The Battle of Britain Five Months That Changed History, May—October 1940 by James Holland (z-lib.org).epub

the way forward and the only tactic likely to persuade the British fighters to
come out into open battle. General von Richthofen was of a similar mind.
‘This afternoon the decision comes to raid London,’ he recorded. ‘Let’s
hope the Reichsmarschall stands firm. I’ve got my doubts on that score.’
Von Richthofen need not have worried. The following afternoon,
Göring stood on Cap Gris Nez with his assembled commanders and
entourage watching the largest Luftwaffe formation ever assembled pass
over his head. There were some nine hundred aircraft – three hundred
bombers and six hundred fighters – stepped up between 14,000 and 23,000
feet. It was a vast armada, the like of which had never, ever been seen
before.
Tom Neil had sensed something was up. Already he had been on two sorties
that morning, the first for around fifteen minutes, the second for almost an
hour and a half, during which they had patrolled the Thames estuary and as
far east as Canterbury. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but it was
almost tangible. All of south-east England had been spread before him,
basking in the glorious sunshine of a perfect Indian summer, and yet they
had not spotted a thing. As his Hurricane had thrummed rhythmically over a
silent world, he had felt as though they were the only people alive.
The squadron was now based at North Weald, in 11 Group, a fighter
airfield to the north-east of Epping Forest in Essex. Since their arrival five
days before they had had plenty of scrambles but Tom, for one, had still not
seen much action. Having landed back at the airfield, Tom had headed to
the crew room and slept, fully dressed, his Mae West round his neck, until
suddenly, at 4.30 p.m., they were scrambled, and ordered to patrol
Rochester–Maidstone.
They had climbed to 18,000 feet when they spotted puffs of ack-ack
bursting and then immediately saw the armada of Germans – a wedge of
Heinkel 111s, then Dornier 17s and above a huge cloud of fighters.
Tom heard the attack cry, ‘Tally ho!’, and then they were turning
towards the enemy, twelve Hurricanes against more than a hundred.
Attacking from the beam, Tom watched the Heinkels fill his gunsight. ‘Like
slugs,’ he thought. ‘Huddled together as though for warmth.’ Checking his
gun button was ready to fire, he glanced either side of him and saw
Hurricanes rocking and bunching eagerly. Banking more sharply to give
himself a clearer run, he closed towards the bombers, which seemed to