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

foot when the telephone went.’ Bee slept as much as he could. ‘If you’d
been fighting during the day and you’d gone off down the pub with the lads
at night and then had a little bit more than you should have,’ he says, ‘by
four o’clock in the morning when you were woken you probably had a bit
of a hangover and so as soon as you got to dispersal you’d find a bed and lie
down and go to sleep till somebody woke you up.’
Some people read but Bee never did. Nor did Allan Wright. He greatly
enjoyed reading but he couldn’t whilst waiting to be scrambled. ‘If you’re
immersed in a book,’ he says, ‘and you are suddenly called out, it takes a
few seconds, or a minute or so to readjust and I thought that might slow me
up.’ Instead he preferred to talk to his fitter and rigger, check his aircraft
and simply watch what was going on.
Time between missions was different for Luftwaffe pilots because they
usually knew when they would be flying – normally only a couple of pilots
would be kept at cockpit readiness in case of intruders. ‘Very often it was
decided in the evening before the mission what every pilot had to do the
next day,’ says Hans-Ekkehard Bob, ‘whether it would be a free hunt, or
close escort.’ Pilots still felt tense waiting around to fly, however, but would
spend the time in much the same way their British counterparts did.
‘Writing, reading, playing chess, eating, sleeping etc,’ scribbled Siegfried
Bethke, ‘passing the hours, each in his own way.’ Hans used to play a
German card game called Skat a fair amount, and like Siegfried would
swim in the sea whenever he got the chance.
Relaxation was crucial to a pilot’s chances of survival, and those who
were able to switch off and turn their minds to other things would tend to
live longer. There was a balance, however. Getting blind drunk and flying
still half-inebriated was obviously not a good idea, but nor was living and
breathing the war every minute of the day. A cool, calm head was also
essential. In times of intense pressure and stress, the body tenses, the
muscles shorten, and the heart rate quickens. In these circumstances it is
harder for the brain to make calm, informed decisions, so panic takes over
and the brain works irrationally. By keeping calm and measured, the effects
of pressure lessen: the heart rate remains at a steadier pace, the body feels
more relaxed and so those split-second decisions that can mean the
difference between life and death are more likely to be the right ones. Hajo
Herrmann, for example, was superb under pressure, able to control his fears
and think clearly at all times. ‘My crew always said that I was