airlife - hurricane - ocr

7/22/2019 Airlife - Hurricane - OCR

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HURRIC NE

EDW RD ISHOP


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HurricaneEdward ishop

~ : : > t _ irlife England


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,.

-1?-4-2f8 7) 13 ;

Copyright 1986 Edward BishopISBN 0 906393 62 0First published 1986by Airlife Publishing Ltd.All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in an yform or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying,recording or by an y information storage an d retrieval system, without permissionfrom the Publisher in writing.Printed in England by Livesey Ltd., Shrewsbury.

irlife Publishing Ltd751. John s Hill, Shrewsbury, England.


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ont ntsChapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter

How it happenedT he name of Hawker deserves to live in the hi stor yof aviation light 9Bulman takes her upAnother winner I think George Bulman6 November 1935Going to warThe Hurricane inspired solid affection .A ir Mar sh al Sir Pe ter Wyke ha mMost of the fewThe Hurricane was great an d we proved it .Group Captain Peter TownsendSaving the nationBest of all it was a maJ;vellous gun platformGroup Captain Sir Douglas BaderHurricane s victorySpitfire snobbery still persisted .New rolesW e seem to be forgotten nobody loves us . Hurricane squadron commanderSeatimeI f an old bo y like me can do it it won t mean athing to lads like you . . .Squadron Leader Louis StrangeDesert daysHurricanes doing magnificently loyal workMarshal of Th e Royal Ai r F or ce Lord TedderEast of SuezThey gripped the Japanese ai r power and repelledits offensive. . .Lieutenant-Colonel Frank OwenAppendices.

Index \ < .

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46

53

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ref ce

Perhaps it was inevitable that I should writeabout the Hurricane, although until AlastairSimpson of Airlife suggested the Spitfire smore numerous Battle of Britain companionas a subject I had not considered it. I shouldhave known better. Yet, I hesitated.Publication ofmy book, The Battle Britainwas as long ago as 1960 to commemorate the20th anniversary and I thought I had left allthat behind me. Very soon, however, Irediscovered the fascination of the per iodand, of course, the Hurricane s subsequentcareer.Sadly, many who had helped me hithertowere no longer here, but since their assistanceand support has carried forward into thisbook I repeat my indebtedness to them all andin particular to Lord Beaverbrook, sogenerous with his time and hospitality, and toLord Dowding who so patiently answered myquestions.In some instances continuity has beenachieved. Group Captain Tom Gleave,helpful also with a later book, The Guinea PigClub entertained me at the Royal Air ForceClub, bringing with him Robert Wright whowas at Dowding s side at Bentley Priory. was also reassuring to find at least onefamiliar face at the Air Historical Branch ofthe Ministry ofDefence in the person of DenisBateman who in 958 unearthed for TheWooden Wonder a picture of the bear whichcrewed a Mosquito in the Far East. Unableto pinpoint photographs of Hurricanes inRussia, I returned to Denis Bateman whoredirected me with the negative numbers tothe Imperial War Museum - as ever veryhelpful - but where in this respe ;tT hadpreviously drawn a blank.

My thanks are also due to staff at theAdastral House Library of the Ministry ofDefence and to Reg Mack of the Royal AirForce Museum. Assistance with illustrationswas also received from Richard Riding, editorof eroplane Monthly and his colleague,David Moncur of the Quadrant PictureLibrary which includes the Flight and eroplane collections; and from MarkSkidmore, formerly of British Aerospace,Kingston, where the Hurricane was designed.I value, too, the encouragement of AirCommodore Henry Probert, Head of the AirHistorical Branch, two of whosepredecessors, Mr. J. C Nerney and Mr. LJackets facilitated my research in 958 and1959.I wish to thank also Air Chief Marshal SirHarry Broadhurs t who kindly sent me inhandwriting an account of how he acquiredhis private Hurricane.I am especially indebted to Francis KMason for permission to use technical andother material from The Hawker Hurricanehis Macdona ld monog raph of 1962.Publication of the Appendices would nothave been possible without this muchappreciated assistance. Comprehensiverecords no longer exist at British Aerospace.Lastly, it has been a bonus to have two suchhelpful neighbours as Wing CommanderBryan Winslett who took part in theTurbinlite night fighter trials, employing theHurricane as satellite to the Havoc, andMajor Matthew Oliver who loaned researchmaterial.

Edward Bishop


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hapterw it happened

Th e name of Hawker deserves to live in the history of aviation Flight 1921Aerospace design teams dependent uponcomputers schoolchildren learning mathswith pocket calculators must marvel that theHurricane ever happened. The HawkerHurricane was the product of pencil an dpaper arithmetic a nd c om pa ra tiv elyu nl et ter ed talents. Its solid p er fo rma nc e asBritain s predominant fighter a ir cr af t in theopening stages of the Second World Wa rreflected the reliability of its design an dproduction pedigree an d the de pe nd ab lenature of its creators.In t he b eg in ni ng there was S opwi th thenthere were Sigrist Hawker Camm Spriggsan d Bulman. Of course there were others bu tthese a re t he p ri nci pa ls w it ho ut wh om t her ewould have been no Hawker pedigree; nom on op la ne eight-gun fi ghter t o precede t heSupermarine Spitfire an d outnumber it in t heBattle of Britain of 1940.After the First World War the SopwithAviation C om pa ny h ad found itself with aproduction line bu t little business. ThomasOctavius Murdoch Sopwith eighth child of acomfortably well-off north of Englandfamily was born in 1888; on schedule forindulging as a young man the novel pleasuresof motor racing competitive flying an ddriving fast motor-boats. As horsemenemployed grooms Sopwith neededmechanics to service his machines.In 1910 he employed Fred Sigrist aschauffeur an d odd-job man. Sigrist was soonto care f or a six-cylinder N ap ie r m ot or -c armotor-boats and Sopwith s aeroplanes - anAvis m on op la ne b ui lt by Howard Wdght;aWright biplane an d a Bleriot monoplane.When Sigrist needed help he engaged E.Kauper who ha d replied to an advertisementfo r a n a er op la ne me cha ni c and a carpe nter.

Kauper knew that Harry Hawker anAustralian friend had arrived in England andwas looking for work. In J un e 1912 Sopwithhired Haw ke r b ank in g as a deposit the 40which Hawker had saved for his passagehome.As Hawker joined Sopwith the aviationcompany operating from sheds encircled bythe motor-racing track at Bro ok la nd s inSurrey received a Naval order.In Sigrist w ho became works manager;Kauper foreman an d Hawker responsiblefor the flight shed Sopwith ha d recruited byinstinct the nucleus of an engineering staff.

Sopwith hired H arry H aw ker in June 1912 an db y S ep tem ber the young Austral ian ha d a pilot slicence. Bri/ish Aerospar,


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HOW IT HAPPENED

Sopwith and his sister May with HowardWright biplane. FlightA factory was established at a disused rollerskating rink some seven miles down river atKingston-on-Thames.Chalk outlines appeared on the walls asthough cavemen had been busy. A plan viewwas on the floor. There were no detaileddrawings or stress diagrams; not even sliderules. Conditions were rudimentary at thework place which, within 22 years, was to givebirth to the Hawker Hurricane.

Harry Hawker, son of a Cornishblacksmith and Scottish mother, had runaway from school in Australia at the age of 2and found work at five shillings a weekwith amotor-car business. He had saved 100 andsailed for England with Kauper. Taking aseries of humble jobs, he spent any spare timeat Brooklands, watching the flying.Sopwith had hired Hawker by hunch andshortly afterwards he taught him to fly. BySeptember 1912 Hawker possessed a pilot scertificate. Within a year he held the Britishair records for speed, altitude and endurance;a grand slam of successes rendered the moreremarkable because he was by no meansrobust, and suffered from air sickness andback trouble. An almost statutory Australian2

irrev erence cockily expressed by hispreference for perching a flat cap back-tofront,pn his curly head and a reputation asConstance Babington-Smith writes in TestingTime or being quick as a wink and sparkingwith .fun camouflaged his physicalweaknesses.Very soon he was Sopwith s test pilot. Hewas intimately involved with each newaeroplane from design to modifications untilhe was killed in a crash on 2 July 1921. But hehad survived long enough to give his name tothe company which created the Hurricaneand to help establish the Hawker Hurricane sstrong and healthy pedigree.

From the Tabloid fighter of the FirstWorldW ar, Sopwith, and subsequently Hawkeraircraft, were full of Harry Hawker s ideas.They evolved from hard and dangerousexperience as a test pilot and from onesensational international exploit.On18 May 19l9,partnered by CommanderKenneth Mackenzie Grieve of the Royal Navyas navigator in a single-engined Sopwithbiplane, Hawker attempted a first west-easttrans-Atlantic non-stop flight fromNewfoundland to Ireland. The machine,carrying 350 gallons of fuel for an estimated

22 hours duration, was confronted bynor therly gale force winds. Less than halfway, with 8 gallons expended and theengine over-heating, Hawker put down in thesea. The pair were presumed lost and KingGeorge V sent a telegram of condolence toMrs Hawker, but the Mary, a small Danishfreighter on the Mexico run, had sighted thewreckage and after only 30 minutes in the seaHawker and Mackenzie Grieve were rescued.(Captain John Alcock and Arthur WhittenBrown achieved the first Atlantic crossingfrom Newfoundland in a Vickers Vimy on 5June 1919, and were knighted).The dramatic nature of their failureestablished Hawker and his partner aspopular heroes and unusually for a civilian,Hawker was awarded the Air Force Cross.But before long Harry Hawker would be asmuch out of work as so many less fortunateservicemen survivors of the First World War.In September 1920, in the absence of


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government orders Sopwith pu t the companyinto voluntary liquidation while it remainedsolvent. Within two months the H. G.Hawker Engineering Company wa sregistered as a p ri va te c om pa ny with ca pi ta lof 20 000 in shares t o acquire from F. Bennett all the patents rights etc relating tothe manufacture of motor-cycles. . . . t washoped to make aeroplanes an d after themotor-cycle venture ha d evaporated Sigristsaid to Sopwith an d Hawker: Let s makeaeroplanes again .Sigrist who ha d prospered on a royaltyfrom each Sopwith aeroplane joined Sopwithan d Hawker as an investor. Frank Spriggswhom Sopwith to free himself from ledgersha d promoted from office boy to costingbookkeeper completed the team.In less than a year Hawker was dead. Hecrashed while testing his Nieuport Goshawkentry at Hendon four days before the 6 July9 aerial Derby.

