brussels, northern france & south england · the peenemünde army research center favoured...

BRUSSELS, NORTHERN FRANCE & SOUTH ENGLAND

1. Day

A. Royal museum of the Armed Forces and Military History, Brussels, Belgium

B. La Coupole, France

C. Pas De Calais, France

RoyalMuseumoftheArmedForcesandMilitaryHistory

Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and Military History

Documentation Centre

Jubelpark, 3

1000 Brussels

The Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and Military History (French: Musée Royal de l’Armée et d’Histoire

Militaire, Dutch: Koninklijk Museum van het Leger en de Krijgsgeschiedenis, often abbreviated to KLM-MRA) is a

military museum that occupies the two northernmost halls of the historic complex in Cinquantenaire Park in

Brussels, Belgium.

History

At the Brussels exhibition of 1910, a section on military history was presented to the public and met with great

success.Given the enthusiasm of the population, the authorities created a military museum within the international

context of extreme tension which led to the Great War.[clarification needed] The museum was originally installed

on the site of the Abbaye de la Cambre and moved to the Cinquantenaire Park in 1923.

The building

In 1875, the Belgian architect Gédéon Bordiau made a proposal to build flats on the site of a former parade ground

of the Garde Civique. The location was named "Cinquantenaire" (literally "50th anniversary") because it was

planned to celebrate the half-century since the independence of Belgium in 1830 as an exhibition space.

Temporary structures were erected on the site for the World Fair of 1897 as Bordiau's work had not been

finished.[1] The construction of buildings was put on hold in 1890 for lack of funds and was eventually stopped by

the death of the architect in 1904. Work resumed the following year under the direction of French architect Charles

Girault and was completed with a new patron, King Leopold II. The triumphal arch that had already been planned

was amended and expanded to meet the wishes of the King.

The park is set on the continuation of the Rue de la Loi which starts at the end of the Brussels Park before the

royal palace. A fire destroyed the south wing of the building in 1946.

Collection

The North Hall hosts the permanent aviation exhibition.

The collection originally consisted of a set of exhibits collected by an officer, Louis Leconte.[citation needed]

Approximately 900 pieces were brought together, the collection was later heavily enriched by legacies, gifts and

exchanges. Leconte was particular in choosing from equipment abandoned by the Germans in 1918.

Today, it is possible to find uniforms, weapons, vehicles and military equipment of a number of periods and

countries there.

Important developments include:

• 1980 — opening of the armour section

• 1986 — armour collection moved from the northernmost hall

• 1996 — opening of the marine section

Aviation hall

The north wing, built by Gideon Bordiau, has been occupied by the aviation hall since 1972 when the Air and

Space gallery was inaugurated.[citation needed]

The collection includes various types of aircraft, both military and civilian, some dating back to the early twentieth

century, while the most recent additions include a F-16 Fighting Falcon andWestland Sea King. The collection is

one of the largest in the world.

Gallery

Opening Hours from Tuesday to Friday

September to June : 08.30 - 12.00 and 13.00 - 16.30

July to August : 08.30 - 11.50 and 13.00 - 16.00

Closed during weekends and on Mondays; also on public holidays, between Christmas and New Year and two

weeks in september (stock taking - the precise dates will be announced on the website)

For information about the documentation centre and its collections (archives, library, maps and plans, drawings

and graphic art, photographs etc.):

Tel. : 02/737 79 34 – 31

[email protected]

Fax: 02/737 78 02 - 02/737 79 32

LaCoupole

La Coupole

Bauvorhaben 21

Schotterwerk Nordwest

Coupole d'Helfaut

close to Wizernes & Helfaut, Nord-Pas-de-Calais,France

View of the dome of La Coupole

Site history

Built October 1943 – July 1944

Built by Organisation Todt

In use Never completed

Materials Concrete

Battles/wars 1944: Operation Crossbow campaign

Events September 1944: Captured by Allies

May 1997: Reopened as a museum

La Coupole (English: The Dome), also known as the Coupole d'Helfaut-Wizernes and

originally codenamed Bauvorhaben 21(Building Project 21) or Schotterwerk Nordwest (Northwest Gravel

Works),[3] is a Second World War bunker complex in the Pas-de-Calais department of northern France, about 5

kilometres (3.1 mi) from Saint-Omer, and some 14.4 kilometers (8.9 miles) south-southeast from the less

developed Blockhaus d'Eperlecques V-2 launch installation in the same area. It was built by the forces of Nazi

Germany between 1943 and 1944 to serve as a launch base for V-2 rockets directed against London and southern

England, and is the earliest known precursor to modern underground missile silos still in existence.

Constructed in the side of a disused chalk quarry, the most prominent feature of the complex is an immense

concrete dome, to which its modern name refers. It was built above a network of tunnels housing storage areas,

launch facilities and crew quarters. The facility was designed to store a large stockpile of V-2s, warheads and fuel

and was intended to launch V-2s on an industrial scale. Dozens of missiles a day were to be fuelled, prepared and

launched in rapid sequence against London and southern England.

Following repeated heavy bombing by Allied forces during Operation Crossbow, the Germans were unable to

complete the construction works and the complex never entered service. It was captured by the Allies in

September 1944, partially demolished on the orders of Winston Churchill to prevent its reuse as a military base,

and then abandoned. It remained derelict until the mid-1990s. In 1997 it opened to the public for the first time, as

a museum. Exhibits in the tunnels and under the dome tell the story of the German occupation of France during

World War II, the V-weapons and the history of space exploration.

Background

The V-2 rocket was one of several innovative long-range weapons developed by the Germans after the failure of

the Luftwaffe to strike a decisive blow against Britain. It was a revolutionary weapon – the world's first

operational SRBM – that had been developed in a secret programme begun in 1936. The German leadership

hoped that a barrage of rockets unleashed against London would force Britain out of the war. Although Adolf

Hitler was at first ambivalent, he eventually became an enthusiastic supporter of the V-2 programme as Allied air

forces carried out increasingly devastating attacks on German cities.

