminisces: ‘One fine summer day in particular remains firmly in my memory; not only because it was one of my first days after joining a Gruppe that lived in waiting for just such a summons, but also because it was in all respects typical. We were having lunch in the Gruppe staff mess when the loudspeakers barked at us. “Damn!” the Gruppe Kommandeur grumbled, dropping the fork that was half way to his mouth. His chair clattered against the wooden wall of the hut and a moment later he was outside and rushing to his aircraft with giant strides.’
He followed the Kommandeur towards the sandbagged blast pens where the aeroplanes were kept hidden and from which they could taxi straight out onto the field. By the time a pilot reached his machine the mechanics were already standing by ready to help him to put on his helmet and plug in the radio lead, fasten the safety harness, start the engine and close the cockpit canopy. The order to start up had not been given yet and everybody wondered if it was another false alarm. But the loudspeaker bellowed, ‘Attention! Attention! Targets at 3,000 metres near Dunkirk. No take-off yet.’
This pilot, though not detailed for the mission, was as highly charged with vicarious emotions as the others were with the reality. He knew the feelings of those who were sitting in their cockpits with all their thoughts and expectations concentrated on the imminence of combat. Foremost in their minds was the hope that the take-off would not be cancelled. The moments of uncertainty ended abruptly: ‘Attention! Attention! Numbers One and Three Staffeln led by Hauptmann Pingel take off immediately. Instructions: barrier patrol in the area.’ Even before the message ended the starter motors began to whirr.
The first of the Bf 109s rolled out of concealment in the woods and presently from all around the half-circle of pens the rest converged on the down-wind end of the grass runway. They reminded the onlooker of a swarm of angry hornets lusting for the fray. ‘An overpowering impression,’ he remembers.
The weather was ideal for an enemy attack. Visibility was clear for 5 to 6 miles (8-10km) and great clumps of cloud, among which the stalking aeroplanes could hide, were scattered all over the sky. While the Messerschmitts circled their base, making height and getting into formation before setting course, the noise of heavy flak reached the airfield from the nearby coast.
Those who had to stay behind gathered in the Operations Room, where they could not only follow the track of their own two Staffeln but also listen through headphones to the exchange of radio messages. In this way they formed a clear idea of how accurately the Central Operations Room was directing the fighters towards the incoming raid. They enoyed the casual humour in the comments that crackled briefly between aircraft, the cryptic wit of fighter pilots of any nation. The distance between the adversaries narrowed until a warning ‘Red Indians’ came as unemotionally as the most prosaic comment; as unemphatically as someone waiting at a bus stop might say, ‘Here’s one coming now’; as unhurriedly as at that same moment some RAF fighter pilot must have been reporting, ‘Bandits’. Then followed what one of the listeners in the Gruppe Operations Room described as, ‘a lively brawl punctuated by brief radio flashes that told little except that hectic things were happening’.
Presently the drone of returning 109s reached the airfield. The first one already had its undercarriage down when it came in sight and made a neat landing. Next came Hauptmann Pingel, his bullet-holed machine wobbling with damaged control surfaces. The last to land arrived with a swoop, to soar into a loop and a roll over the centre of the field. A few minutes later the hornets were back in their nests. The petrol bowsers came trundling along, the mechanics gathered around their pilot to hear what he had to say about the way his machine had performed and what in particular needed attention, before they set to work on the engine, the airframe, the electrics and the armament. They hadn’t had lunch yet. Food would have to wait until the servicing had been done.
The Kommandeur went out to meet Pingel, who was coming towards the Operations Room, and congratulate him on the two aircraft the 109s had shot down. ‘But Feldwebel Hoffman is missing,’ he added.
‘What? That’s impossible.’ Pingel looked incredulous. ‘How could it have happened that he let himself get shot down? What was I doing?’
He was obviously concerned and blaming himself. He strove always to place his formation in the most advantageous position before engaging the enemy. He listened to his pilots’ account of the fight, as always and, reconstructing it in his mind, wondered aloud if he had made some mistake. He had not seen the two British machines go down. He wandered off on his own, his face pale and his brow furrowed, listening for the sound of a Bf 109 coming in to land. Nobody intruded on his thoughts. Then a messenger came running from the Operations Room, panted up to him, saluted and said ‘Sir . . . Feldwebel Hoffman is all right . . . his fuel supply has packed up . . . blocked feedpipe, he thinks and he had to make a force landing.’
