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

laughing, reporting that Ops were in a hell of a stew. ‘Plots all over the
board,’ he grinned.
They did not have to wait long. At 5 a.m. the phone in the dispersal tent
rang with orders for them to scramble and patrol Metz at 20,000 feet. They
headed off in two flights, Billy with ‘B’ Flight led by Flight Lieutenant
‘Prosser’ Hanks. Having taken off, they formed up into two sections of
three, maintaining the tight figure ‘V’ vics that they had trained at so
assiduously, and with a further pilot following behind as ‘arse-end Charlie’
protecting their rear. Climbing through the thick early-morning haze, at
around 5,000 feet they emerged into bright clear sunlight.
The problem was that with no controller on the ground vectoring them
into position, they were now on their own. They could barely see the French
countryside below; nor could they see any aircraft at all.
The pilots of the RAF and Armée de l’Air were very quickly
discovering just how confusing air warfare could be and how all the balls
were in the court of the attacker. Neither side had an early-warning system
such as radar. This mattered less to the Luftwaffe because the pilots knew
before they took off where they were heading and when. For the Allied
airmen, however, it was a question of responding to visual reports – which
invariably arrived too late – or of mounting patrols in the hope of spotting
some of the enemy.
Eventually, however, ‘B’ Flight did spy a formation of Dornier 17s,
which they attacked. ‘Boy’ Mould overshot and had his Hurricane riddled
with bullets as a result, but Prosser Hanks managed to down one. Soon
after, Billy managed to get separated from his section because he had been
watching some Me 109s in the distance over Metz. Two 109s attacked him,
but Billy managed to elude them and then get behind one of them himself.
Closing in, Billy was almost within firing range, but the German pilot dived
down towards the deck 3 and sped towards the German frontier. Following
him, Billy crossed over into Germany only to watch the German pilot fly
underneath some electric cables, hoping Billy would follow and hit them.
Fortunately, he managed the same feat himself and opened fire with his
eight Browning .303 machine guns. Much to his satisfaction, the 109
crashed in flames into a wood, exploding on impact.
Although 87 Squadron had been tussling with the Luftwaffe, there was
comparatively little enemy air activity over north-east France that day. The