The 12.5-ton missile, standing 14 metres (46 ft) high on its launch pad, was fuelled primarily by liquid oxygen (LOX)

and methyl alcohol. Deploying the V-2 on a large scale required far more LOX than was available from existing

production sites in Germany and the occupied countries. New sources of LOX were required, situated close to the

missile launching sites to reduce as far as possible the loss of propellant through evaporation. The missile's

operational range of 320 kilometres (200 mi) meant that the launch sites had to be fairly close to the English

Channel or southern North Sea coasts, in northern France, Belgium or the western Netherlands.

Because of the complexity of the missile and the need for extensive testing prior to launch, the V-2's designers at

the Peenemünde Army Research Center favoured using heavily defended fixed sites where the missiles could be

stored, armed, and fuelled from an on-site LOX production plant before launching. But the German Army and the

V-2 project's head, Major-General Walter Dornberger, were concerned that the sites would be vulnerable to aerial

attack by the Allies. The Army's preferred option was to use Meillerwagens, mobile firing batteries, which presented

a much smaller target for the Allied air forces.

The Army was nonetheless overruled by Hitler, who had a long-standing preference for huge, grandiose

constructions. He preferred fixed installations along the lines of the virtually impregnable U-boat pens that had

been built to protect Germany's U-boat fleet. In March 1943, he ordered the construction of a massive bunker (now

known as the Blockhaus d'Éperlecques) in the Forest of Éperlecques near Watten, north of Saint-Omer. The

bunker was soon spotted by Allied reconnaissance, and on 27 August 1943, a raid by 187 B-17 bombers wrecked

the construction site before it could be completed. A surviving portion was reused by the Germans as a LOX

production facility.

Design and location

Map of the Pas-de-Calais and south-eastern England showing the location of Wizernes and other major V-weapons sites

The successful attack against the Watten bunker forced the German Army to find an alternative location for a

launch site nearby. They had already taken possession of an old quarry between the villages of Helfaut

and Wizernes, south-west of Saint-Omer and some 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) south of the Watten bunker, near the Aa

river alongside the Boulogne–Saint-Omer railway line, about three-quarters of a mile (1 km) from Wizernes station.

The quarry had been designated for use as a missile storage depot where V-2s would be housed in tunnels bored

into the chalk hillside before being transported for launching. The Germans undertook major work in August 1943

to lay extensive railway sidings to connect the quarry to the main line.

On 30 September 1943, Hitler met with Albert Speer, the Minister of Armaments and War Production, and Franz

Xaver Dorsch, the chief engineer of the Todt Organisation, to discuss plans for a replacement for the out-of-

commission Watten facility. Dorsch proposed to transform the Wizernes depot into a vast bomb-proof underground

complex that would require a million tons of concrete to build. It would be constructed within a network of tunnels

to be dug inside the hillside at the edge of the quarry. A concrete dome, 16.7 feet (5.1 m) thick, 71 metres (233 ft)

in diameter and weighing 55,000 tons, would be built over the top of the central part of the facility to protect it from

Allied bombing. Beneath it, about 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) of tunnels were to be dug into the chalk hillside to

accommodate workshops, storerooms, fuel supplies, a LOX manufacturing plant, generators, barracks and a

hospital.

The Ida railway tunnel, where V-2s and supplies would be brought in by train and unloaded

A standard gauge railway tunnel, codenamed Ida, was to be built on a curving path that would connect it with both

the east- and west-bound main line railway, allowing trains to run straight through the complex without needing to

reverse or be turned around. This would serve as the main unloading station, where missiles and supplies would

be offloaded onto trolleys that would transport them into the connecting

galleries Mathilde and Hugo. Hugoconnected in turn with Sophie, a dead-end railway tunnel branching from the

main line into Ida. Each of the main tunnels had a number of unnamed side tunnels of the same dimensions as

the main tunnels and up to 90 metres (300 ft) long. The central feature of the complex was a huge octagonal

rocket-preparation chamber directly under the dome. It was never completed but would have been 41 metres

(135 ft) in diameter and up to 33 metres (108 ft) high. A number of intermediate floors, possibly as many as ten,

would have been built up the sides of the chamber.

The western side of the chamber opened onto two tall passageways called Gustav and Gretchen. Each was to

have been protected by bomb-proof doors made of steel and concrete. The passageways were to be 4 metres

(13 ft) wide and at least 17 metres (56 ft) high and were angled in a Y-shape, exiting into the quarry. Open-air

platforms for launching rockets would have been at the end of each passageway. The two passageways were

angled at 64° 50' and 99° 50' west of north respectively – not aligned with any probable target but merely permitting

the rockets to be transported to sufficiently widely separated launch pads.

The facility was designed, as was its predecessor at Watten, to receive, process and launch V-2 rockets at a high

rate. Trains carrying V-2s would enter the heart of the complex through the Ida rail tunnel, where they would be

unloaded. A large number of V-2s could be stored in the side tunnels; LOX would also be produced on-site ready

for use. When the time came, the rockets would be moved into the octagonal preparation chamber where they

would be lifted to a vertical position for fuelling and arming. From there they would be transported on motorised

launch carriages, still in a vertical position, through the Gustav and Gretchen passageways. The launch pads were

located at the end of the track on the floor of the quarry, from where the missiles would be fired.

The priority target for the V-2s was 188 kilometres (117 mi) away: London, which Hitler wanted to see pulverised

by the end of 1943. The Allies were alarmed when an analyst found that part of the complex was aligned within

half a degree of the Great Circle bearing on New York, and its equipment was large enough to accommodate a

rocket twice the size of the V-2: the "America Rocket", the proposed A10 intercontinental ballistic missile.

Although physically separate, another facility built in nearby Roquetoire was an integral part of the Wizernes

complex. Umspannwerk C was built to house a Leitstrahl radio command guidance system which could be used

to send course corrections to missiles launched from Wizernes to fine-tune their trajectory during the launch phase.

Construction

Section of one of the bomb-proof doors for either Gustav or Gretchentunnels. Segments of the doors were found

by Allied troops at a storage dump near the Watten railway station.