‘Well, now, isn’t that exactly what I said must have happened?’ and Pingel returned to the mess to resume his interrupted lunch. Everything looked better on a full stomach. The Staffel had two more victories to add to its record. The day was turning out quite well.
The hours passed quietly until it was almost time for coffee break, when an attack alarm violated the torpor of the warm afternoon. The pilots and mechanics pelted towards their aircraft while the voice that had roused them chuntered on with instructions on the height to make, where to form up and the course to steer. Once again the hunt was on. The wild rush began. Parachute on . . . snatch helmet from the hand that offered it . . . hoist yourself into the cockpit . . . plug in radio and oxygen . . . the starter whines . . . smoke and a lick of flame belch from the exhausts . . . the aircraft vibrates, the engine roars, the propeller becomes a blur . . .
‘Attention! Attention! Alarm cancelled.’
Men look at their watches and at the sky. Rain clouds are spreading . With a little luck they’ll get off early and be able to spend the sort of evening they look forward to but don’t often have the chance to enjoy. Coffee cups are refilled. The Kommandeur turns to his adjutant. ‘Go and ask Geschwader Headquarters if they can justify keeping us at readiness with the weather closing in like this.’ The adjutant mentally composes a more tactful request. The door has scarcely closed behind him when ‘Attack alarm!’ disrupts the pleasant mood of expectation that release for the day is imminent.
‘This time it is a British bomber formation that has crossed the coast somewhere in another sector and looks to be coming our way. At midday that would have been wonderful news. But since the weather had changed meanwhile, it will be sheer luck if we find the raid, which is still a long way off.’
While the fighters were probing around between cloud layers, looking for the enemy, two Blenheim bombers flew over the airfield low enough to identify without field glasses. Sweat formed on the duty officer’s brow as he telephoned the information to Geschwader HQ. ‘Where were our own fighters? Were we going to be bombed? Then we heard someone say he’d spotted the bombers at the coast, but the weather was deteriorating there. Before our chaps could attack, the flak opened fire. A Blenheim was hit and crashed near the beach in shallow water.’ The fighters were recalled.
The penultimate message that the loudspeakers broadcast was, ‘Staff Flight and Numbers One and Two Staffeln released. Number Three remain at readiness.’
It wasn’t long before the next good news came. ‘The whole Gruppe may stand down.’
Now for dinner and then into the nearest town to beat it up a bit.
Anyone on a fighter station in southern England at that period would have felt at home in this atmosphere. For RAF pilots the most evident difference would have been the lack of early warning by radar of the enemy’s approach and of an efficient control and reporting system. Luftwaffe fighter pilots were subject to many more false alarms than RAF pilots were and kept in greater suspense from uncertainty during the long periods of waiting between scrambles because of it.
August 18, 1940, is often described as Fighter Command’s hardest day in the Battle of Britain. The general impression of such a day’s fighting is of the almost ceaseless embroilment throughout the day of every pilot on the Battle Order and a huge number of individual claims of victories. The diary kept by Hauptmann Kramer, Technical Officer of No. III Gruppe of JG26 for six days ending on that date, puts the effort of a typical Gruppe, which corresponded with an RAF wing, in perspective.
‘13th. Two patrols in the Dover area and along the coast. Escort for air-sea rescue aircraft and S-boats (schnell, or fast boats, known to the British, for some reason, as E-boats).
‘14th. One operation over Dover harbour, escorting three Gruppen of Ju 87s. Shot down six enemy aircraft; Major Galland, Oberleutnant Münchberg, Obit Beyer, Obit Schöpfel, Leutnant Bürschgens, Lt Müller-Dühe, one each.
‘15th. Four escort missions for KG 1 and 2. Attacks on Hawkinge and Maidstone. Combat with Spitfires over Boulogne. Gruppe shot down 18. No. 7 Staffel got six: Obit Beyer and Lt Bürschgens two each; one each for Lt Blume and Lt Müller-Dühe.
‘16th. At one hour’s readiness. One scramble for Spitfires over Calais. One shot down by Lt Müller-Dühe.
