Abstract
Aside from revisionist anti-myth objections, 70 years after its conclusion the historiographical narrative of the battle of Britain is now very settled: before Hitler could invade he demanded air superiority over the Channel and bridgeheads. This proved impossible by mid-September 1940 and Operation Sea Lion was called off. Within this broad strategic reality – which takes nothing away from the Royal Navy’s untested prowess in defending the Channel, undoubtedly a major obstacle for Hitler – the battle of Britain was a numbers game, pilots’ daily aircraft victory claims broadcast by both British and German propagandists being central to perceptions about who was gaining the upper hand. As the battle developed these tallies became critical; American war correspondents and news agencies fixated upon whose were the more accurate. This mattered in light of Churchill’s growing anxiety to secure American aid, which was in grave doubt if Britain looked like losing. If RAF Fighter Command denied the Luftwaffe the necessary air superiority for Sea Lion, its two key fighter aircraft – the Spitfire and Hurricane – were foremost in this endeavour.
Both aircraft featured equally in British propaganda during the battle, but there can be no doubting the lithesome Spitfire’s greater public appeal; Spitfire funds bulged with donations. Since the war the Spitfire has attracted much of the glory for winning the battle, R.J. Mitchell’s nimble thoroughbred having been powerfully mythicized. Conversely, there is a corresponding anti-myth that argues for the primacy of the less glamorous, chunkier, but more numerous Hurricane: this aircraft, it is claimed, was actually responsible for shooting down some two-thirds of all Luftwaffe aircraft. Opinions are divided, with the difficulty of accurately ascribing credit even tangling up Leo McKinstry when writing about both: he acknowledged the Spitfire as being the supreme fighter during the battle on the one hand in Spitfire: Portrait of a Legend (2007), then rather took away the credit in his later book Hurricane: Victor of the Battle of Britain (2011, both London: John Murray).
Entering the fray, Dilip Sarkar has published numerous books on both the Spitfire and the battle, and seeks through his ‘controversial thesis’ to ‘finally lay to rest the myth that the Hurricane won the Battle of Britain rather than the numerically inferior, yet more glamorous, Spitfire’. To achieve this Sarkar draws upon a blend of contemporary reports, aircrew memoirs, interviews conducted over many years with surviving pilots, the work of fellow historians, and his exhaustive knowledge of these events. He begins with ‘The bomber will always get through’, which sets the scene for interwar civilian anxieties, Douhet’s theory of air power, Trenchard’s offensive doctrine, and the politics underpinning RAF bomber and fighter provision. Next, the ‘Schneider Trophy races’ are discussed: these allowed for the development of monoplane racers and powerful aero-engines, which in turn assisted the technical evolution of RAF ‘Monoplanes and machine-guns’. ‘The Hawker Hurricane’ and ‘The Supermarine Spitfire’ are considered in developmental and performance terms, both fighters then located within the RAF’s ‘System of air defence’, which is in turn contrasted with ‘German military aviation between the wars, and the Me109’ (or Bf 109E), the Luftwaffe’s most formidable fighter in 1940. Having provided the background within which to frame the imminent battle of Britain, Sarkar next considers ‘The Battle of France’ and subsequent ‘Dunkirk – Operation Dynamo’, the latter, the first point at which Spitfires were committed in large-scale combat. ‘The lull’ following the Dunkirk debacle led into ‘The Battle of Britain’, a narrative history based on many pilots’ memoirs, after which the final chapter is ‘Spitfire ascendant’. These chapters are thorough, detailed, and wide-ranging in content, and are, in essence, about far more than solely the Spitfire, but they certainly contextualize it vis-à-vis the Hurricane and Me 109.
Sarkar’s concluding analysis of battle claims and losses is of keen interest, and reflects the heated debate about who had shot down what (pp. 150–61). Actual Spitfire losses were 276, yet the Luftwaffe claimed 1229 by its bombers and fighters – over-claiming by 4.45, suggesting ‘Spitfire snobbery’. Of this total, Me 109 pilots claimed 1017 Spitfires, whereas only 216 were actually shot down by them – e.g. a staggering 4.7 over-claim. The actual German tally for Hurricanes stood at 406, while they claimed 711 – clearly, Luftwaffe pilots saw less appeal in claiming Hurricanes. Conversely, German combat losses stood at 1273, against which the RAF claimed 2051 – so, an over-claim here of 1.6 (Hurricanes, 1109; Spitfires, 942). In this context Spitfire pilots’ claims thus look more conservative, leading Sarkar to argue that Mitchell’s masterpiece ‘is beginning to look distinctly impressive’, as the ‘less numerous Spitfire emerges in the lead – firmly challenging the Hurricane myth’ (p. 159).
John Alcorn’s statistical analysis, which focused on the actual ‘kills’ made by RAF squadrons rather than individual pilots (‘B-of-B Top Guns’, Aeroplane, September 1996, pp. 14–18, and ‘Battle of Britain Top Guns – update’, Aeroplane, July 2000, pp. 24–9), is cited by Sarkar in support of his thesis. Alcorn argued that out of the ten top-scoring squadrons, six flew the Spitfire; similarly, four out of the six ‘Top Bf109 killers’ squadrons also flew Spitfires. Sarkar cites Alcorn’s view that ‘the Spitfire was accordingly 0.51 more successful than the Hurricane’ in shooting down aircraft – the latter’s own estimate was 0.32 in the Spitfire’s favour (p. 160). Despite the controversy generated at the time, the editor of Aeroplane magazine has separately confirmed that ‘he had not seen any major critique of Alcorn’s research and considered it still stood as the definitive study’ (G. Mitchell, R.J. Mitchell: Schooldays to Spitfires, Stroud: History, 2005, p. 293).
Also cited by Sarkar, battle of Britain historian Alfred Price offered comments at the end of Alcorn’s 1996 article, arguing that the Spitfire was the more effective fighter and remained in action for longer, while the Hurricane was almost twice as likely to be shot down, thus requiring replacement. This said, the two fighters were similar in their ability to shoot down enemy aircraft, but much depended on the aircraft being attacked: Stukas were easy game, but well-flown Me 109s were formidable opponents. Sarkar confirms that only the Spitfire was capable of taking on the Me 109s at high altitude, whence, if not challenged, they had the drop on RAF fighters – often Hurricanes – attacking bomber formations. As combat reports confirmed, Hurricanes operating alone without Spitfires as top-cover were badly mauled, as indeed were unwary Spitfires battle-climbing beneath higher-flying Me 109s.
As to whether the Spitfire ‘won’ the battle of Britain, Sarkar concedes: ‘whilst the claim that the Hurricane executed greater damage upon the enemy while the Spitfire walked away with the glory is largely a myth, the fact is that in 1940 the Hurricane was essential to the defence of this country’ (p. 161). But this was more about the relative availability of these fighters to the RAF during the battle than performance. Without the Spitfire, Fighter Command would have been in severe difficulty during the battle, a point reinforced by many fighter pilots since the war. In the final analysis the Luftwaffe was worried, perhaps obsessed, by the Spitfire, and in addition to its fighting capability, the aircraft undoubtedly undermined German aircrew morale to the same degree that it bolstered the British home front. For that alone it deserves its hallowed reputation in the public’s mind, which some might argue has never come under serious pressure vis-à-vis the battle. Nevertheless, Sarkar’s well-researched, accessible, and carefully argued book reinforces the Spitfire myth through evidence about what mattered most – its combat prowess – and is a welcome addition to the battle’s historiography.