From his airfield two miles a way at StagLane Captain Geoffrey de Havillandwatched the aeroplane climb steeply and fallou t of control. An inquest revealed thatHawker ought no t to have been flying. Atubercular spine ha d reduced his vertebrae toa shell. A h ae mor rha ge was thought t o havep ar al ysed his legs in flight. But c ra sh detailsreleased years l at er suggest fire ha d causedloss of control. Harry Hawker had gone at theearly age of 31 this great an d restless spirit

HO W IT HAPPENED

as his near contemporary test pilot HaraldPen rose was t o describe him.Flight commented: T he name of Hawkerdeserves to live in the history of aviation notfor the performances associated with thename bu t for his contributions to the increaseof aeronautical knowledge. He decided tobuild better aeroplanes than anyone hasbuilt .Since the absorption of the Hawker aircraftcompanies by th e impersonal BritishAerospace Hawker s name has beendissociated from present-day aviation. But itlives on coupled with the company shistorically most celebrated aeroplane theHawker Hurricane. Hawker-Siddeley is nolonger in aviation.

Sidney Camm who was to design theHurricane joined the company in 1923 assenior draughtsman to o late to have workedwith Harry Hawker. His qualifications wereacademically scrappy bu t he was rich inpractice an d in experience in this youngindustry. He was a carpenter whose hobbyinterest in model gliders as a member - latersecretary - of th e Windsor Model AeroplaneClub ha d impelled him to night school andflying machines.Sydney Camm brought to Hawkerscredentials earned at Martinsydes after beingemployed there in 1912 as a woodworker.When Martinsydes ceased production in 9

Camm ha d p rog re ssed fro m c ra ft sm an to

Now will sh e s tart? Sop with an d Howard Wright machine. Flighl


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mechanic draughtsman and senIOrdraughtsman.As with Sigrist, Hawker an d Spriggs,Sopwith warmed instinctively to Camm whoin 1925 at the age of 32 was appointed chiefdesigner. Sopwith has said that he recognisedCamm as a genius, thoug h other colleaguesdisputed this assessment, rating him adesigner of skill an d ability.Certainly, it was Camm s skill an d abilitythat established the line of piston-enginedaeroplanes which was t o p ea k in the HawkerHurricane, Tempest an d Typhoon and extendinto the Hunter an d Harrier, influencing eventhe Hawk an d Tornado.

From Camm s drawing board in swiftsuccession over the next nine years came,among others, the Hart Fury, Hornet Audaxand Hotspur; an apprenticeship for theHurricane. The method of construction oftheHu rr ic an e differed only in details an d sizefrom its predecessors.In these years the Hawker team an d itsbiplanes matured. Sopwith, now greying,reflected how well his instinct ha d served himand stood back as Camm sped from onedesign to the next. He admired Camm sdedication, bu t privately sympathised withmembers of the staff who suffered thisthrusting impossible-to-satisfy chiefdesigner.As Camm dominated th e designd e p a r t m e n t a t K i n g st o n Spriggsimmaculately suited an d unsuspected by anincreasing workforce as the general dogsbodyhe once was, dr ov e a ma nag er ial desk.Sigrist was here, there an d everywhere, a nabsolute whirlwind of energy an d activity ,Harald Penrose remembers. The H. G.Hawker Engineering Company ha d learnedto live without Harry Hawker.An aircraft manufacturer with a decliningorder book is very soon no company at all, asSopwith ha d found in 9 9 In the 1920s an dearly 1930s, after the war-to-end-wars, acompany dependent upon military spendingwas particularly vulnera ble. Once anae roplan e was on the drawing board it wasprudent to look ahead to the next. . . an d thenext an d the next for fear that

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co.mpetitors would beat you to the AirMinistry door. Sydney Camm 26,000aeroplanes were built from his 52 designs)neglected the trail from Kingston-onThames to Adastra1 House in Holborn whereRoyai}.ir Force requirements were planned.Camm wooed his Service customer a nd p ai dcareful attention to the reports andrecommendations of the Hawker an d Servicetest pilots upon which the company s welfaredepended.Towards the end of the Hart and Furystream Camm was conscious that biplanefighter performance could not be muchimproved. t seemed to have peaked in hisdes.ign of a Fury to fulfil an order for theYugoslav Air Force.I n 1933 he began to cons ider the design ofwhat was at first known as the Furymo no pla ne. The co nce pt of a monopla nefighter superseding the biplane was no texclusive to Camm an d Hawkers. AtSupermarine, a Vickers Aviation subsidiarysince November 1928, R J. Mitchell, designerof the renowned seaplane series culminatingin the SB6B monoplane winner of theSchneider Trophy in 1931, nursed similarambitions.

At much the same time AdolfHitler an d hisNational Socialist Party came to power inGermany 30 January 1933), pledged torearm, an d the British Air Marshals began toshed their suspicions of the mon op la ne .Together these events conspired to encourageprivate venture design an d production whichwould result in the Hurricane - an d theSpitfire.

Th e emphasis in the ventures remainedmuch on the private . As the 1930sprogressed, Winston Churchill, a back-benchMember of Pa rli ame nt in the wilderness,warned of the perils of German rearmament.His efforts were not however, assisted by theparticipation of the Na ti on al Government under Labour s Ramsay MacDonald fromNovember 93 to June 1935) in theDisarmament Conference at G eneva until itwas adjourned indefinitely in June 1934. Noras will becom e evident, did the appointmentby Lord L ondonderry, the Air Minister, of


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Ai r Chi ef Marshal Sir Edward Ellington asChief of the Air Staffafter the untimely deathin 9 of Air Chi ef M ar sha l Sir GeoffreySalmond, help the fighters. Londonderry hasbeen much criticised, but there were positiveresults of his term at the Air Ministry. DespiteGeneva, he managed to retain an air force andhe established the committee under Mr. H. Tizard which fostered radar and promotedthe concept of monoplane fighter design,le ading t o the H ur ri ca ne and the Spitfire.

amm had been convinced that themonoplane would supersede the biplane fromthe time of his appointment in 1925 as ch iefdesigner at Hawkers. Before embarking onhis biplane series he had visualised a smallmonoplane fighter to be armed with twoVickers machine-guns and engined by aBristol Jupiter. He was ahead of hiscontemporaries, but Ai r Ministry a tt it ud eswere still conditioned by the disintegration in1912 of two monoplanes, after which RoyalFlying Corps pilots had been or dered no t tofly Service monoplanes.On a hot day in the holiday month ofAugust 1933, amm called at Adastral Houseby appointment on Major Buchanan, eputy

HOW IT HAPPENED

But f or Sir Thomas Sopwith there would havebeen no Hawkers t o build the Hurrican e. Heemployed Sigrist, Hawker and Spriggs.British Aerospace

Sopwith s oddjob man F re d Sigrist second left) h ad faith in Hawker af te r the Fi rs t W or ld War andbacked his venture. Flighl


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Unrecognisable as Sopwith s office boy, Sir Frank Spriggs (right) was the driving force behindHurricane production an d Hawker s commercial success. Brirish Aerospacethem . He also tended to tick of f seniorstaffinfront of visitors. An encouraging pat on theback would have been ou t of character, evenfor his little-known assistant , Roy Chaplin,whom Harald Penrose noted as a soundengineer an d administrator who was veryloyal to Camm though Camm never gave himhis due .The fact was that the creator of theHurricane was a hard taskmaster, of whomSopwith remarked that he wondered why themen put up with him. Th e reality lay in thedepression years an d the unemployment ofthe early 1930s before rearmament providedmore opportunities in the aircraft industry.

Camm paced among the drawing-board asthough keeping a schoolroom class up to itswork. Outside, the gloomy an d somewhatdingy design office, suburban trains ofSouthern Electric rattled past on the nearbyWaterloo line. was an uninspiringbirthplace for the revolutionary eight-gunfighter which was predominantly respqn siblefor the defeat of the Luftwaffe in 1940 ..

Camm his team, an d all at Hawkers, wereengaged in a great act of faith. Whatever

personal solace Buchanan and some servingofficers at the Air Ministry might offer, theInterceptor Monoplane continued to faceformidable official opposition, not least ofwhich was the obduracy of Air ChiefMarshalSir Edward Ellington, Chiefof the Air Staffinthe critical years between 9 an d 1937. Thecurrent rearmament programme was plannedfor completion in 1942 an d Ellington hadconvinced himself that there would be no waruntil that year. He also believed that thebomber would remain the dominant weaponin the ai r an d should, therefore, receivepriority over fighter development; an opinionto which Stanley Baldwin, the Conservativepolitician, who replaced RamsayMacDonaldas Prime Minister in June 1935, gave voice inthe phrase: The bomber will always getthrough . Baldwin was conditioned to someextent by the thinking of Air Marshals whoha d fought as young pilots in the Royal FlyingCorps an d who ha d yet to accept fully thespeed and armament potentialities of amonoplane fighter.Fortunately, however, there was a youngsquadron leader in th e Operational

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Requirements Branch of the AirMinistrywholaunched a persistent one-man campaign towin them over. Ralph Sorley believed thatmonoplane fighters would produce speeds sofast that their pilots would not be able to holdan enemy in their sights for more than twoseconds. Consequently eight guns would beneeded to achieve the necessary concentratedfire-power. He supported his argument for amonoplane eight-gun fighter with the resultsof experiments carried out by Captain F. W.Hill, senior ballistics officer at the Aeroplaneand Armament Establishment at MartleshamHeath in Suffolk. On 19 July 1934 CaptainHill presented them at an Air Ministryconference on armament.By now Camm, because of the advent of theMerlin, was designing as a private venture anair interceptor monoplane much advanced onthe monoplane version of the Fury. Sorleycalled at Kingston to press the incorporationof eight guns, encouraging Camm that strongHawker wings would provide anincomparable mounting for eight Brownings.It was a courageous initiative on the part ofa young squadron leader in the face offormidable opposition, including that of AirChief Marshal Sir Robert Brooke-Popham,Commander-in-Chief, Air Defence of GreatBritain, who thought eight guns was going abit far . Early next year, 1935, when the AirMinistry at last issued a specification F5/34)for a monoplane fighter giving 275 mph at15,000 feet, eight guns were called for.To Camm, as also to Mitchell atSupermarine, the specification was academic.He was already confident of bettering it. TheAir Ministry issued a revised SpecificationF36/34 in terms of what Hawkers werealready doing.