‘17th. At 30 minutes’ readiness. Aircraft serviced. III/JG26’s total victories to August 15, 119.
‘18th. Two operations north of London. Ten victories: Obit Schöpfel four; Obit Sprick one; Lt Bürschgens two; Lt Ebeling one; two by No. 8 Staffel. The Gruppe flew an offensive patrol over North Weald and Hornchurch. Lt Müller-Dühe was shot down. Lt Blume is missing.’
On the 18th, Major Galland was absent, summoned by Goering to an interview. His second-in-command, Oberleutnant Schöpfel, accordingly led III Gruppe that day, and gave the following report of an engagement in the Folkestone–Canterbury area.
‘Suddenly I found a squadron of Hurricanes below me in the usual British formation of tight threes, which were climbing in a spiral. I circled about 3,300ft (1,000m) above them. Then I saw a pair of Hurricanes weaving behind the formation, on guard against attack from astern. I waited until they were curving north-westwards from Folkestone, then attacked out of sun and below.’ According to his Combat Report he shot down both the weavers without the others being aware of it. ‘Now I was beneath a third machine. I fired a short burst. This aircraft likewise fell apart. The British flew on, having noticed nothing. I positioned myself under a fourth machine. This time I had to get closer. When I pressed the firing button the Hurricane was so close to me that fragments from it hit my aircraft. Oil covered my cockpit so thickly that I couldn’t see, and after two minutes of action had to break off.’
At that time the Bf 109E had two cannon, each with 60 rounds, of which he still had 15 left.
‘After I had broken off, ‘Schöpfel continues, ‘Oberleutnant Sprick led No. 8 Staffel in an attack on the British, who were now aware that Germans were right behind them and dived. However, Sprick managed to shoot down two more. I think this was the first time in this war that a pilot shot down four British aircraft on the same sortie. Looking back at those anxious moments, it was not very difficult. My shots must have hit the right place, so that there was no time for the others to be warned. These four brought my score to a total of 12.’
No. II Gruppe habitually flew at a maximum of 26,000 to 30,000ft (8,000-9,000m), where lone Spitfires were sure to be found. On August 13, II JG 26 were at 26,000ft (8,000m) with 1 JG26 below them. They were approaching the coast with the cliffs of Dover in sight, but to the west spread an unbroken bank of cloud 6,500ft (2,000m) high. The Kommandeur, Hauptmann Ebbinghausen, flew through it.
In his diary, Leutnant Borris wrote: ‘Low on our left a formation appeared, apparently enemy fighters, by the suspicious look of their flying in threes. Low on our right someone reported another formation, towards which our Kommandeur turned. I was flying in the Staff Flight with März and Leibing. Ahead and beneath us flew three machines that I recognised as Hurricanes. Apparently the Kommandeur hadn’t seen these, as he was watching the two big formations which were still some five kilometres in front of us. I dived . . . 400 metres . . . 300 . . . 200. I had the Tommy on the left in my sights. Would the other two turn on me? My concentration was stretched to breaking point. One hundred metres . . . 70 metres, the Hurricane grew big. Now! It swerved aside. I stopped shooting. It was on fire. I hauled my machine round in a climbing turn to rejoin my flight. In front of me a Bf 109 was firing at a Hurricane, but couldn’t turn as tightly as it. I side slipped down on the Hurricane . . . 70 metres . . . 50. My four machine guns hurled bullets at it. Thick black smoke and flames belched from it. I broke upwards. A little lower a Hurricane had spotted me. Climb! The Tommy couldn’t keep up with me. He gave up and swung away. Where were my friends? I couldn’t see anything. From above and behind an aeroplane was hurtling towards me. In an instant I rolled onto my back and disappeared.’
Borris flew home alone, striving to stay in cloud until he reached the mouth of the Somme, and arrived cheerfully over the airfield. On his landing approach the 109 dived to the right. He quickly raised the undercarriage, climbed to about 3,300ft (1,000m) and tried again. Once more the aileron stuck and he found himself about to hit the ground. He would have to land without flaps. März and Leibing landed after him. Unteroffizier Wemhöner had reported during the combat that he had been shot down (he was taken prisoner). The whole of No. 6 Staffel was missing and four pilots of No. 5 Staffel. They had lost their way in thick cloud and landed in the Reims and Verdun areas.
