Most historians agree that the very nature of the Battle of
Britain changed on 7 September, with a shift away from the direct attack on
Fighter Command's airfields and the factories which produced its aircraft. The
change in targeting was driven by Goring and supported by Kesselring, who felt
that the anti-airfield campaign had run its course, and that Fighter Command
was finished. But Sperrle protested strongly, believing that Fighter Command
probably still had a thousand aircraft left, and wished to continue to scourge
the No.11 Group airfields. He was overruled.
But it would be a mistake to see the targeting of London as
necessarily marking a fundamental change in direction by the Luftwaffe. The aim
was still the destruction of Fighter Command, and the targeting of London
merely represented a switch to a target which the Germans felt was most likely
to draw the RAF's fighters into the air, where they could be destroyed. It was,
in the words of one German officer, the 'only target that Fighter Command would
give everything to defend.' That, at least, was Goring's theory, although it
did also mark an opportunity for vengeance following Bomber Command's raid on
Berlin on 25 August. And London was a vitally important target. It was Europe's
largest city, and was the capital city of a nation whose capital was of
unparalleled importance. It was the centre of Britain's economy, a major
industrial and port city, the seat of government and the home of the King.
Small wonder that it was a tempting target.
But just as Goring had rethought his battle plans, so too
did Dowding adjust his tactical thinking, and restructured his forces. By
coincidence, as the new phase of the Battle began, Dowding's reclassification
of his squadrons came into effect. Thereafter, the frontline squadrons in No.
11 Group were categorised as Class A squadrons, as were those units in Nos 10
and 12 Groups which Park might call on to reinforce his Group. Class B
squadrons were fully manned and fully established, and were ready to be called
into action, but might be lacking in combat experience or be suffering from a
degree of fatigue. Finally, Class C squadrons were those which had suffered
severe losses, and were being rested and re-equipped. Experienced survivors
from these units were taken (as soon as they were ready) to act as replacements
for pilots killed or wounded in the higher category units. This cut the link
between an individual pilot and his original unit, but ensured that newly
formed squadrons would have a core of combat-experienced veterans. Meanwhile,
Keith Park instructed his controllers and pilots to henceforth obey altitude
orders from Group, without making any personal interpretations of the heights
given. He did this to ensure that climbing fighters did not emerge below their
targets, but it caused delays and sometimes meant that the RAF fighters fought
the escorts instead of the bombers, which often flew slightly lower.
As if to deliberately confuse Fighter Commander, the
Luftwaffe began 7 September as it had begun many of the past days, with a
handful of reconnaissance sorties, but thereafter, the radar screens remained
clear and the plotting tables empty. The long delay seemed ominous. The Air
Ministry had already issued an 'Invasion Alert No. 1' (meaning attack imminent)
without having previously issued Alert Nos 2 and 3 (attack probable within two
and three days, respectively).
History records that the first raid counter was placed on
the plotting table at Bentley Priory at 1554, and that within minutes counters
representing many hundreds of aircraft were on the table. Goring had launched
virtually the full strength of KG 1, KG 2, KG 3, KG 26 and KG 76, together with
the Bf 110s of ZG 2 and the Bf 109Es of JG 2, JG 3, JG 51, JG 52, JG 54, I./JG
77 and I./ and II./LG 2. This colossal armada numbered 965 aircraft, stepped up
from 4268m to 7010m (14,000ft to 23,000ft) advancing along a 32.2km (20-mile)
front. Dowding and Park correctly guessed that only London could be the target
of such a vast force, and at 1617 11 fighter squadrons were ordered into the
air, with 21 units airborne by 1630. All available fighters raced towards the
capital, with no thought of standing guard over their airfields. The RAF
fighters were massively out-numbered by the German escorts, but tore into the
enemy with great ferocity. The German bombers aimed for the docks, but their
bombs fell over a wide area, from Kensington in the west but concentrated in
the East End, and doing as much damage to the densely packed terraces of
working-men's houses as to the docks, gasworks and power stations that were
also hit. The enemy bombers turned around and were all en route home by 1745,
albeit with huge gaps in the neat formations.
As the skies above London emptied of aircraft, the fight was
taken over by the firemen, who fought the spreading fires with a grim
determination. They fought to douse the burning buildings, the wooden-block
road surfaces on older streets and even the surface of the River Thames itself
(where floating liquid sugar ignited), all the while with the warehouses of
paint, oil, explosives and ammunition blowing up in terrifying explosions. But
it was not just the obviously dangerous materials that exploded - flour and
pepper were equally dangerous, and the conflagration threatened to become
self-sustaining as the fire sucked in oxygen from the surrounding streets.
Burning debris was tossed into the air like straw, setting new fires wherever
it landed. The London Fire Brigade classified a fire requiring 30 pumps as a
'Major' fire, yet in the early evening of 7 September, the Fire Brigade were
tackling nine fires which were officially rated as 'Conflagrations', in that
they required more than 100 pumps each. The largest was in the Surrey Docks,
where the fire was too large to classify, and where it was arbitrarily rated as
a 300-appliance fire.
At about 2010, the next wave of 318 German bombers began to
pour down tons of incendiaries. 306 civilians died in the bombing, and 1337
more were seriously injured in the City, with 142 more killed in the suburbs.
An enormous pall of smoke hung over the capital, and the fires burned on.
The first day cost Fighter Command dear, with the loss of 15
Spitfires (and four pilots) and 17 Hurricanes (with seven pilots). But the
Luftwaffe lost 38 aircraft, including 14 Bf 109s. The balance of attrition was
not very different from that suffered during the past weeks, although this
changed as the campaign wore on, and the onslaught on London soon became much
more costly to the attacker than to the defenders. And the blitz against London
lasted long after the Battle ended, bleeding the Luftwaffe white in the
process. The attacks continued on 76 consecutive nights, with only a single
exception. This was 2 November, when the weather was too poor to allow the
German bombers to operate. Perhaps most crucially, the Fighter Command
airfields, and the Chain Home stations were given precious respite by the switch
in targeting. Even the pilots themselves were rested when not actually in the
air over London. Squadrons spent whole days without coming to readiness, and
there was even time for newly arrived pilots to be taken on training and
familiarisation sorties -luxuries which would have been unthinkable only days
before. And, as in the phrase popularly used at the time, 'London could take
it'. Dowding was relieved by the switch in targeting, commenting that 'The
nearness of London to German airfields will lose them the war.' Churchill put
it in typically over-blown fashion. 'London is like some huge prehistoric
animal, capable of enduring terrific injury, mangled and bleeding from many
wounds yet preserving its life and movement.'
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