The Allies first noticed construction activity at Wizernes in mid-August 1943 when the Germans began building

railway track and the offloading stores into the old quarry. After Hitler authorised the decision to turn the depot into

a missile launch site, construction was stepped up. Work on the dome began in November 1943 and tunnelling in

the cliff face below began in December. At the start of January, Allied reconnaissance aircraft observed an

elaborate system of camouflage on the hill top, installed to conceal the dome. The building works were greatly

hindered by the constant air-raid warnings, which stopped work 229 times in May 1944 alone. In response to

Hitler's desire to see the site completed the workforce was expanded substantially from 1,100 in April 1944 to

nearly 1,400 by June. About 60% of the workers were Germans; skilled workers, such as miners fromWestphalia,

were recruited to excavate the tunnels and build the dome. The remainder were principally Frenchmen conscripted

by the Service du travail obligatoire (STO), plus Soviet prisoners of war. The project was overseen by several

large German construction companies, with Philipp Holzman A.G. of Frankfurt am Main and the Grossdeutsche

Schachtbau and Tiefbohr GmbH serving as the chief contractors.

One of the most difficult challenges faced by the Germans was constructing the great dome while under regular

air attack. The dome's designer, Todt Organisation engineer Werner Flos, devised a plan under which the dome

would be built first, flat upon the ground, and the soil underneath it would be excavated so that the construction

works below would be protected against aerial attacks. A circular trench was excavated on the top of the hill above

the quarry to an outside diameter of 84 metres (276 ft). The dome was built within this trench and the galleries and

octagonal preparation chamber were excavated below.

As an additional bomb-proofing method, the dome was surrounded by a bomb-proof "skirt" or Zerschellerplatte of

steel-reinforced concrete, 14 metres (46 ft) wide and 2 metres (6.6 ft) thick. This was supported by a series of

buttresses, which were not tied into the dome itself, above the entrances to the Gustav and Gretchen tunnels.

Another concrete structure was tied into the skirt to the north-west of the dome, which was perhaps intended for

use as an observation and control tower. A separate underground building was constructed on the western side

of the quarry to serve as a hospital and as offices for the engineers.[24] A Decauville narrow-gauge railway was

installed on the quarry floor to transport supplies from the main line to the construction site.

A cube-shaped concrete building was constructed on the top of the hill, next to the dome. This was intended to be

used as the bomb-proof outlet for a ventilation and air conditioning shaft. It was an essential component of a facility

where dangerous and explosive gases were expected to be used in large quantities on a daily basis. It was never

finished, and the Allies found when they captured the site that the ventilation shaft had not been fully excavated.

The building survived the bombing intact and is still prominently visible today.

Unlike its sister site at Watten, there was no on-site power plant. Electricity at Wizernes was provided by a

connection to the main electric grid, with power consumption estimated at between 5,000 and 6,000 kVA.

Discovery and Allied attacks

RAF ground crew handling one of the Tallboy bombs that was dropped on Wizernes during an attack by 617

Squadron (1944)

A photograph taken by a British Mosquito aircraft flying only 20 metres (66 ft) above the ground shows the dome,

still intact, sitting at the centre of the wrecked construction site on 6 July 1944, shortly before its abandonment

The Allies became aware of the Wizernes site in August 1943 when the Germans began laying extensive new rail

sidings which were spotted by RAF reconnaissance flights. In November 1943, the Allied Central Interpretation

Unit reported that the Germans had begun constructing the concrete dome and were undertaking tunnelling works

in the east face of the quarry. However, it was not until the following March that the Allies added the site to the list

of targets for Operation Crossbow, the ongoing bombing campaign against V-weapon sites that had already

wrecked the Watten bunker and numerous V-1 launching sites. Over the next few months, the USAAF and RAF

carried out 16 air raids involving 811 bombers that dropped some 4,260 tons of bombs. The bombing caused

destruction across a wide area, killing 55 residents of the nearby village of Helfault.

Conventional bombing raids only achieved a single bomb hit on the dome itself, causing negligible damage.

However, in June and July 1944 the RAF began attacking the site with 12,000 pounds (5,400 kg), ground-

penetrating Tallboy bombs. The external construction works were completely wrecked by the bombing and one

Tallboy landed just beside the dome, blowing out the entire quarry cliff face and burying the entrances to

the Gustavand Gretchen tunnels. The entrance to Sophie was also buried, leaving Ida as the only entrance to the

facility. The dome was unscathed but the buttresses supporting the protective Zerschellerplatte were dislodged

and slid partway down into the quarry. Serious damage was also caused to the tunnels beneath the dome. The

damage made it impossible to continue work on the site. Dornberger complained: "Persistent air attack with heavy

and super-heavy bombs so battered the rock all around that in the spring of 1944 landslides made further work

impossible." His staff reported on 28 July 1944 that, although the dome had not been hit by the Tallboys, "the

whole area around has been so churned up that it is unapproachable, and the bunker is jeopardised from

underneath."

Although three launch battalions were formed by the Germans in late 1943,[28] they never got the chance to deploy

to the V-weapons launch sites at Watten and Wizernes. On 3 July 1944, the Oberkommando West authorised the

cessation of construction at the heavily damaged sites. On 18 July 1944, Hitler abandoned plans for launching V-

2s from bunkers and authorized the downgrading of the Wizernes bunker to make it a LOX production

facility. However, these plans were overtaken by the Allied liberation of Northern France following the Normandy

landings. The site was finally abandoned a few days before the Allies reached it at the start of September during

the rapid liberation of the area by British, American, Canadian and Polish troops.[31] British engineers inspected it

on 5 September.

Post war investigations

Original V-2 rocket and engine on display under the dome of La Coupole

Shortly after the Wizernes site had been captured in September 1944, Duncan Sandys, the head of the British

"Crossbow Committee" investigating the V-weapons programme, ordered the constitution of a Technical Inter-

Services Mission under Colonel T.R.B. Sanders. It was given the task of investigating the sites

at Mimoyecques, Siracourt, Watten, and Wizernes, collectively known to the Allies as the "Heavy Crossbow" sites.

Sanders' report was submitted to the War Cabinet on 19 March 1945.