On May 19 II Gruppe had lost their Kommandeur, Hauptmann Herwig Knüppel, and on July 24 his successor, the dashing Hauptmann Erich Noack. On August 16 Borris recorded that 20 aircraft of the Gruppe were half-way across the Channel on their way to carry out an offensive patrol in the area of Dover and Folkestone, under the leadership of Hauptmann Karl Ebbinghausen, when 20 Spitfires jumped them. He was at 23,000ft (7,000m), line abreast with the Gruppe Kommandeur and Eckart Roch while Leibing and März flew behind. To their left ahead and above were the Spitfires. During the dogfight seven Spitfires engaged the five Bf 109s of the staff flight. In the confusion Borris saw a 109 some distance astern being attacked by a Spitfire. The 109 reacted swiftly with a diving turn. The pilot was Waldi März, whom he had been unable to warn, because his radio was faulty. März landed with 20 bullet holes and an overheated engine. Borris was able to confirm a victory for Eckart Roch. He says that how Ebbinghausen was shot down when the flight was attacked by ‘only seven Spitfires’ remained a mystery. Ebbinghausen, he points out, had fought in Spain and was highly experienced.
There is no mystery about it: the Germans had met more than their match. The pilots on each side respected their opponents’ courage and skill and acknowledged the quality of their respective aircraft. No RAF pilot conceded that the Bf 109 was superior to the Spitfire, although many regarded it as equal. Among the Luftwaffe, on the contrary, there was a host of Spitfire admirers, among whom was Galland. This infuriated Goering when the Commander-in-Chief visited his fighter Geschwader on the Channel coast in the first week of September. Goering first asked Mölders what he most wanted and nodded approvingly at the reply: ‘A new series of Me 109s with more powerful engines.’ He then put the same question to Galland, whose reply, ‘A Geschwader of Spitfires’, threw him into such a fury that he walked away without comment.
The only advantage that the Bf 109 had over the Spitfire at that time was petrol injection instead of a carburettor. This meant that when a German pilot rolled his fighter onto its back and dived vertically his petrol supply did not falter. When a British pilot did the same manoeuvre, there was an interval of a couple of seconds during which his petrol flow was interrupted: sufficient time for the enemy to put enough distance between them to ensure his escape. Later, when petrol injection was introduced to the Rolls-Royce Merlin engine, the Bf 109 pilots suffered some unpleasant shocks.
‘My most successful day,’ says Oberleutnant Heinz Ebeling, who was shot down and taken prisoner on November 5, 1940, ‘was August 31.’ After a long duel with a Hurricane he managed to shoot it down, but discovered that his radiator was leaking. ‘From well to the north of London I got as far as 10 kilometres out over the Channel beyond Dover, accompanied by my Number Two, before I had to bale out. I had transmitted on the radio for my position to be fixed and an hour and a half later a Do 18 flying-boat fished me out. At the sea rescue centre in Boulogne where I was given a beer glass full of cognac and some pea soup, a car came to fetch me back to the airfield. It was then about l400hrs. I flew on the Gruppe’s next mission and bagged two more Hurricanes. That evening I met our Geschwader Kommodore, Major Galland, who told me that Generalfeldmarschall Kesselring had awarded me a goblet of honour.’ In the Great War, German pilots were awarded a goblet for each victory and the custom of awarding such a trophy for special feats survived. ‘Shortly thereafter Goering presented me with it personally. The victory I had scored that morning was my thirteenth, but it had brought me good luck!’
Equal with Galland in the respect and admiration with which he was regarded and in which his memory is held, was Werner Mölders. He was the first fighter pilot in the world to surpass Manfred von Richthofen’s Great War record of 80 victories and the first to reach a score of 100 enemy aircraft destroyed. Both these figures, however, included the 14 he shot down in Spain, where he was the Luftwaffe’s highest scorer, which were a lot easier to achieve than sending down a French or British fighter.
At the age of 27, when he took command of JG53, Mölders was already a man of considerable maturity of character and high principles. An ardent Catholic, he was of a serious nature and became known at once to the members of his Geschwader as Vati, ‘Daddy’. He fought his first combat of the war on September 20, 1939, when he shot down a French Air Force Curtiss, a week before being appointed to lead No III Gruppe of JG53. On June 5, 1941, by which time he had increased his score to 25 (11 in the current war), he was shot down by a French pilot, as has been described in the chapter on the prelude to the Battle of Britain, and taken prisoner. His incarceration was short. Two weeks later France capitulated and he was given command of JG51, to become the youngest Geschwaderkommodore in the Luftwaffe.