Meanwhile the Government remainedconvinced that the bomber should takepriority until as late as 21 May 1935. On thatday the Cabinet considered a report from arecently appointed Air Parity SubCommittee, chaired by Sir Philip CunliffeLister, President of the Board of Trade, who,as Viscount Swinton, was to become AirMinister on 7 June. The very phrasing of thereport emphasises how private were the8

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company ventures. It read: The firms of.. awker and Supermarine are are..- informed, designing low-wing monoplaneswith retractable undercarriages, flaps for slow

:.)anding, and an estimated speed of 300 mph.:Prototypes may be expected in July and:October, 1935, respectively .While Hawkers and Supermarine weregoing it alone courageously, production ofmedium and heavy bombers had beenordered off the drawing-board. Ellington,Chief of the Air Staff, had frustrated similaraction on the new fighters. The best that couldbe achieved for the future Hurricane andSpitfire were orders for prototypes and thesewere sanctioned only after the personalinsistence of the Air Member for Researchand Development. Little known tothe public,the then Air Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding hadrendered his first great service towards savingBritain from invasion in 1940. But there wasstill no production order for eithermonoplane fighter.Despite the report of the Air Parity SubCommit tee, the policy of priority for theBomber Command of the RAF would not bereversed until the Inskip Report of 1937, thebasis of the Empire s preparation for war,awarded priority to Fighter Command. TheAir Staff did not like this, regardingexpansion of Fighter Command in defenceagainst any attempted knock-out blow asrisky in the extreme. still favoured thedeterrence of a strong bomber force, a policyvigorously pushed by a certain GroupCaptain Arthur Harris, Ellington s DeputyDirector of Plans, who believed the bomber tobe the decisive weapon.The appointment in 1936 of Sir ThomasInskip to the new post ofMinister for the Coordination of Defence was described byWinston Churchill as the most astonishingappointment since Caligula made his horse aConsul . In the House of Commons,Lieutenant-Commander R. T. H. Fletcherheaped further opprobrium, portraying thischubby Bristol lawyer as a barrage balloon cumbrous and not of any proven worth .Inskip knew nothing about defence when hetook office, but flying in the face of the Air


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Sir Sidney Camm, designer of the Hurricane an d creator of a long Hawker pedigree, H. K. Jones alsoof Hawkers, an d P. W. S. George Bulman. F/ighrStaff he assured a future for the Hurricanean d the Spitfire.A year earlier, Baldwin, after takingRamsay MacDonald s place as PrimeMinister, ha d in some measure soothedChurchill s hurt in the wilderness by invitinghim to join the newly formed Committee ofImperial Defence on Air Defence Research.For all his initial sarcasm over Inskip,Churchill subsequently provided him withinformation an d suggestions, some of whichpromoted the cause of the monoplanefighters.The obstacles encountered by C am m a ndMitchell) have long since been overlaid by theoperational success stories of their aircraft. AtKingston, Camm, the former woodworker,contended with the unknown. Theconstructional pedigree existed, bu t th eoverall performance demands of am on op la ne , n ot to say wing flaps an d ar et ra ct ab le u n de rc ar ri ag e, called forinnovations, particularly new hydrauliccontrol systems. Camm ha d also to cohsiderblind-flying instrument panels and>inoresophisticated radio an d oxygen supplyrequirements. He supervised work 01 1 amultitude of detail while th e monoplane fookgeneral shape, first as a series of scalemodels

an d then as a wooden mock-up.Camm presented the mock-up to visitorsfrom the Air Ministry on 10 January 1935.

Although the design di d no t accommodatemore than four guns at this stage, AirCommodore L. A. Pattinson fromArmaments Research an d Wing Commander N. Lowe from Air Defence of Great Britainwere no t unduly concerned. Licence tomanufacture the Browning in Britain h ad n otyet been obtained from the Colt PatentFirearms Company in t he U ni te d States. was July before the contracts were awarded tothe Birmingham Small A rms C om pa ny a ndVickers, the .300 inch Browning beingadapted to fire British .303 rimmedammunition.

Unrelenting, Camm drove on hi sdraughtsmen in the long room at Kingston sCanonbury Park Road and on 21 February1935 he sent provisional performance figuresto the Royal Ai r Force. The Ai r Marshalswere surprised. Camm s estimates exceededtheir expectations after they ha d concededSorley s case for an eight-gun fighter.Maximum level speed at 15,000 feet ha dincreased from the specification s 275 mp h to330 mph. It so happened t hat it was on thisvery d ay th at Hawkers received a firm order

9


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The somewhat gloomy surroundings in whichthe Hurricane was designed at Hawker sCanonbury Park Road Kingston-upon-Thamesworks. Bri/ish Aerospace

for one prototype of the fighter whichP at ti nson h ad seen in mo ck -u p. H en ce fo rt hthe embryo Hurricane would be honouredwith a registration number - K5083.Now as the private venture began to bepaid for the company was better placed toconsider expansion. Rearmament graduallyan d grudgingly accepted at Westminster hadstarted to improve its prospects in thepreceding two years. In 1933 when AdolfHitler was proclaimed Chancellor ofGermany the H. G. Hawker EngineeringCompany gave way to Hawker Aircraft apublic company in a financial arrangementwhich allowed for expansion.

Sopwith Spriggs an d Sigrist who hadjoined H ar ry H aw ke r in his e nt erp ri se a ft erthe F ir st W or ld W ar rec og ni sed the need t ofortify the business financially an d provide

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space for expanding production. Capacity atkil1gston was limited because mu ch of thesheap floor had been leased to the LeylandMotor Company in the t hi n times of the late

J ~ Q { SO Hawkers bought the GlosterAirc; raft Com pa ny a t Brockworth. Althoughthis brought no immediate relief as Glosterswere heavily engaged with the Gauntletbiplane the RAF s last open-cockpit fighteran d predecessor of the Gladiator it was a fa rsi gh te d a cq ui si ti on p ro vi di ng a dd it io na lcapacity fo r future Hurricane production.Spriggs was appointed chairman at Glosters.C amm and P W S George Bulman chieftest pilot j oi ne d the H aw ke r b oa rd amiddevelopments engendering confidence an d asense of company an d personal achievementwhich could only enhance the prospects ofthenew monoplane fighter.As the fuselage took shape an d the hole inthe hump so characteristic of a SydneyCamm design b ecame more obviously acockpit George Bulman was a frequentvisitor to the s ho p floor. Hawker s chief testpilot was impatient to familiarise himself withthe controls. The appointments of Bulmanan d Camm as directors in June 1935 wereunusual distinctions for a chief designer an dchief test pilot. O th er tha n H ar ry Hawker noBritish test pilot ha d sa t on an aircraftmanufacturer s board.

Camm did no t t ak e k in dl y t o b ei ng t ol d hisbusiness bu t he listened to Bulman withw ho m he ha d worked amicablyJor ten years.He always acknowledged that the success ofhis aircraft owed much to Bulman an d hisfellow test pilots.W hen K5083 s c oc kp it was r ead y the c hi eftest pilot climbed in. Operationally theHurricane was to accommodate t he long an dth e short an d the tall . No t a ll w ou ld find it asroomy as Bulman. He was a small man an dhis light physique facilitated quick an d easyaccess. He felt very much at home.


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Chapterulman takes her upAnother winner I think . G eo rg e B ul ma n No ve mb er 1935Th e airframe of th e prototype was finished inAugust and in September the Merlin wasinstalled. On October 1935 the fuselagean d two wings were transported by lorry toBrooklands. It seemed entirely right that thefirst Hawker Hurricane should fly from thefield where in 1912 So pwith ha d hiredHawker.Bulman who would take her up when shewas ready watched keenly as the fabriccovered wings were slotted into the centresection. He was reputed to put in more hoursof preparation on the ground t han in the airensuring that his recommendations werecarried out. In previous weeks he ha dattended undercarriage retraction tests.Hawker sheds at Brooklands. Flighl

A t ight tarpaulin concealed thedismembered prototype as it aiTived in theconspiratorial first light of that late autumnday. Larger t ha n a ny load normally receivedat Brooklands it halted while the gates wereremoved. Then against the sombre backdropof Surrey pines an d the steep concretebanking of the race-track s mountain circuitthe lorry moved to the Hawker assemblyhangar on the airfield. Bill Bailey theforeman an d Bert Hayward the riggerremoved the wraps.

Bulman s homework for the m aide n flightof K5083 was characteristically painstaking.Shortly before the outbreak in August 19140fthe First Wor ld War he ha d worked at the


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Bank of E ngl and as a junior clerk. He joinedthe Royal Flying Corps an d qualified as apilot. At Hawkers he brought thefastidiousness of Thr ea dn ee dle Str eet to hispaperwork an d the experience of a f ighterpilot to his test flying.When the prototype was ready he notedthat ballasted for guns an d ammunition an dfuelled the aircraft showed an all-up weightof 5 416 pounds. Centre of gravity ha d shifteda mere half-inch f ro m Camm s estimate.Bulman taxied K5083 accustoming himselfto the field of vision from the cockpit an d thegreenhouse effect of the canopy. An opencockpit aviator he ha d some sympathy withBrooke-Popham s reservations about puttingthe pilot indoors although he accepted thatf utur e s peeds would r equire it.

For all his experience B ulma n was facingthe u nk no wn . H e could d ra w u po n his wa ryears in the Royal Flying Corps p ost -warservice in the Royal Air Force as chief testpilot at the Royal Aircraft Establishment an dsubsequent years at Hawkers bu t aft er somany biplanes this low-wing monoplane theHurricane was something very different.Foreman an d rigger ha d been surprised by

the -sheer size of the great humped shapeunder the t r p ~ u l n and on the November dayBulman took her up even Sopwith Spriggsand.Camm were struck by the contrastbetw;e en the pale blue an d silver monoplanean d the dainty Fury standing by .When all was ready on the m or ning of 6November 1935 the impression of size andstrength given by the new fighter wasaccentuated by the small slim bald-headedfigure of George Bulman trotting over to t hefirst Hurricane and slipping quickly into thecockpit.B ulma n taxied f or tak e- of f at the controlsof the fastest fighter aircraft in the world thefirst to offer its pilot more than 300 m ph ;indeed Bulman would soon record 318 mph at15 500 feet. But this N ov em be r morning hewould feel his way at speeds with which hewas familiar condition himself to theclaustrophobic canopy an d the absence of thewind an d unmuffled engine s ou nd s whichalways t ol d him so much.