The purpose of the Wizernes site had been unclear prior to its capture but Sanders was able to deduce its

connection with the V-2 from the dimensions of the complex and some intelligence information that his team had

been able to retrieve. Sanders' report concluded that it was "an assembly site for long projectiles most conveniently

handled and prepared in a vertical position". He conjectured the approximate length of the projectiles from the

height of the Gustav andGretchen tunnels, though he noted that there was some doubt about the height of the

doors at the tunnel entrances. Segments of the doors had been recovered from a storage dump near Watten

railway station, but were incomplete. Judging from the size of the tunnel entrance, the maximum size of the

projectile could have been between 17 metres (56 ft) and 24 metres (79 ft) in length and 4 metres (13 ft) in breadth.

(This was substantially larger than the V-2, which measured 14 metres (46 ft) long and 3.55 metres (11.6 ft) wide.)

Two witnesses interviewed by the Sanders team reported "an intention of firing a projectile 18 metres

long". Sanders noted that "the dimensions of the site make it suitable for the A.4 (V-2) rocket, but the possibility of

a new rocket up to half as long again as the A.4 and twice the weight cannot be ruled out." He concluded that

much of the site was becoming unsafe due to the progressive collapse of timbering and recommended that the

tunnels and workings under the dome should be destroyed to prevent subsequent accidents or misuse.

The site reverted to private ownership after the war. As the quarry had long since been worked out, it was

abandoned. The tunnels were not destroyed but were sealed off, though at some point they were reopened by

local people and could be entered; the octagon remained sealed off with a ceiling-to-floor barricade. The quarry

itself remained in almost the same condition as it had been in 1944, with sections of railway track still in place on

the quarry floor. The hospital section remained relatively intact and was used by the local gendarmes as a shooting

range.

Museum of La Coupole

Entrance to the museum of La Coupole

In 1986, the Espace Naturel Régional in Lille earmarked 10 million francs to develop the site as a tourist attraction

for the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region with the intention of establishing a World War II museum there. The plan was

publicised in a special open weekend on 20–21 June 1987, attended by over 20,000 people, in which the dome's

designer Werner Flos met Professor Reginald Victor Jones, a surviving member of the "Crossbow Committee", at

Wizernes. The Ida tunnel and side chambers were opened to the public and used for an audio-visual exhibition of

the site's history.

Local historian Yves le Maner was charged with the task of developing the project while a feasibility study was

conducted into the possibility of completing some of the original excavation work to make the site safe for public

access. The plans were approved in 1993 and the site was purchased by the Commune de Helfaut. The following

year, the Conseil Général du Pas-de-Calais acquired the site. The 69-million-franc project (£7.5 million at 1997

prices) was largely underwritten by the Conseil Général, which provided 35 million francs, with another 17 million

coming from the regional council. The European taxpayer provided a further 12 million, the French State provided

3 million and the Saint-Omer municipal administration funded the remaining 1 million francs; a number of private

shareholders were also involved. The Societé d'Equipement du Pas-de-Calais was contracted to carry out the

development work, which involved excavating a further two metres (six feet) beneath the dome, clearing out and

completing the unfinished concreting of some of the tunnels, building an exhibition centre and car park in the

quarry floor and installing a lift to carry visitors up from the octagon to the dome.

The museum opened in May 1997. Visitors enter and leave through the Ida railway tunnel, though the rails have

been removed and the floor levelled. Short branch tunnels lead off on either side; originally used for storage, they

now display wartime objects. Headphone stands along the way present multi-lingual accounts of the construction

and purpose of the facility. The tour continues along the Mathilde tunnel to reach a lift that has been installed to

bring visitors up to the space beneath the dome, where the main exhibition area is located. Focusing on the story

of the V-weapons, life in occupied France, and the conquest of space after the war, the tour presents audio-visual

displays in English, French, Dutch and German. The museum houses a large number of original artifacts including

a V-1 provided by London's Science Museum and a V-2 provided by the Smithsonian Institution,[1] and incorporates

a memorial to the 8,000 people who were shot in or deported from the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region during the war;

computer terminals track the paths of several hundred of the deportees. In 2011, the museum welcomed 120,000

visitors. In July 2012, the museum opened a planetarium as part of Cerendac, a newly established Centre de

ressources numériques pour le développement de l'accès à la connaissance (Resource Centre for the

development of digital access to knowledge). The €6 million centre is funded by the Pas-de-Calais department,

the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, the French state, the European taxpayer and the intercommunality of Saint-Omer.

Since 2010, the museum has also managed the V-3 site of the Fortress of Mimoyecques.

Visiting circuits

Through a dark tunnel, still permeated by echos of the sounds of works and bombing, we access the luminous

concrete dome. Two circuits are on offer: "The New V1 and V2 weapons" (Rex Circuit), following in the footsteps

of Wernher von Braun, the German engineer behind the V2 rocket and Man's first steps on the moon. "The North

of France in German hands" (Cinéac Circuit), examining the major periods of the Occupation: the invasion, exodus,

daily life, the Resistance, collaboration and the Liberation.

Opening times and services

History Centre La Coupole is open daily non-stop from 9AM to 6PM all year round and from 10AM to 19h00 in

July and August. Annual closure from January 6 to 19 included. Average length of visit: 2 hours 30 minutes

For visitors' comfort, all rooms are fitted with seats on which to relax. Bring warm clothing for the underground

galleries (some fleece jackets are available free of charge). Under the dome, where most of the tour takes place,

the air is heated to a temperature of 19 ° C. Hostesses are constantly on hand to ensure that your visit goes

smoothly. The entire La Coupole museum circuit is accessible to people with reduced mobility.

3D Planetarium

The 3D Planetarium offers several sessions per day, see schedule in the planetarium section. Every session starts

with a 15 minutes introduction (solar system simulation, galaxies...) commented live by our team in french, followed

by a spectacular show (30 minutes). Every show is available in english with an audio headset.

