Hi, my name's Kevin Hicks, welcome to my YouTube channel The History Squad.
Now today's film is about the Battle of Britain, 15th of September 1940,
and we're broadcasting or filming if you like, from the Saskatoon Museum of Military Artifacts
over here in Canada. I thought it a bit poignant as it's the Royal Canadian Air Force section yeah,
so the Battle of Britain. Battle of Britain day we knew it as, 15th of September. When I
was a youngster and there were RAF veterans and cadets and that kind of thing on the streets of
Britain selling little wings, little paper pilot wings of the RAF, it was the Royal Air
Force Association and their Wings Appeal, raising money for veterans that kind of
stuff. We all used to put these on and run around playing at airplanes. It was just the other day,
uh I came across something about the Battle of Britain day, 15th of September and I thought
nobody does it now. Nobody remembers do they? And I thought what a shame, it was really big when
I was a kid you know and the family always…. you know about the Britain day. So Battle of Britain.
What does it mean really? Well if you look at what had happened to the Brits at the beginning
of the war, we'd been uh beaten. We fought hard and we’d lost. Our troops withdrew at Dunkirk
and if the Germans had followed us over it would have been horrendous. The only
division of soldiers we had in England that were fit and ready to fight were the Canadians, thank
goodness for those. But the Germans from what I've learned, they weren't going to follow us.
There was lots of lots of stuff going on and I've come across like plans from the Wehrmacht,
the German army, they were going to send 40 divisions of troops. They were going
to attack down in Devon, come around the seven Estuary, all the way down the Isle of Wight then
down the Thames, cut off London. And then the Navy said we don't have enough ships and then,
okay we'll do nine divisions and two Airborne divisions and uh that's 200000
troops. And then the Luftwaffe, the Air Force says we can't guarantee air cover for, for that.
Meanwhile Hitler is celebrating that famous dance he did in Paris, about the defeat of the allies
and the Battle of Britain begins kind of half cocked, as we would say. They attacked the
convoy system coming along the channel. Dover, the Straits of Dover. Hell Fire Corner they called it,
and there's some fantastic footage that you can see online actually from the
Imperial War Museum about the Stuka dive bombers attacking these ships.
The British were in dire straits at this time. We were trying to retrain our army,
trying to re-equip our army and our air force had lost half its strength in the fight for France.
And as Churchill says, you know, “the battle for France is over, now begins a battle for Britain”
Everybody believed that the Germans were going to come. The operation was called Operation Sea
Lion and they did prepare, they did have landing craft but the army didn't agree with the navy,
who didn't agree with the air force and I, I watched an interview with Adolf Galland,
one of the Luftwaffe aces of the war, probably the most famous Luftwaffe ace and he was asked
directly, this is way back in the 1960s. Were you prepared for Operation Sea Lion’ And he laughed,
he said it was ridiculous. We weren't trained to fight an air war over England and he says
we had two squadrons that were actually earmarked to go and fly from England.
We never thought it would be successful. That's from the mouths of the Germans.
Still they launch it, and what they're going to do, is they're going to take out the RAF.
They're gonna blow the airfields to pieces and they start, and the casualties mount.
In fact the casualty figures are quite incredible. I'm not going to go through them
we'll show you them at the end on screen because there's just so many that they almost brought
the British to their knees so the attacks on the RAF airfields in Britain uh by the Luftwaffe,
the German air force, came to a peak last week of August first week of September. This is 1940
don't forget. The RAF they'd lost 103 Pilots killed in action, 128 seriously injured now
these aren't specifically British Pilots because this was British and the Commonwealth right,
and other volunteers too. Six airfields were out of action and 500 planes have been destroyed.
Fighter Command, RAF Fighter Command was on its knees. And then on the 7th September, the Germans
changed tactics. They were actually winning, and then they changed tactics and they bomb London.
They start the Blitz and it costs Londoners hell, but it gives Fighter Commander respite, it gives
the RAF chance to regroup, and the whole thing really comes to a head on what we call Battle of
Britain day, the 15th of September. The Germans, they're going to bomb London they did two raids I
understand, they weren't expecting any opposition. But the RAF got their big wing together. They shot
down 56 German planes for the loss for 29 of their own. It was the apex, they say on the 15th
that the RAF won the Battle of Britain. It was a terrible cost for both sides. When I was a kid I
used to cycle up to a place called Cannock Chase, a big desolate piece of land in Staffordshire,
in England, and look at the First World War British cemetery and behind it was a German War
Cemetery. Some First World War but the majority over 2,000 were Second World War casualties,
a good chunk of them German air crew and pilots and that from the Battle of Britain. I’ve never
forgotten that gray cemetery, hardly anybody ever visited it. We just used to go and play around,
but then it all fades from memory doesn't it? It's easy to forget you know, Second World War,
you know it's all fading isn't it? Well I had an experience, I was giving a talk at an old age
pensioner’s, an old folks home, all ladies and they'd asked if I could do a history talk and
I said I'm not going to do First or Second World War just in case one of the elderly ladies there
had been alive at the time. I said we'll do the Battle of Waterloo, how's that? And they floated
that with the ladies. Yeah that'll be great, and Kevin turns up with his musket and red coat and we
do the Battle of Waterloo. Now these ladies there must have been 20 or 30 of them in this little
hall there, but in the corner was one slumped over. A real old lady, wasn't snoring, wasn't
breathing, OMG she's dead. So I thought, when towards the end when we were just having a chat
the old lady puts up her hand. Everybody else goes quiet. Reverence there.
So I go over, and this lady was quite an age. She was slumped there, didn't open her eyes properly,
just flipped them open a little bit and I put my ear next to her mouth.
My husband was in a war. I said oh really I says, which war was he in? Oh he was in the last war,
the Second World War you call it. I said oh right. I said what did he do?
He was a fighter pilot in the RAF. He flew Spitfires. I said wow!
He was 19 when he was shot down and killed. I was pregnant with my daughter.
Do you know I never remarried. And her eyes opened and looked right into my, she says because I loved
him. Then she went back to sleep. That's it isn't it, that's the cost, the price of war.
Well I hope you enjoyed that little video of mine the reason I wanted to
shoot it is to illustrate how easy it is to forget. We have the poppy day don't we,
on 11th November. Other parts of the war are forgotten and yet those men and women too lay
down their lives for the freedom that we enjoy now. Lest we forget. Anyway enough of that,
if you enjoyed the film, like, share and subscribe and don't forget turn on the notifications button
so that you know what's coming down the line. But before I go, a mention to two of my patrons there
Christopher Varner and Jeremiah, hey guys thank you very much. But for now bye-bye.