Anxiety over th e unproved Merlinh eigh te ne d the tens ion of Sopwith an d hisparty. Much work lay ahead before RollsRoyce got it right an d its p er fo rm an ceAn inverted Audax one of the Hurricane s biplane predecessors over Brooklands in the period ofK 5083 s ma iden flight there is a reminder that biplanes still defended Britain. Bri/ish Aerospace


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Hardly the expecte d ou tf it f or a c hi ef test p il otbu t Geo rg e Bulman som etim es flew theprototype in a trilby hat. R FMuseum

supported the c om p an y s i nt er na ti on alreputation for reliability. This morninghowever all was well. Th e Merlin an d thetwo-blade Watts fixed pitch wooden propellergave Bulman an easy exit from the soup plategrass airfield within the concrete Brooklandsmotor-racing circuit.Now the Hawker par ty c ou ld only wait.Camm was t o admit that he worried. Not thatthere might be a disaster: he was confi dent ofhis design an d the results of extensive windtunnel tests on scale models. Camm st hought s as Bulm an an d K5083 disappeared

Th e prototype at Brooklands. British Aerospace

BULMAN TAKES HE R UP

were on his d is ap po in tm en t t ha t theaeroplane was no t as good as it could havebeen. Strength had been the company skeynote for c on str uc tion . He p on de re d theperformance that had been surrendered inpursuit of this quality: i f only the wing hadbeen thinner . . . .After h alf a n h ou r Bulman returned an d ashe m ade his approach Camm noticed that theundercarriage was fully extended. In factBulman knowing that its hand pumpedhydraulic jacks were uncertain ha d notret ract ed it. He taxied to the narrow strip oftarmac by the Hawker sheds an d opened theconservatory . Camm climbed on to a wingan d the chief test pilot said quietly: Anotherwinner I think . Camm respected Bulman squalification. He would no t have wished itotherwise. He knew George Bulman as adisciple of Roderic Hill w hom he ha d joinedin 1919 as a Farnborough test pilot. Hill atthat time a Squadron Leader an d alreadygaining a reputation as an artist an d aphilosopher ha d taught Bulman to rejecttemptation to show off; to fly withoutflamboyance report without fuss. Hill hadalso t au ght Bulma n that a test pilot shouldaccept that he is complementary to hisdesigner.Bu lma n s ap pr en tices hip u nd er Hill hadbrought another an d very pract ical asset toH awkers. At Farnborough he had flown inthe engine flight. In the course of Bulman:s


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Bulman s maiden flight was on 6 November 1935. This shot was taken shortly afterwards. Flightlong p a r t n e r s h i p with C a m m theperformance of Hawker machines hadbenefited from Bulman s dedication to theflight development of engines. Both designeran d chief test pilot knew that ifeventually th enew fighter was to become a real winner insquadron operational service it could be onlyas good as its eng in e.

Camm and Bulman were aware that th eMerlin C engine powering th e prototypeHurricane ha d failed to obtain the civil 50hour certificate of airworthiness. Bu tHawkers were in a hurry. Th e threat pos ed byGerman rearmament under Adolf Hitler anddomestic competition represented by amonoplane fighter designed by ReginaldMitchell to a similar specification and on th eway from Supermarine no w a VickersAviation subsidiary dictated the earliestpossible maiden flight. By 8 Decemberwhen certification was received K5083 ha dcompleted sev en fi ghts totalling about sixhours. After t ha t t he Merlin gave trouble an dthe prototype was grounded between itseighth flight on 26 December an d ninth flighton 5 February 1936 wi th a n ew e ng in e.4

For all t he great regard in which the RollsRoyce Merlin that powered th e HurricaneSpitfire M os qu it o a nd Lancaster - amongother Second World War aircraft - was to beheld the PV engine of th e prototypeH ur ri ca ne e nc ou nte re d serious earlydifficulties.

Three years before Bulman s maiden flightwork had started on the engine at Derb yw he re it wa s th e last t o be nur se d i nt o life bySi r Henry Royce wh o di d not live to see itthrough its teething troubles. After these hadbeen overcome it was evident that Pa Royceas his men knew him had produced an enginecapable of rapid development. At th e centreof its excellence was th e cap ability ofin c re a s in g s u p e rc h a rg er b o ost an dstrengthening crankshaft an d bearings inaccord; a design legacy w hi ch a ft er Royce sdeath in April 1933 was to enable hissuccessors led by E. W. Hives first as head ofth e Experimental Department later asgeneral manager and chairman to raise th eMerlin s horsepower from t he 790 hp of th ePV to more than 2 000 h p.In the New Year of 1936 t he RAF wa s


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agitating to test the prototype Hurricane foritself bu t Bulman was loath to part with her.Philip Luc as wh o ha d joine d H aw ke rs atB r o o k l a n d s in 1931 was sh a r i n gexperimental flights with the chief test pilot.He has recalled that after the m aide n flightK5083 soon r an into the ine vita ble tee thingtroubles one expects with a prototype .Nothing dissuaded B ul man from his firstbelief that the fighter could be a winner bu t aspressure mounted for delivery to the Aircraftand Armament Establishment at MartleshamHeath in Suffolk engine installation slidinghood and r etra ctab le u nd er ca rr ia ge weregiving tro ub le . I n the w in tr y c on dition s of aNew Year such flying as was possible wasrestricted to evaluating control an d stabilityan d trying ou t remedies for the mostprominent faults. Bulman never trul y athome in an enclosed cockpit discovered thatthe canopy could not be o pe ne d a t speedsexc eed ing a slow climb. A fter the third flightthe hood fell off. Cautiously it will berecalled he had not retracted th eundercarriage on the maiden flight.Subsequent ly he discovered that it \wasdifficult to retract an d l ock using the hand-operated hydraulic pump. At this stage the

B UL MA N T AK ES H ER UP

Prototype pictured 1937 after its acceptanceby the RAF at Martlesham Heath. RAF Museumundercarriage was no t powered.Such problems were trivial compared withthe scares the Merlin was providing. Bulmanan d Lucas realised that if Hawkers were tomeet Martlesham s demands for delivery theywould have to t reat the Merlin gently. Yethowever much they nu rse d it mechanicaltrouble persisted denying them theopportunity to compile performancemeasurements beyond as Lucas describedthem scratch readings in level flight to get

No t yet in the hunt but t he new monoplane fighters provide an incongruous background for thePuckeridge meeting at RAF Debden. Flighl


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HURRICANE

Dick Reynell helped test an d demonstrate theprototype. During the Battle of Britain as aFlight L ie ut en an t o n the Reserve he r ep or te d toHawkers on the fighter s performance incombat. In September 1940 he was killed whileflying with No. 43 Squadron. Flightsome idea of the suitability of the w oo de npropeller . Diving K5083 to c hec k stabili tya nd c on tr ol when flying f as te r than in levelflight was pr eclude d. C os se tt in g the enginealso forbade spinning an d aerobatics.It was n ot until a fter K5083 ha d been flownwith a new engine on 5 February that on 7February Bulman agreed to pass theprototype on to the RA F for its assessment.But there were considerable misgivings aboutth e hand-over. Lucas described them:Although initial difficulties were convertedat least to a usable standard we were far fromhappy at letting Service pilots fly ou r preciousprototype before we had time to find ou tmuch more about it ourselves . When Bulmandelivered K5083 to the RAF s experimentalteam at Martlesham Heath it ha d flown eighthours in ten flights.6

The prototype did no t remain long as aguest of the RAF with whom it behavedrather b ette r tha n B ulma n an d Lucas ha dexpected. Squadron L ead er D. F. A nd er sonres p0J;lsible for trials which took place t w ~ n 8 an d 24 February reportedfavoiirably. M ar tle sh am p il ots wereaccustomed to the unknown by virtue of theirrole bu t they were impressed by how differentthis monoplane was. They complimented thecomfort of the c on se rv ator y c oc kp it andcontrary to Bulman s reservations about theweaving required to see ahead noted that theview was acceptable. They relished thenovelty of the retractable undercarriage an drep.0rted that the aircraft handled easilyalthough controls became heavy at highspeeds. Maximum speed attained was 315mp h at more than 16 000 feet handsomelytop ping the A ir Staffs 275 mp h requirement.However the engine - it was changed severaltimes during the trials - continued to givetrouble. was a pp ar en t to Hawkers RollsRoyce an d the RA F that the Merlin wouldhave to undergo intensive development.I n M ar ch n ot wi th st and in g the Merl in sunreliability H aw ke rs p lu ng ed intoproduction preparations for a run of as manyas 1 000 aircraft. Sopwith an d Spriggs tookthe view that if orders were no t forthcomingf ro m the Ai r Ministry then the export marketwould mo p them up. On 3 June 1936 thecompany s risk and p er sev er an ce wererewarded with a contract for 600- the largestsuch order in pea cetim e - and on 27 JuneCamm s monoplane design to SpecificationPilofs-eye view of cockpit of an early HurricaneI emphasising gun button on the controlcolumn spade grip an d nature ofinstruments. RAF Museum