Visits are audio-guided using infrared headsets, enabling you to go round the tour at your own pace. The

commentaries coming through the headsets are fully translated into the visitors’ mother tongue (French, English,

Dutch, German); they are easy to use and are also adapted for the hearing-impaired. Each visitor is given a

headset at no additional cost.

Shop and café

Our shop, located in the reception building, offers a selection of unique articles and books on our "library" shelves,

along with souvenirs and regional products. La Coupole gift cards are also available.

Enjoy refreshments, hot drinks, sandwiches and hot snacks in our specially designed Café area.

Picnic area

A free picnic area is at your disposal, with tables and benches set in green surroundings, and enjoy a breathtaking

view of the bunker.

Calais

Calais (/ˈkæleɪ/ CAL-ay, traditionally /ˈkælɨs/; French pronunciation: [kaˈlɛ]; Picard: Calés; Dutch: Kales) is a town

and major ferry port in northern France in the department of Pas-de-Calais, of which it is a sub-prefecture. Although

Calais is by far the largest city in Pas-de-Calais, the department's prefecture is its third-largest city of Arras. The

population of the metropolitan area at the 2010 census was 126,395. Calais overlooks the Strait of Dover, the

narrowest point in the English Channel, which is only 34 km (21 mi) wide here, and is the closest French town to

England. The White Cliffs of Dover can easily be seen on a clear day from Calais. Calais is a major port for ferries

between France and England, and since 1994, the Channel Tunnel has linked nearby Coquelles to Folkestone by

rail.

Due to its position, Calais since the Middle Ages has been a major port and a very important centre for transport

and trading with England. It was annexed by Edward III of England in 1347 and grew into a thriving centre for wool

production. Calais was a territorial possession of England until its capture by France in 1558. The town came to

be called the "brightest jewel in the English crown" owing to its great importance as the gateway for

the tin, lead, lace and wool trades (or "staples"). In 1805 it was a staging area for Napoleon's troops for several

months during his planned invasion of the United Kingdom. The town was virtually razed to the ground

during World War II, when in May 1940, it was a strategic bombing target of the invading German forces who took

the town during the Siege of Calais. During World War II, the Germans built massive bunkers along the coast in

preparation for launching missiles on England.

The old part of the town, Calais proper (known as Calais-Nord), is situated on an artificial island surrounded by

canals and harbours. The modern part of the town, St-Pierre, lies to the south and south-east. In the centre of the

old town is the Place d'Armes, in which stands the Tour du Guet, or watch-tower, a structure built in the 13th

century, which was used as a lighthouse until 1848 when a new lighthouse was built by the port. South east of the

Place is the church of Notre-Dame, built during the English occupancy of Calais. It is arguably the only church

built in the English perpendicular style in all of France. In this church former French President Charles de

Gaulle married his wifeYvonne Vendroux. South of the Place and opposite the Parc St Pierre is the Hôtel-de-ville

(the town hall), and the belfry from the 16th and early 17th centuries. Today, Calais is visited by more than 10

million annually. Aside from being a key transport hub, Calais is also a notable fishing port and a centre for fish

marketing, and some 3,000 people are still employed in the lace industry for which the town is also famed.

History

19th century to World War II

World War II bunkers at Calais

Calais was also on the front lines of France's conflict with the United Kingdom during the Napoleonic Wars. In

1805, it hosted part of Napoleon's army and invasion fleet for several months before his aborted invasion of

Britain. From October to December 1818, the British army used Calais as their departing port to return home after

occupying post-Waterloo France. General Murray appointed Sir Manley Power to oversee the evacuation of British

troops from France. Cordial relations had been restored by that time and on 3 December the mayor of Calais wrote

a letter to Power to express thanks for his "considerate treatment of the French and of the town of Calais during

the embarkation."

Debris from the Siege of Calais

The British returned to Calais again during World War I; it was near the front lines in Flanders, and a key port for

the supply of arms and reinforcements to the Western Front. In the 1930s, Calais was known as a politically

socialist stronghold. The town was virtually razed to the ground during World War II. In May 1940, it was a key

objective of the invading German forces and became the scene of a last-ditch defence—theSiege of Calais—

which diverted a sizable amount of German forces for several days immediately prior to the Battle of Dunkirk.

3,000 British and 800 French troops, assisted by Royal Navy warships, held out from 22 to 27 May 1940 against

the 10th Panzer Division. The town was flattened by artillery and precision dive bombing and only 30 of the 3800-

strong defending force were evacuated before the town fell. Their sacrifice may have helped Operation Dynamo,

the evacuation of Allied forces at Dunkirk, as 10th Panzer would certainly have been involved on the Dunkirk

perimeter had it not been busy at Calais. Between 26 May and 4 June 1940, some 330,000 Allied troops escaped

from the Germans at Dunkirk.

During the ensuing German occupation, it became the command post for German forces in the Pas-de-

Calais/Flanders region and was very heavily fortified, as it was generally believed by the Germans that the Allies

would invade at that point. It was also used as a launch site for V1 flying bombsand for much of the war, the

Germans used the region as the site for railway guns used to bombard the south-eastern corner of England. In

1943 they built massive bunkers along the coast in preparation for launching missiles on the southeast of

England. Despite heavy preparations for defence against an amphibious assault, the Allied invasion took place

well to the west in Normandy on D-Day. Calais was very heavily bombed and shelled in a successful effort to

disrupt German communications and persuade them that the Allies would target the Pas-de-Calais for invasion

(rather than Normandy). The town, by then largely in ruins, was liberated by General Daniel Spry's 3rd Canadian

Infantry Division between 25 September and 1 October 1944. On 27 February 1945 Calais suffered a last bombing

raid—this time by British bombers who mistook the town for Dunkirk, which was at that time still occupied by

German forces. After the war there was little rebuilding of the historic city and most buildings were modern ones.

Migration issues in the 21st century

Since 1999 or earlier, an increasingly large number of migrants have started to arrive in Calais, where they remain

living in makeshift camps, and attempt every night in their hundreds to illegally enter the United Kingdom by

crossing the English Channel via the Eurotunnel Shuttle, either by breaking into lorries making the crossing or on

the railway track itself.