He became at once involved in the fighting over England and is regarded as the Luftwaffe’s outstanding figure in the Battle of Britain. By October 29 he had flown 208 operational sorties and added 54 kills to the 14 he had made in Spain. His logbook shows the intensity of his activities during the second half of the Battle of Britain.
Perhaps more typical of his character, than the days when he was out hunting the RAF, was the occasion at the end of the Battle of Britain when his friend Oberleutnant Claus was shot down in the Thames Estuary. Mölders personally gave orders to the air-sea rescue service to begin searching for him without delay, before going up himself to look for some sign of his friend. No one on the Geschwader HQ staff could reason with him. Accompanied by Leutnant Eberle he dashed back over the Channel and made a fruitless search all over the Thames Estuary, where the 109 must have sunk long ago. During this dangerous search he was totally distraught and took no heed of where he went: a wonderful target for the RAF. But he lived to return to base.
In May 1941 Werner Mölders, at the age of 28, was promoted to General of Fighters. By then he had 101 victories, not counting the 14 in Spain. On November 22, 1941, he was killed when an He 111 in which he was a passenger crashed. The 29-year-old Adolf Galland succeeded him in command of the Luftwaffe fighter arm.
Galland, who became Germany’s most famous fighter pilot, had qualified for his wings in 1934. In April 1935 he was posted to JG132 (later JG2), the ‘Richthofen’ Geschwader, first fighter Geschwader of the new Luftwaffe. In 1937 he went to Spain as a member of the Legion Kondor that was fighting on the Fascist side in the civil war. His unit, Jagdstaffel 3, flew the obsolete He 51 biplane while the Republicans were equipped with the greatly superior American Curtiss and the Russian Polikarpov. Hence the Staffel that Galland commanded was compelled to limit its activity to strafing in support of the ground troops, which denied him the chance to shoot down any enemy aircraft. In May 1939 Werner Mölders took over the Staffel.
While Galland was in Spain he compiled a report on close support based on his 300 operational sorties. The Air Staff, whose thinking had turned to a new use of aircraft, dive bombing, to which ground attack was closely related, was much impressed and posted him to the Air Ministry. This was not what he had expected and he strove incessantly to return to flying.
In 1939 he was given command of a Staffel in a close support Gruppe equipped with the biplane Hs 123 dive bomber. This unit was the first to put into effect the technique of dive bombing as an important element of Blitzkrieg. Its effect was devastating. The lessons learned in the Spanish Civil War paid off. Galland was heavily engaged in the onslaught. In 27 days he flew up to four sorties a day and was awarded the Iron Cross Second Class. As a recognised expert in this form of aerial warfare, it seemed most probable that he would spend his whole career practising it. He had become too valuable and his reputation now stood in the way of his unwavering desire to be a fighter pilot. It was always in his mind that two months after Mölders took over command of his Staffel in Spain it converted to Bf 109s; and Mölders had scored 14 victories there.
It was obvious to him that henceforth he would fly only second- and third-class aircraft and never do what he considered to be real air fighting, unless he took drastic action. He resorted to a ruse and reported sick with alleged rheumatism. The Gruppe medical officer referred him to higher authority. The next doctor to examine him was a friend and understood the mentality of young pilots. He reported that Galland must not fly in an open cockpit; which meant automatic transfer to modern aeroplanes. Shortly afterwards Galland joined JG27, commanded by Oberstleutnant Max Ibel; but, to his disappointment, he was made adjutant, which would involve trayfuls of paperwork and leave little time for flying.
It was not until May 12, 1940 that he made his first kill: a Belgian Air Force Hurricane. On the same sortie he shot down a second and, later in the day, a third. He says, ‘I took all this quite naturally, as a matter of course. There was nothing special about it. I had not felt any excitement and I was certainly not elated by my success. I had something approaching a twinge of conscience. An excellent weapon and luck had been on my side.’ These sentiments were often expressed by British pilots, too.