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No. Squadron was pu t through i ts paces before hostil it ies began by its commander DownwindGillan. R F usemF36/34 received Air Ministry approval for thecompany s choice of name. HenceforthK5083 would be known as the HawkerHurricane.Although there existed bu t one Hurricane,one single-seat monoplane fighter, faster by100 mph than the biplanes defending theUnited Kingdom, no attempt was made toconceal it. Within weeks of the productionorder the prototype was presented - to theBritish public, representatives of friendlynations and an y potent ia l enemy - at the1936 Hendon Air Display. Squadron LeaderAnderson, who ha d assessed it for the Serviceat Martlesham Heath put on a dazzlingperformance. Th e aircraft was to reappearregularly in domestic an d international ai rshows until the Brussels exhibition on the veryeve of war in the summer of 1939.But Hawkers purposeful presentation ofthe new fighter has to be viewed against thecompany s initial pr ivate venture risk an dproduction scheme for 1,000 aircraft beforereceiving an order for 600. In 1936 ;it stillseemed almost inconceivable that Europewould again resort to war to s t t l ~ itsdifferences. The company was pursuing itshighly developed commercial instincts The

lack of orders after the First World Wa r hadhastened Sopwith Aviation s liquidation. seemed prudent to Sopwith an d Spriggs toseek export business.The air displays served an equally usefulpurpose for the rising Luftwaffe, whose seniorofficers used them as a happy hunting groundin which to gather intelligence an d establish asomewhat fretful fraternisat ion with seniorRA F officers. Their persistence was rewardedwith an exchange of visits in which HermannGoring s airmen sought to stimulate aboisterous bonhomie as between formeropen-cockpit opponents of the WesternFront. the Luftwaffe officers ha d a tendencyto show of f an d the RA F gained from it. ButGoring s leaders were no t without style,Generals Udet, Junek and Schoenebeck, atechnical triumvirate, landing a smart MelO8Taifun at Hendon for the 1937 display whichfeatured the Hurricane . In the event buyersfrom Hawkers customary export marke twere more impressed by the Hurricane thanthe window shoppers from Germany whowere well content with the Me 109, alreadyproven in the Spanish civil war. Despite theinsistence of Inskip, Swinton an d Sir KingsleyWood, his successor as Air Minister, on the


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HURRICANE

No. I II Squadron photographed by Charl es E.Brown while based at N or tholt before t he outbreak ofw r R F useum

urgency of production of monoplane fightersfor the RAF orders were to be accepted fromYugoslavia South Africa Belgium an dRomania. In retrospect this may appearfoo lh ardy in the ex trem e bu t they should bejudged in the context of Prim e M in is te rNeville Chamberlain s peace in ou r timereturn in September 1938 from his historicm ee ting with the German Chancellor AdolfHitler at Munich. Moreover Yugoslavia wasa regular customer a nd h ad provided a steadymarket in the 1930s for Hawker Hinds an dFuries.The first of 24 Hurricanes for th e RoyalYugoslav Air Force wa s flown fromBrooklands on 15 December 1938 refuellingin France an d Italy en route to Belgrade. Ina ddi ti on Yugoslavia was licensed to buildHurricanes and ordered 100 from factories inBelgrade and Zemon. Only 2 of thesemachines had been delivered by 6 April 1941when Yugoslavia was invaded. Th e RoyalYugoslav Air Force s Hurricanes wereengined with exported Merlins excepting on eaircraft which was fitted experimentally with18

a Daimler Benz.South Africa another previous purchaser

of the Hawker Fur y was a ls o e ag er to moveup to the Hur ri cane and in November 1938shipment began of seven aircraft released bythe Air M in is try from storage. These aircraftwere delivered before the provision of tropicalai r filters an d succumbed to climaticconditions.In the same period King Carol ofRomania visiting Britain was much taken bythe Hurricane at an RA F presentation of theaircraft and the Ai r Ministry agreed to the saleof 12 machines. Delivery started a few daysbefore the outbreak of the Second WorldWar.Belgium received 2 Hurricanes in 1939and was l i e n s e ~ t build 80 of which onlytwo were completed before the Germaninvasion. Turkey took 15 Persia ordered 18Tw o were delivered the remainder of th econtract being honoured after th e war. Th ehapless Poland received just one.

Chamberlain s return from Munich wasalso followed by the shipment to Canada of 22


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r

\\

Delivery of Hurricanes ordered for the Yugoslav Air Force before the outbreak of the SecondWorld War began on December 1939 British Aerospace

/


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HURRICANE

aircraft ordered by the Department ofNational Defence to re-equip No.1 Squadronof the Royal Canadian A ir For ce . H aw ke rssupported the delivery with two sets ofproduction drawings on microfilm, thusassuring production in Canada s ho uld warcome. Among the many decisions made alongthe way by Sopwith, Spriggs and Camm thismust rank as on e of the m or e imp or ta nt.Subsequently, the Air Ministry contracted theCanadian Car and Foundry Company inMontreal to build Hurr icanes, 40 of whicharrived in time to take part in the Battle ofBritain. In all 45 Hurricanes were built inCanada.At the time of Mun ic h, as f or me r c av alryofficer W ins to n C hur chil l was to no te , fivesquadrons had been remounted onHurricanes . Of Fighter Command s 750fighter aircraft 93 were eight-gun Hurricanes.The Spitfire was no t in squadron operationalservice. Remounting w ou ld h av e been m or erapid had it not been fo r the Merlin s troubles,which delayed production fo r f ou r m on th s.H ou sing the Merlin I I exercised C am m a ndhis staff as they r es ha pe d the nose fa iring forthe re-designed engine mounting. There werealso modifications to the cockpit canopy andthe tail. The strut b rac in g t he t ail plane inCamm s prototype ha d long since gone an dnow an extended rudder an d small ventralfairing were introduced to counter problems

experienced during sp inn ing trials atBrooklands an d Martlesham.Irp,the RAF even before productionaiicrafL Jad reached it, there had been stories,rumo\lri: exaggerations about the new type.There. always were. With the Hurricane,surmise attained an almost unhealthyextreme. A Hurricane pilot, it was put aboutwould have to be something very special. Hewould live on an Air Ministry diet of steakand carrots, sleep at least ten hours a nightand be checked by a medical officer after eachlanding. Unfortunately, shortly after No. IIISquadron flying Gauntlet biplanes atN or th olt, b ega n to be e qu ip pe d in D ec em be r1937, an d No. 3 Squadron at Kenleyexchanged its Gladiator biplanes forHurricanes in March 1938, fatal accidents lentcredence to this e rr on eo us mystique. Th emain difficulties as the monoplane fighter wasintro du ce d were that after being nursedtowards squadron operational service byBulman, Lucas an d the Martlesham pilots, itwas gett ing i nto t he ha nds of comparativelyinexperienced young pilots in a rapidlyexpanding air force; an d also that Kenley wasto o small.

Squadron Leader J. W. Gillan, the 31-yearold son of an RA F padre commanding No.III Squadron - the nucleus of the Ai rFighting Development Establishment mastered the new type so that he could give

Hurricane I of No.3 Squadron based a t Biggin Hill shortly before the outbrea k of war.Aeroplane-Quadrant


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On a clear day - aircraft of No. 601 (County of London) Squadron patrol the patchwork quilt socharacteristic of rural England before post-war destruction of hedgerows changed the countryside.Imperial War Museum

his pilots all the help they needed. Gillantrained himself to be at one with theHurricane, much as a leading jockeyacquaints himself with a thoroughbred Derbyentry. On 10 February 1938, Gillan pu t manan d machine to a test which he intendedshould dispel any doubts about the Hurricaneamong his pilots an d those who would follow.Almost without notice he flew a round tripto Scotland. After flying to Turnhouse Edinbu rgh) against strong afternoonheadwinds Gillan made a quick turnround.At 17,000 feet with an 80 mph tailwind heraced for home, averaging 408.75 mph over327 miles. This feat was splashed in the-Press,the reports mostly ignored the tailwind.Jt ~a remarkable achievement for a Hurricane Iwith a two-bladed wooden propeller an dfabric-covered wings. Most significant wasthe manner in which the aircraft s Merlin.II,subjected to almost take-off boost from start

-. -. .

to finish, ha d withstood the punishment. Itwould be 18 months before the introductionof the constant speed propeller to allay suchstresses.The Hurricane won international acclaimand, of more consequence to Gillan, theconfidence of his young pilots. Gillan,henceforth known as Downwind , nanniedthem firmly, teaching them to come to termswith gravity an d blackouts when recoveringto o sharply from a dive, and drumming in thelesson of lowering the undercarriage beforelanding. Air Commodore Roy Dutton, then aPilot Officer an d who was to fight in the Battleof Britain and end the war with at least 19victories, remembers Gi llan s painstakingleadership. New pilots were told to makethree take-offs and landings withoutretracting the undercarriage an d with thecockpit open before the CO allowed themmore rem.


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HURRICANE

. . ~

A metal cov ered wing Mark I of 1940. Bri ish erospaceObviously opinions differed among pilotsflying the Hurricane fo r the first time but asits ease of handling became more an d more

apparent the stories that it required asuperman at the controls evaporated. Formerbiplane pilots did however find that they hadto get used to engine vibration an d noiseacceleration an d speed an d their sometimesdisconcerting effects. For instance Duttonexperienced the wing gun-bay panels partiallyfalling out and the wing fabric distending likesausages between the ribs . On the wholepilots agreed that the Hurricane was forgivingwhen things went wrong.No squadron could have been moredelighted to c on ve rt to the a ir cr af t than No.43 at Tangmere. While Chamberlainappeased Hitler its pilots ha d wondered justhow effective they could be as their gleamingsilver Furies were camouflaged in sand andspinach warpaint. They knew that they couldneither outpace Do 7 an d He I II bombersno r were their guns effective a bov e 15 000feet. Shortly after conversion they were badly

shaken however by the death of a SergeantPilot who gliding back to the airfield with afaulty engine dived headlong into theground. Although having plenty of height toland he turned too slowly an d the Hurricanefell ou t of his hands.

The future Gr oup Captain PeterTownsend then a young pilot of No. 43Squadron had recently exchanged his Furyfor a Hurricane when he found t heoccasional phenomenon known as surgingaccompanied by a sudden loss of powerparticularly disconcerting at night when withthe sudden loss of power the blue exhaustflames faded to an unnerving yellow .But overall the pilots verdict was a heartythumbs-up as expressed by Graham Leggetta former Hawker c om pa ny s tu de nt whonoted after his first flight at No.5 OperationalTraining Unit Aston Down There s much tolearn but already I know the Hurricane ssecret - superb manoeuvrability the qualityabove all others that is to make her a legend .