The migrant crisis led to escalating tension between UK and France in the summer of 2015. UK blamed France

for not doing enough to stop migrants from entering the tunnel or making attempts to scale fences built along the

border. The British Prime Minister released a statement saying that illegal immigrants would be removed from the

UK even if they reach the island. To discourage migrants from jumping on train shuttles at Calais, the UK

government supplied fencing to be installed in Eurotunnel where the vehicles are loaded on to train shuttles in

Calais.

Calais is located on the Pas de Calais, which marks the boundary between the English Channel and North Sea and

located at the opposite end of the Channel Tunnel, 34 kilometres (21 miles) from Dover. On a clear day the White

cliffs of Dover can be viewed across the channel. Aside from being an important port and boarding point between

France and England, it is at the nucleus of many major railway and highway networks and connected by road

to Arras, Lens, Béthune and St. Omer. Dunkirk is located about 47 km (29 mi) by road to the east. Calais is located

288 km (179 mi) north by road from the French capital of Paris, roughly a 3-hour 15 minute journey. The commune

of Calais is bordered by the English channel to the north, Sangatte and Coquelles to the west, Coulogne to the

south and Marck to the east. The core area of the city is divided into the Old Town area within the old city walls,

and the younger suburbs of St. Pierre, which are connected by a boulevard.

Côte d'Opale is a cliff-lined section of coast that parallels the white cliffs on the British coast and is part of the

same geological formation. It is known for its scenic cliffs such as Cape Blanc Nez and Cape Gris Nez and for its

wide area of dunes. Many artists have been inspired by its landscapes, among them the composer Henri Dutilleux,

the writers Victor Hugo and Charles Dickens, and the painters J. M. W. Turner, Carolus-Duran, Maurice

Boitel and Eugène Boudin. It was the painter Édouard Lévêquewho coined the name for this area in 1911 to

describe the distinctive quality of its light.

The climate is temperate oceanic in Calais. Temperature ranges are moderate and the winters are mild with

unstable weather. It rains on average about 700 to 800 mm (28 to 31 in) per year.

2.day

E. Calais, Museum WW2, France

B. Musee Du Mur De L`Atlantique, France

C. Historique De La Deuxieme Guerre Mondiale a Amleteuse, France

D. Le Blockhaus D`Eperlecques, France

E. Calais, France

CALAIS

The museum has an excellent collection of posters and uniforms derived from the various countries at war. Audio

guide An audio guide system is available for the visitors in a vatiety of languages (English, German, Dutch, French)

Conditions available at the reception desk.

The Calais War Museum is located in a German War II naval bunker in the Park Saint Pierre opposite the Town

Hall in Calais. The museum has a nice collection of World War II uniforms, weapons and military equipment. The

museum also display a lot of World War II pictures, documents and stamps.

Parc Saint Pierre – 62100 CALAIS

Tél : 0033(0)3 21 34 21 57

Fax : 0033(0)3 21 96 01 92

Email : [email protected]

ORGANISATION

Tourist Office management and in conjunction with Amis du Vieux Calais

12 Bd Clémenceau 62100 CALAIS

Tél 0033(0)3 21 96 42 40

[email protected]

OPENING HOURS

15th February to 31th March : open 11 am – 5 pm, closed on tuesday

April and September : open everyday 11am – 5.30pm

From 1st May to 31th August : open every day 10am – 6 pm

From 1st October to 15th November : open evey day 12am – 5pm Closed on tuesday

Access avalaible for wheelchair users.

The museum is in the Park Saint Pierre opposite the Town Hall. It is a genuine german Navy command post which

now holds uniforms, weapons, documents and many other original items. A visit of Calais Second World War

museum is an opportunity for you to know what took place here during these tragic years and what could have

happened to the British people and therefore to the whole world if the “fighting spirit” had been overcome.

Into the War

The so-called “phoney War” became established in the area. The British Expeditionary Force, the 7th French

Army, Air and Navy took up positions.

Green jackets

The Green Jackets regiment distinguished itself during the battle of Calais in May 1940 alongside French troops.

Calais remenbers them.

Aviation

The battle of Britain with daily raids. Display of pieces of the aircrafts shot down in the region – engines, machine

guns, etc.

German secret weapons

Original documents explaining how the TODT Organisation built the secret bases for V1 V2 and V3 in the region.

Navy

Equipment and uniforms from the German Navy.

Lindemannn Battery

A fine model plus documents depict the most powerful long range gun of the Atlantic Wall located 10km south

west of Calais.

Prisoners of war

One room of the museum is devoted to prisoners of war with an impressive model of a camp items and original

documents.

Charles de Gaulle

The activities of general de Gaulle during the Second World War. (The General, as a young officer married

Mademoiselle Vendroux in Calais and retained a keen interest in the Town, and surrounding area thereafter).

Coastal support position

Reconstruction of a defence post in the sand dunes. The German sentries maintain surveillance ready to sound

the alert if necessary.

MUSÉEDUMURDEL’ATLANTIQUE

62179 Audinghen Cap Gris Nez

Tél : 0033(0)3 21 32 97 33 – 0033(0)3 21 82 62 01

Fax : 0033(0)3 21 32 00 67

www : http://www.batterietodt.com

Open from February to 30th November

It was one of the biggest gun emplacement on the coast facing Dover. Also a rare K5 gun on rail on display at this

museum.

The Atlantic Wall Museum - Battery Todt - is located in a German War II Atlantic wall bunker at the French coast

near Calais. The museum has a great collection of World War II uniforms, weapons, vehicles and other military

equipment. Outside the museum a heavy German Krupp K5 railway gun is displayed.

HISTORIQUEDELADEUXIÈMEGUERREMONDIALEÀAMBLETEUSE

CD 940 – 62164 Ambleteuse

Tél : 0033(0)3 21 87 33 01

Fax : 0033(0)3 21 87 35 01

Email : [email protected]

Open from 1st April to 15th October

HORAIRES D’OUVERTURE

Opening time Season : 1st April to 15th October – 9.30 AM to 6.00 PM. Week-end 10.00 AM to 6.00 PM – 15th

June to 31st August to 7 PM.