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hapterGoing to WarT he Hurricane inspired solid affection.Conditions as the Hurricane went to war inthe autumn and winter of 1939 exercised moremundane qualities than its manoeuvrabilityin com bat. French airfields available t o thefour squadrons of the Air Componentcovering arrival of the British ExpeditionaryForce required the aircraft to rough it.Camm s provision of a s tr on g broad-trackundercarriage enabled Nos 85 87 1 an d 73Squadrons to operate from poorly drainedfields. Subsequently Nos 1 an d 73 Squadronst ransferred t o becom e the fighter element ofthe Advanced Ai r S tr iking F or ce of

Air Marshal Sir Peter Wykeham.Blenheim an d Battle squadrons. The fighterstrength in France was reinforced later by Nos607 615 3 79 504 an d finally 5 Squadronsof Hurricanes. Considering that one yearafter Munich no more than 497 Hurricanesha d been delivered equipping 7V2 squadronswith the remainder in reserve an d that therewere only nine squadrons of Spitfires theHurricane squadrons of the Ai r Componentan d Advanced Air Striking Force representeda substantial commitment.If at the outset the Hurricane s fightingqualities were little exercised the aircraft s

Th e novelty of the monoplane fighter ea rly in the Se cond W or ld War is emp hasised b y the Gladiatorspresence at this December 1939 inspection of the A ir Component in F ra nc e by King G eorge VI.Hurricanes in th e foreg ro un d b elon g to No. 85 Squadron. Imperial r Museum


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HURRICANE

strong physique was hard tested. In theopening weeks of the Second World War itscampa ign serviceab il ity e stab li shed areputation, squadron pilots recognising itsruggedness and stamina as its chief assets.Some pilots in France said the Hurricane hadthe strength of a battleship . Pilots of No. 87Squadron at Lille Vendeville, a muddy, roundfield with draughty wooden huts, foundrefuge from the winter by sitting in theircockpits with the canopies closed.At home in these early weeks, in theabsence of enemy custom, the weather posedmore problems than the Luftwaffe. Accidentsincreased pilots confidence in the aircraft sstrength. On a pitch-black night in February1940, John Simpson of No. 4 Squadron,which had been moved from Tangmere in thesouth to Acklington near Newcastle in thenorth-east, had engine trouble. Too low tobale out and unable to lower the flaps he keptthe Hurricane straight and, as best he couldjudge, at 100 mph. He bounced offa haystack,losing half his propeller, sliced a telegraphpole and ploughed into a wood of larch trees.Although badly bruised, suffering a brokennose and cheekbone, Simpson wassufficiently mobile to inspect the wreckage inthe morning. Only the cockpit remainedintact amid 6 cut-down trees.

During the winter at home and in Francemany young pilots sensed that they werethemselves maturing and hardening as theydiscovered how much of a weather-beatingthe Hurricane could take. This wasparticularly so of squadrons such as No. 43which found the harsh north-east of Englanda discomforting contrast to Tangmere and thesoft south. Covering coastal convoys, oftenfrom a snowbound airfield, No. 43 flattenedand hardened the snow into a runway bytearing a door off the dispersal hut, sittingthree men on it, and towing the improvisedroller behind a tractor There was no snowplough.By this time some squadrons had flown theHurricane for almost two years andreasonably might have been expected toagitate for conversion to the Spitfire, nowbeing slowly introduced. However, neither4

tb e Spitfire s speed nor its more aestheticappearance could impair their loyalty. JohnSimpson of No. 4 Squadron confided in hisfriend, the author Hector Bolitho: We have,, hac;t :our Hurrybugs since December 1938, andwe still think they re the tops . A companionsquadron, No. 152, operating with Gladiatorssince the outbreak of war, was being reequipped with Spitfires when FlightLieutenant Peter Townsend and FlightLieutenant Caesar Hull were permitted to trythem out, looping and rolling in closeformation over the airfield. Simpsoncommented afterwards; Caesar and Peterstill feel the same after their l ine-shooting in.the Spitfires It may well seem nonsense,bu t I wouldn t change over ifthey asked me . was as well that the Hurricane was theobject of so much esteem and affection. would be many months before the Spitfirewould be as readily available. Although theSpitfire s maiden flight had taken place atEastleigh in the hands of Mutt Summers, theVickers chief test pilot, on 4 March 1936, itsproduction had proved more troublesomethan that of the Hurricane. Each type hadbeen late in delivery, but constructionsimilarities between the Hurricane and theHawker biplanes had given the monoplanefighter the production edge over the Spitfire.Camm, recognising that availability wouldencourage orders, had taken the productionfactor into account in his design. Mitchell,breaking away from the aerodynamic practiceof the 1930s, had designed a wafer-thin, metalwing of low thickness-chord ratio in contrastto Camm s thick, and at that stage, fabriccovered wing. He knew that to gain AirMinistry acceptance the Spitfire would haveto offer a far better performance than itscompetitor. He had succeeded, but in the NewYear of 1940 Hurricane pilots could still echothe comment of a Group Captain comparingthe aircraft when they were at MartleshamHeath for acceptance trials. Looking at theSpitfire he said: There s a racehorse for you .Then, app roaching the hump-backedHurricane, he added: That s more like anaeroplane . Air Marshal Sir Peter Wykehamwas to take another view, writing: The


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GOING TO WAR

Hurricanes of No.3 Squadron cuckoo a Gladiator ou t of the nest at Kenley.RAF Museum

Hurricane inspired solid affection an drespect the Spitfire devotion .Over the next four years the Hurricanewould no t be short of heroes bu texpeditionary conditions of the winter of th e phoney war of 1939-1940 were no tconducive to producing them. Consequentlyit was an achievement fo r a young NewZealander Flying Officer Cobber Kain toearn recognition as the RAF s first Hurricaneace by shooting down five enemy aircraftincluding three Me 109s between November1939 an d March 1940. Such exploits againstthe 9 an d other successes against the Me heartened pilots and public alike althoughth e public were no t aware of the problemsbeing encountered by Hurrica ne pilots . Onedeficiency discovered in this period was theabsence of armour to prot ect a pilot s back.No. 1 Squadron experimented with armourplate from a Fairey Battle with the eventualresult that Hurr icanes were fitted With it.Another s nag was that Browning g l n s ~ ~ rjamming because ammunition some otwhichhad been stored fo r 30 years haddeteriorated. Beyond the need >for

modifications revealed by operationalexperience peacetime formation practiceswere found to be far too rigid. Rolan dBeamont of No . 87 Squadron has recalledgetting clobbered badly in the process ofsailing into battle with the immaculateformations of before t he wa r .

On 9 April 1940 after occupying DenmarkGermany invaded Norway. A ngl o-F re nc han d Polish forces went to the ai d of Norway.Neville Cha mb erla in who wou ld no t bereplaced by Winston Churchill as PrimeMinister until the invasion of the LowCountries on May hoped to avert Germanaccess t o the North Atlantic an d counter thethreat of enemy naval an d air bases inS ca nd in av ia to Brita in s eas t an d north-eastcoastline. Moreover the n or th er n p or t ofNarvik provided year-round facilities free ofice for exporting rail-freighted Swedish irono re for the German armaments industry. Butif Allied efforts were to hold any.credencethen in the absence of a long-range fightermonoplane fighters must reach Norway fast.In practice this meant Hurricanes.

From the start the absence of Hurricanes25


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HURRICANE

Hurricanes of No. 73 Squadron over France during the period of the phoney war .Imperial War Museum

was reflected in swift enemy success assuredb y air s up er io ri ty . Courageous attempts top ro vide cover by biplanes from the carriersr Royal an d Glorious were inadequate an dthe fate of 8 Gladiator biplanes of No. 263Squadron flown ash or e f ro m Glorious on 24April underlined the urgent need forHurricanes. No t one Gladiator survived morethan 7 hours at the RAF squadron soperational base the ice of Lake Lesjaskognear Aandalsnes. They were destroyed on theground . Expeditionary troops in CentralNorway were evacuated.Although No. 263 S qu ad ro n h ad lost itsaircraft the pilots ha d returned home by sea. M ay f ou nd them flying t heir r ep lacement

26

Gladiators ashore from the carrier Furiouswas abortive. Tw o aircraft followed a guidingSwordfish into a mountainside an d theremainder returned to the carrier. The nextda y the squadron succeeded in establishingitself at Bardufoss.T he bi pl an es fo r all their obsolescencewere to put up a magnificent performancebu t the n eed r emai ned fo r Hur ri canes. As ithappened No. 46 Squadron had embarked itsHurricanes with No. 263 s Gladiators inFurious only to sail home with the ca rrierbecause their base at Skaanland was not readyto receive them. However by 6 May they ha dreturned to Norway after being transferredfrom Furious to Glorious Because t hr ee


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OIN TO W R

Hurricanes of No. 306 Squadron demonstrate the difficulties of operating at Turnhouse in Scotlandduring the winter of 1940 1941.R FMw eum

Hurricanes ha d nosed over in the softconditions at Skaanland No. 46 wasdespatched to join No. 263 at Bardufoss.Although the Hurricane would later establishitself as a carrier borne fighter the decision toferry No. 46 Squadron in uriousan d loriouswas an innovation. The RA F pilots had noexperience of deck landing an d take off no rwere their aircraft fitted with arrester hooksfor landing. When the aircraft weretransferred from urious to lorious for thereturn passage to northern Norway they werehoisted laboriously in an d ou t of lighters.

The Hurricanes put immediate heart intothe troops landing on 7 May at Narvik.Morale lifted as No. 46 Squadron circledoverhead an d immediately the expeditionseemed more feasible. No t that the 5remaining Hurricanes were destined to covera prolonged stay. Defeat in France ordained asecond withdrawal from Norway.Between 3 June and 8 June most of theHurricane an d Gladiator squadrons effortswere devoted to covering the evacuation. Thefighters were given a hard time because by 2

June the Luftwaffe much reinforced wasRoughing it on farmland Hurricanes withstood the rigours of unsatisfactory airfields in France thanksto the sturdiness of Camm s construction.

27


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concentrating bomber and dive-bomberattacks on shipping, covered by Me 110fighters. But the Hurricanes had enabledcomplerion of the vital demolition of portfacilities at Narvik. It would be the New Yearof 1941 before Germany could resumeshipment of iron ore from that source.After the evacuation there was the puzzle ofwhat to do with the surviving ten Hurricanes.Their pilots could be embarked, but not theiraircraft. The Gladiators, despite the absenceof arrester hooks, with their low speed, couldreasonably be expected to land on GloriousConsequently No. 46 Squadron was orderedto fight on and then destroy its aircraft. ButSquadron Leader Kenneth Bing Cross couldnot bring himself to supervise theirdestruction. The only alternative was toattempt to land on Glorious Any Hurricanethat failed would probably be destroyed.Cross borrowed a Gladiator, flew out to thecarrier and persuaded her reluctant CaptainG. d Oyly Hughes that he could devise amethod of halting the Hurricanes on deckwithout arrester hooks. In the event sandbagswere secured below the tail surface of eachfuselage. The modification may not have hadthe finesse of a design detail in Camm sKingston office, but it worked. ThreeHurricanes, sent ahead under FlightLieutenant P. Jameson, a New Zealander, totest the scheme on the evening of 7 June,landed safely. At Bardufoss Cross awaitedconfirmation. did not arrive. Neverthelesshe decided to lead his seven Hurricanes out tosea in the early hours of 8 June. Each landedwithout mishap. That afternoon Glorious fellin with the battle-cruisers Scharnhorst andGneisenau She was sunk with 1,100 men andthe Hurricanes. Two pilots survived. Theywere Squadron Leader Cross and FlightLieutenant Jameson, rescued by a Norwegianfishing boat after three days on a Carley float.Loss of Hurricanes in support of theNorwegian expedition would have beenserious at any time. In the wake of thelightning German advance on the Channelports and Paris, it was disastrous. In France,since the 1 May invasion of Holland,Belgium and Luxembourg, and the28

CDnsequent turning of the Maginot Line, tenHurricane squadrons , falling back onimprovised landing strips and reinforced on13 May by 32 Hurricanes from home, had

fougbt as best they could against great odds.While the dwindling numbe rs ofHurricanes were dividing their presencebetween covering the retreat of the BritishExpeditionary Force to the Channel ports

and the defence of Paris, a somewhat differentconflict was developing between FighterCommand headquarters at Bentley Prioryand 1 Downing Street. Dowding knew that ifHurricane losses continued to be sustained inFrance there would be too few left to defendBritain.

On 13 May, by which day the RAF had lostmore than 200 Hurricanes in support of theBEF and the French army, he was obliged bythe War Cabinet to send 32 more. Dowding,who already regarded France as a lost cause,now took the bold and unusual of seekingto put his case to the Cabinet. He felt he couldnot rely on support f rom his Service andpolitical colleagues at the Air Ministry for hisdetermination to keep the Hurricanes athome. Dowding was to recall that on 15 May,before leaving headquarters for Whitehall, hehad drawn a simple graph of the heavy fighterlosses. In the Cabinet room he got up from hisseat at the table, walked to Churchill s placeand laid it before him. He said: f the presentrate of wastage continues for anotherfortnight we shall not have a singleHurricaneleft in France or in this country . LordBeaverbrook, who was not present, alsoenjoyed repeating this account of the 15 MayCabinet meeting. Oddly, as John Terrainewrites in The Right the Line no suchintervention appears in the minutes.There can be no doubt Dowding saidsomething very effective on the case forkeeping Hurricanes at home, bu t the storymay have improved over the years. Nomatter, Dowding was rewarded with aCabinet decision in his favour, but the verynext day Churchill reversed it and he wasordered to send four more Hurricanesquadrons to France. Dowding now wrote aformal letter, addressing it to Captain Harold


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Balfour, the Under-Secretary of State at theAi r Ministry.

He stated: I must point ou t that within thelast few days the equivalent of ten squadronshave been sent to France that the Hurricanesquadrons in this country are seriouslydepleted, an d that the more squadrons whichare sent to France the higher will be thewastage an d the more insistent the demandsfor reinforcements .After reminding the Air Council tha t thelast estimate which they made as to the forcenecessary to defend this country was 52squadrons and my strength has now beenreduced to the equivalent of36 squadrons heemphasised that the new circumstances hadvery much extended the line to be defended a tthe same time as ou r resources are reduced .He concluded: I believe that if anadequate fighter force is kept in this country,if the fleet remains in being, an d if HomeForces ar e suitably organised to resistinvasion, we should be able to carryon thewar single-handed for some time, in no tindefinitely. But ifthe Home Defence Force isdrained away in desperate attempts to remedythe situation in France, defeat in France willinvolve the final, complete an d irremediabledefeat of this country . This documentresulted in the conservation of enoughHurricanes to tide over Fighter Commandan d keep Britain in the war.While Dowding shamefully unsupportedin the Cabinet room by Sir Cyril Newall, thatvery same Chief of the Air Staffwho had putbombers before fighters in the crucial late1930s, h ad b att le d to hoard his Hurricanes,numerous d ram as beset the doomedsquadrons. Of these, possibly the oddestconcerned Louis Strange, the much decoratedformer Lieutenant-Colonel an d WingCommander of the First World War who,aged 49, ha d rejoined as Pilot Officer, thelowest commissioned rank in the RAF.Demanding to fly, he was ordered a test in aTiger Moth. By a coincidence t r n g ~ ha dsigned th e instructor s father s


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A Hurricane of No. 46 Squadron being hoisted inboard f ro m a lighte r for t ransport to Norway.RAF Museumas Prime Minister as recently as 1 May.Franc e was Brita in s Ally and beyond thatthe Fren ch were a p eo ple to whom Churchillfelt emotionally attached. The Hurricanes bynow about 30 paid the price fighting indefence of Paris between 16 May and 2 Junefrom airfields south-east of the capital. Amidmuch remarkable air fighting an action on 27May by No. 5 1 Squadron stands out. Flyingfrom a strip at Boos near Rouen 13Hurrica ne s e nc ou ntered 24 He Ills and 20Me 1lOs destroying at least 11 bombers. Butthe Hurricanes days in France werenumbered. On 3 June the tattered AdvancedAir Striking Force of Hurricanes Blenheims

3

Gladiators and Lysanders - most of itsBattles had been lost a tt em pt in g to stem theGerman offensive at th e out se t or on theground - withdrew to six strips south-west ofParis. By 15 June the remaining Hurricanesmoved to cover the closing stages of theBritish evacuation. In all Fighter Commandhad lost 477 aircraft in the May and JuneBattle of France. Of them 386 wereHurricanes.

Among the casualties was Cobber Kain thefirst Hurrica ne ace. Cre dite d with 17 enemyaircraft destroyed he killed himself in afarewell beat-up of his airfield.


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hapterMost the fewT he Hurricane was great and we proved itOn 8 June Winston Churchill, addressingth e House of C om mo ns a nd that eveningbroadcasting to the nation said: WhatGeneral Weygand called the Battle of Franceis over. I expect th e Battle of Britain is aboutto begin . History demands dates. W he n t hetime came to honour aircrew, those whoserved in operational fighter squadronsbetween July an d 3 October 1940 werepr ivileged to w ea r a B attle of Britain rose giltemblem on the ribbon of the 1939-1945 Star.

On the very first da y of the Battle of Britainan action took place which typified thenumerical disadvantage at which th eHurricane was to find itself throughout thesummer an d autumn of 1940. At 1.40 p.m. on July six Hurricanes of No. 32 Squadronapproaching their patrol line 10,000 feetabove a convoy of f Dover flew into a raincloud. Th e flight split into two sections.Emerging, Green section, Flying Officer J. BW. Humpherson Sergeant L. Pearce an dSub-Lieutenant A ) G. G. R. Bulmer, on loanfrom the Fleet Ai r Arm, saw the enemy.Waves of enemy bombers coming from thedirection of France in boxes of six , Bulmerreported. In fact the enemy comprised amixed force of Me 109s, Os and Do 17s. Ast he first three Hurricanes engaged, 20 moref ighters f ro m No s an d 56 Hurricanesquadrons an d Nos 64 an d 74 Spitfiresquadrons were on the w ay to support them.When the Spitfires arrived over the convoytheir pilots saw that enemy bombers an dfighters ha d spiralled into three- layers,creating a cylinder over th e target, ; 9s atop110s in th e middle an d Do 7 bombersoelow.Among th e reinforcements were .eightSpitfires of No. 74 Squadron. Climbing to13,000 feet, 1,000 feet above the guardian

Group Captain Peter Townsend.109s, th e Spitfires dived into the cylinder. Theconvoy sailed on after losing on e small ship.The Luftwaffe lost four fighters to the RAF sthree Hurricanes one of which had rammed abomber. Despi te t hei r losses t he Hurricanesquadrons d er ive d s om e c on so la tion in thatthe e ng ag em en t c onf ir med t he Hurricane sabi lity to deal with t he Me 110, whose pilotsh ad s ou gh t refuge in a defensive circle. Thiswas, however, about the only solace on a daywhich p ro du ce d f ur th er evidence of thedifficulties that lay ahead for Hurr icanesquadrons an d the air defences.Ai r Vice-Marshal Keith Park the NewZealand Scot wh o commanded No. Groupdefending the vulnerable invasion corner ofsouth-east England and who visited his sectors ta tion s in his personal Hurricane could notkn ow , as a ny plot b uilt u p, w he th er it was thebeginning of the enemy s big throw; possiblythe preliminary to invasion. On this July day,as on following da ys he respondedc au tiou sly. A total of 200 Hurricanes an dSpitfires, about one-third of Britain s firstline fighters, were under his command: 3squadrons of Hurricanes an d six squadrons ofSpitfires. In the west of England, north ofLondon in the north of England andS cot la nd respectively, Nos 10, 2 an d 3Groups mustered 6 single-seater monoplanefighter squadrons of which four Hurricanesquadrons were forming or re-equipping. Forthe rest, Fighter Comm and s O rder of Battlecomprised six Blenheim squadrons twosquadrons of the power-turreted Defiant an done flight of Gladiator biplanes - in all some60 0 serviceable fighters of varyingperformance of which the majority wereHurricanes. Of an authorised FighterCommand establishment of 1,450 pilots only

3


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1,253 fighter pilots were available, more than5 of whom were on loan from the Fleet AirArm.Park, as he visited the sector stations, flyinghis personal Hurricane, knew that a mistakeon his part could lose the war, that No. Group must stay in the fight until moreHurricanes, which in the foreseeable futurewould cont inue to outnumber the Spitfires,were available. Hence his caution incommitting so few of his precious Hurricanes.Both Dowding at Fighter Command sStanmore headquarters and Park atUxbridge, conscious of the loss of 5 fightersin the past seven days, were guided by theparamount need to husband Spitfires.Hurricanes were no more expendable, bu tthere were more of them an d they could be themore readily replaced. By 1 September therewould be 4V Hurricane to 9 Spitfiresquadrons; evidence that even allowing forthe heavy fighting in August, productionreserves and repair of the Hurricane allowednew squadrons to be formed. Spitfireproduction was stretched to meet losses an dmaintain 9 squadrons.Determined to conserve their fighters,Dowding and Park recognised that radarstations, fighter airfields, aircraft factoriesbuilding Hurricanes and Spitfires, an dLondon itself, were now vulnerable tobombers based across th e Channel.Moreover, enemy fighters were capable ofescorting the bombers to their objectives an dback although this would leave little marginfor the Me 109s over London.