Out of season : week-end and on appointment for groups.

Car park, toilets. Access for disabled people (car-park, toilet facilities). Souvenir Shop (free entrance). Military

surplus and collectables, model kits, bookshop, fresh drinks and many other items…

Discover ail the story of the second world war at the museum of AMBLETEUSE. Thousands of items displayed.

Permanent displays dramatically recreating the various campaigns.

A video film about the battle of NORMANDY in a typical 40’s cinema.

Chronological display of the events from the POLISH campaign to the JAPANESE surrender.

More than 120 dummies dramatically recreating the various campaigns.

Explanations both in French and English as well as the video film.

Hundreds of original documents - Posters, tracts, newspapers...

Hundreds of headgears, insignia, uniforms and various equipment.

Civilians and soldiers everyday-life items.

Armaments belonging to the different armies.

LEBLOCKHAUSD‘ÉPERLECQUES

62910 Éperlecques

www : http://www.leblockhaus.com

Tél : 0033(0)3 21 88 44 22

Fax : 0033(0)3 21 88 44 84

Open from 1st march to 30th november

At the fringe of the Eperlecques forest you will find one gigantic bunker. The “blockhouse” dates from the Second

World War. It has been preserved since 1945 at is was. Planned as the first base for ballistic rockets (V2), this

bunker could have changed th course of the war, if the allied bombers had not arrived in time ! The visit to this

hostoric monument is in peaceful woodland park. You can compare the V1 and V2 during the well commentated

visit. Today the “blockhouse of Eperlecques” is open for peace.

The biggest bunker in the north of France, witness of the 1939-45 dark age, from 1939 to 1945.

Open to the public since 1973 and listed "Ancient Memorials" in 1985.

A 90min-visit, alone or with your family, to discover and learn the history of the Eperlecques Bunker, the

technologie of the V2 & V1 secret weapons, in a wooded parc, you'll be impressed, interested and you'll keep

and unforgettable memory.

3.day

A. Calais, France

B. The secret wartime tunnels, Dover, England

C. Battle of Britain Memorial, Capel-le-Ferne, England

D. Kent Battle of Britain Museum, England

Dover

This article is about the English town. For the larger local government district, see Dover (district). For other uses,

see Dover (disambiguation).

Dover (/ˈdoʊvər/; French: Douvres) is a town and major ferry port in the home county of Kent, in South East

England. It faces France across the strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel, and lies south-east

of Canterbury; east of Kent's county town Maidstone; and north-east along the coastline

from Dungeness and Hastings. The town is the administrative centre of the Dover District and home of theDover

Calais ferry through the Port of Dover. The surrounding chalk cliffs have become known as the White Cliffs of

Dover.

Its strategic position has been evident throughout its history: archaeological finds have revealed that the area has

always been a focus for peoples entering and leaving Britain. The name of the town derives from the name of the

river that flows through it, the River Dour. The town has been inhabited since the Stone Age according to

archaeological finds, and Dover is one of only a few places in Britain – London,Edinburgh, and Cornwall being

other examples – to have a corresponding name in the French language, Douvres.

There was a military barracks in Dover, which was closed in 2007. Although many of the former ferry services

have declined, services related to the Port of Dover provide a great deal of the town’s employment, as

does tourism. The prospect of privatising the sale of the Port of Dover to create increased cash flow for the

government was given a recent ironic twist due to the rejection of a possible bid from the town of Calais in France

after opposition in Dover against any sale forced the government to withdraw the Port from the market. Local

residents had clubbed together to propose buying it for the community, more than 12,000 people have bought a

£10 share in the People's Port Trust.

The name Dover was first recorded in Latinised form as Portus Dubris, which was for many years explained as

derived from the Brythonic Dubrās ("the waters") referring to its river Dour. However, a recent detailed

study showed that the name is far more likely to come from an ancient word for 'double bank' referring to the

shingle spit(s) that formed across the harbour entrance, for which a word dover is still used in the Isle of Wight.

Subsequent name forms included Doverre; the modern name was in use at least by the time Shakespeare

wrote King Lear (between 1603 and 1606), in which the town and its cliffs play a prominent role. The cliffs may

have given England its ancient name of Albion ("white").

Dover’s history, because of its proximity to France, has always been of great strategic importance to

Britain.Archaeological finds have shown that there were Stone Age people in the area; and that by the Bronze

Agethe maritime influence was already strong. Some Iron Age finds exist also, but the coming of the Romansmade

Dover part of their communications network. Like Lemanis (Lympne) and Rutupiae (Richborough) Dover was

connected by road to Canterbury and Watling Street; and it became Portus Dubris, a fortified port. Forts were built

above the port; lighthouses were constructed to guide passing ships; and one of the best-preserved Roman villas

in Britain is here.

Dover figured largely in the Domesday Book as an important borough. It also served as a bastion against various

attackers: notably the French during the Napoleonic Wars; and against Germany during World War II. It was one

of the Cinque Ports during medieval times.

Dover Castle

Dover Castle is a medieval castle in Dover, Kent. It was founded in the 11th century and has been described as

the "Key to England" due to its defensive significance throughout history. It is the largest castle in England.

The Roman lighthouse at Dover Castle

The site may have been fortified with earthworks in the Iron Age or earlier, before the Romans invaded in AD43.

This is suggested on the basis of the unusual pattern of the earthworks which does not seem to be a perfect fit for

the medieval castle. Excavations have provided evidence of Iron Age occupation within the locality of the castle,

but it is not certain whether this is associated with the hillfort.[4] There have also been excavations on the mound

which the church and Roman Pharos are situated on, which has been discovered to be a Bronze Age mound.

The site also contained one of Dover's two 80-foot (24 m) Roman lighthouses (or Pharoses), one of which still

survives, whilst the remains of the other are located on the opposing Western Heights, across the town of Dover.

On the site is a classic montrol (campsite) where the Normans landed after their victorious conquest.

Saxon and early Norman

The view down from the Castle to the Church, possible Saxon burgh, and Harbour beyond.