Just as he had prevented the nightmarepossibility of sacrificing the defence ofBritain, hoarding an d cossetting the Spitfireat the expense of the Hurricane when Francewas falling, Dowding acted now to avoidlosses over the Channel in defence o fconvoys.He warned the Navy that convoys might haveto fend for themselves.While the sun was still rising on the secondday of the battle Fighter Command was facedwith this problem. Six Hurricanes of No. 5Squadron in Park s most westerly sector,Middle Wallop, were scrambled with sixSpitfires of No. 609 Squadron. Ten Ju 8732

S t u b dive-bombers an d 2 Me 109s wereh ~ i n g in from the Cherbourg area. Th eHuITicanes engaged the 109s an d on eHUI::ricfine was shot down. The Spitfires, trlvillg-afterwards, lost two to the 109s, bu tthe ~ o n v o y sailed on without loss.Only two days into the battle an d Park sparsimony, blessed of course by Dowding,was already bewildering pilots whosek n o w l e d g e o f th e s tu t on wasunderstandably limited to squadron andsector. Hurricanes an d Spitfires, togetherwith their pilots, were being lost againstim possible o dds. There were furtherengagements in the afternoon of this second

bu t it is no t the purpose here to tell thestory of the Battle of Britain, da y by day,phase by phase. Rather to follow the fortunesof the Hurricane an d its pilots in relation tothe development of the battle - an d to itspartner the Spitfire.In the folklore of the Battle of Britain theHurricane an d Spitfire ar e indivisible. Eventoday in the Battle of Britain Memorial FlightHurricane and Spitfire ar e tenderlymaintained for annual exhibition duets in thesummer a nd a ut um n season of ai r displays.Theirs is a partnership as inseparable inpublic remembrance as were their showbusiness contemporaries Flanagan and Allenor in a cricket context, Compton and Edrich.But that is as far as the analogy goes, becausethe basic roles of the Hurricane an d Spitfirewere disparate and dictated by theirrespective performance an d availability.Each was a star in its own right, wherepossible th e Hurricane attacking th ebombers, dive-bombers an d Me twine ng in ed f igh te rs; th e faster betterperformance-a t-al ti tude Sp i tfire pittedpreferably against the high-flying Me 109escorts. Of course, amid the confusion ofbattle an d as the pressures mounted in Augustan d September, demarcation could never beas neat as that. Frequently the Hurricane ha dto be committed by ground controllers,regardless of such copybook considerations,or by pilots according to the circumstances inwhich they found themselves.

Somewha t perversely the general


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Cramped conditions on a 1940 production line but a sight to rejoice Lord Beaverbrook. Flightinferiority on paper of the Hurr icane to theSpitfire as an opponent of the Me 109enhanced its pilots chances. Even before theopening of the Battle of Britain the Luftwaffetended to under-estimate the Hawker fighteran d suffered in consequence. As early as theSpring of 1940 Flight Lieutenant PeterTownsend of No. 43 Squadron defending thenaval base at S capa F low identified thisSpitfire snobbery as he termed it.Aftershooting down a Heinkel III he r e t ~ r r i ~ f ohis airfield to find that another HeinkeI;afterbeing crippled by a fellow Hurricane pilotha d crash-landed there. On ditching asbelieved the German crew took of f their

boots threw ou t a dinghy an d dived after it.Townsend whose Hurricane ha d been badlydamaged learned later that the Heinkel crewwho thought they were in the sea insisted theyh ad been attacked by a Spitfire.German fighter pilots repeatedly claimedthey ha d been in combat with Spitfires afterfalling victims to the Hurricane s

manoeuvrability. The ultimate for aLuftwaffe fighter pilot was to claim a Spitfireshot down. Helmuth Wieck a pupil of MajorWernher Daddy Molders in the SpanishCivil War an d who by November 1940 washimself a 25-year-old Major boasted: I n thefirst great air b attle o ver the Channel I shot33


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down three Spitfires af ter bit ter fighting .Heinz Knoke, author of I f lew r the Fuhrerconfided in his diary: Achtung SpitfireGerman pilots have learned to pay particularattention when they hear this warning shoutin their aeroplanes . Achtung - Hurricane- there is a faintly ridiculous ring about it,and yet there were many many moreHurricanes than Spitfires in the Battle ofBritain. Major Adolf Galland later General,touched the heights of adulation of theSpitfire at the expense of the Hurricane whenin the summer of 1940 he urged HermannGoering: Give me on e wing of Spitfires an dwe ll finish this job . Later Galland scoffed:The Hurricane was hopeless a niceaeroplane to s hoot down .But many Battle of Britain pilots werenever in an y doubt about the wrongheadedness of such contempt for theHurricane, resulting as it so often did from theself-aggrandisement obtainable throughSpitfire snobbery. Peter Townsend hasrecalled in Duel Eagles . We ourselvesthought the Hurricane was great an d weproved it . He quotes the Air Ministry insupport: T he total number of enemy aircraftbrought down by the single-seat fighters wasin the proportion of three by Hurricanes totwo by Spitfires. Th e average proportion

serviceable each morning wa sapproximately 63 pe r cent Hurricanes an d 37per cent Spitfires. In p r o p o r t i o n Spitfires b ro ugh t down six pe r centmore than the Hurricane . As Townsendcomments: This was no reason for theHurricanes to blush, considering they wereslower than the Me 109 an d Spitfire .Indisputably the Hurricane s record in theBattle of Britain rebuts the assertion of FieldMarshal Kesselring, commander of Ai r Fleet2 that only the Spitfires worried us .In all the discussion since the battle on thecomparative merits of the two fighters, someof the more generous tributes to theHurricanes s role have come from Spitfirepilots. Jeffrey Quill, the Vickers test pilot whohad shared the early flying of the Spitfire withJ. Mutt Summers after Summers maidenflight on 5 March 1936, ison record as saying:34

t took both of these great aeroplanes to winthe battle . Quill, who as a 34-year-oldRef> \;rve Regular Air Force officer took leavefrom Vickers t o pu t in a spot of practical inJh{}>:anle with No. 65, a Spitfire squadron is

c o n ~ i i c e d that neither aircraft would havewon the bat tle on its own.Camm sacrificing performance in the

Hurricane for ease of handling, speed ofp ro du ct io n a nd simplicity of maintenance,had assured the Spitfire s greater fame inposterity, an d yet in combat Quill believed,the edge was marginal. Comparing theprototypes, his opinion is that Camm sHurricane with a very thick wing, fabriccovering an d a humped-back fuselage an d thesame power, performed remarkably inrelat ion to R J. Mitchell s Spitfire with itsmetal-skinned thin wing of an unusually lowthickness/chord ratio in defiance of allcontemporary aerodynamic design. Quill sverdict after fighting in the battle: T heHurricane an d Spitfire ideally complementedeach other .

Extraordinarily however during thesummer of 1940 there was on e particularaircraft which looked like a Hurricane, was aHurricane, b ut p er fo rm ed like a Spitfire.Elegantly monogrammed H. B. , the initialsof its owner Har ry Broadhurs t it waspowered ahead of its Mark I contemporariesby the very latest two-stage superchargedMerlin XX which the recently promotedWing Commander had charmed ou t of RollsRoyce. Even more unusual, the aircraft reallywas Broadhurst s very own private Hurricanefor a while.Air Chief Marshal Sir Harry Broadhursttells the story: O n 19 May 1940 when I wascommanding 6 Wing in France I receivedorders to prepare to evacuate the wing back tothe UK. That evening the wing moved toMerville where was joined by the aircraft ofanother wing - both had been welldecimated by then. then received detailedinstructions for the evacuation, which werethat should retain a minimum number ofairmen to enable me to continue to operatewhilst the remainder were to be sent of f byroad to one of the ports in NW France under


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the command of Wing Commander Finchwho had been the commander of the otherwing. The arrangements then were thatsufficient transport aircraft would arrive at1800 hours on 20 May to pick up theremaining airmen as quickly as possible,whilst the Hurricanes would circle overheadto protect the airfield and then escort thetransports back to England.All went to schedule except that I left myHurricane ticking over in a corner of theairfield whilst I supervised the loading of thetransports intending to take off and join theparty for the trip home. Unfortunately when Igot back to my Hurricane I became involved

MOST OF THE FEW

in a slight argument with some Army officerswho wanted a lift back to England. By thetime I took off I was alone in the sky and a ripetarget for four Me IlOs who intercepted me enroute. When I had shaken them off myHurricane was very badly shot up, but Imanaged to struggle back to the UK. I landedat Northolt because I knew everybody therehaving been stationed there with Squadron before my promotion to WingCommander. The next day I had to repor t tothe C-in-C Fighter Command Dowding) totell him all about the ai r fighting in France. Iwas then sent on a tour ofall the squadrons inFighter Command to lecture them on my

Leader of the Few Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding was bowler-hatted after the Battle of Britainduring which he was acutely conscious that the majority of his pilots flew the Hurricane. On 4September 1941, he was reunited with some of them. Although Spitf ire pilots are included in thiscompany readers will recognise the names of some pilots who figure in this account, among themWing Commander Ian Gleed and Wing Commander Max Aitken.Pictured from left to right are: S/Ldr. A. e. Bartley, D.F.C.; W Cdr D. F. B. Sheen, D.F.e.; W CdrR. Gleed. D.S.G., D.F.C.; W Cdr Max Aitken, D.S.O., D.F.e.; W Cdr A. G. Mal

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