After the Battle of Hastings in October 1066, William the Conqueror and his forces marched toWestminster

Abbey for his coronation. They took a roundabout route via Romney, Dover, Canterbury, Surrey and Berkshire.

From the Cinque Ports foundation in 1050, Dover has always been a chief member—it may also have been this

that first attracted William's attention, and got Kent the motto of Invicta. In the words of William of Poitiers:

Then he marched to Dover, which had been reported impregnable and held by a large force. The English, stricken

with fear at his approach had confidence neither in their ramparts nor in the numbers of their troops ... While the

inhabitants were preparing to surrender unconditionally, [the Normans], greedy for money, set the castle on fire

and the great part of it was soon enveloped in flames...[William then paid for the repair and] having taken

possession of the castle, the Duke spent eight days adding new fortifications to it'. The Castle was first built,

entirely out of clay. It collapsed to the ground and the clay was then used as the flooring for many of the ground-

floor rooms.

This may have been repairs and improvements to an existing Saxon fort or burgh, centred on the Saxon church

of St Mary de Castro, although archaeological evidence suggests that it was actually a new motte and bailey design

castle built from scratch nearby.

In 1088, eight knights were appointed under tenures to guard Dover Castle, their names were: William d'Albrincis;

Fulberl de Dover, William d'Arsic; Geoffrey Peverell; William Maminot; Robert du Port; Hugh Crevecoeur; and

Adam Fitzwilliam.

Section of the western curtain wall leading to Peverell's Gateway

It was during the reign of Henry II that the castle began to take recognisable shape. The inner and outer baileys

and the great keep belong to this time. Maurice the Engineer was responsible for building the keep,[5] one of the

last rectangular keeps ever built.

In 1216, a group of rebel barons invited the future Louis VIII of France to come and take the English crown. He

had some success breaching the walls, but was unable ultimately to take the castle (see The First Barons' War).

The vulnerable north gate that had been breached in the siege was converted into an underground forward-

defence complex (including St John's Tower), and new gates built into the outer curtain wall on the western

(Fitzwilliam's Gate) and eastern (Constable's Gate) sides. During the siege, the English defenders tunnelled

outwards and attacked the French, thus creating the only counter-tunnel in the world. This can still be seen in the

medieval works.

During the time of Stephen de Pencester, a windmill was erected on Tower 22, which was later known as the Mill

Tower.[6] By the Tudor age, the defences themselves had been superseded by gunpowder. They were improved

by Henry VIII, who made a personal visit, and added to it with the Moat Bulwark.

During the English Civil War it was held for the king but then taken by a Parliamentarian trick without a shot being

fired (hence it avoided being ravaged and survives far better than most castles) in 1642.

Dover Castle was a crucial observation point for the cross-channel sightings of the Anglo-French Survey (1784–

1790), which used trigonometriccalculations to link the Royal Greenwich Observatory with the Paris Observatory.

This work was overseen by General William Roy. The other English viewpoint used to make measurements across

to Cap Blanc Nez in France was at Fairlight, East Sussex.

Dover Castle in 2011.

Massive rebuilding took place at the end of the 18th century during the Napoleonic Wars. William Twiss, the

Commanding Engineer of the Southern District, as part of his brief to improve the town's defences, completed the

remodelling of the outer defences of Dover Castle adding the huge Horseshoe, Hudson's, East Arrow and East

Demi-Bastions to provide extra gun positions on the eastern side, and constructing the Constable's Bastion for

additional protection on the west. Twiss further strengthened the Spur at the northern end of the castle, adding

a redan, or raised gun platform. By taking the roof off the keep and replacing it with massive brick vaults he was

able to mount heavy artillery on the top. Twiss also constructed Canon's Gateway to link the defences of the castle

with those of the town.

With Dover becoming a garrison town, there was a need for barracks and storerooms for the additional troops and

their equipment. The solution adopted by Twiss and the Royal Engineers was to create a complex

of barracks tunnels about 15 metres below the cliff top and the first troops were accommodated in 1803. At the

height of the Napoleonic Wars, the tunnels housed more than 2,000 men and to date are the only underground

barracks ever built in Britain.

The windmill on the Mill Tower was demolished during the Anglo-American War of the orders of the Ordnance

Board. It was said that the sale of materials from the demolished mill did not cover the cost of the demolition. At

the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the tunnels were partly converted and used by the Coast Blockade Service to

combat smuggling. This was a short-term endeavour though, and in 1827 the headquarters were moved closer to

shore. The tunnels then remained abandoned for more than a century.

Thesecretwartimetunnels

Address: Dover, Kent, United Kingdom

Phone:+44 1304 211067

The Second World War Coastal Artillery Operations Room in the Secret Wartime Tunnels

The outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 saw the tunnels converted first into an air-raid shelter and then

later into a military command centre and underground hospital. In May 1940, Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsey directed

the evacuation of French and British soldiers from Dunkirk, code-namedOperation Dynamo, from his headquarters

in the cliff tunnels.

A military telephone exchange was installed in 1941 and served the underground headquarters.

The switchboards were constantly in use and had to have a new tunnel created alongside it to house

the batteries and chargers necessary to keep them functioning. The navy used the exchange to enable direct

communication with vessels, as well as using it to direct air-sea rescue craft to pick up pilots shot down in

the Straits of Dover.

Later the tunnels were to be used as a shelter for the Regional Seats of Government in the event of a nuclear

attack. This plan was abandoned for various reasons, including the realisation that the chalk of the cliffs would not

provide significant protection from radiation, and because of the inconvenient form of the tunnels and their

generally poor condition.

Tunnel levels are denoted as A - Annexe, B - Bastion, C - Casemate, D - DUMPY and E - Esplanade. Annexe and

Casemate levels are open to the public, Bastion is 'lost' but investigations continue to gain access, DUMPY

(converted from Second World War use to serve as a Regional Seat of Government in event of an atomic war) is

closed, as is Esplanade (last used as an air raid shelter in the Second World War).

The Annexe level was excavated in 1941 to serve as a medical dressing station for wounded soldiers. It contained

two operating theatres and had basic accommodation for patients. Soldiers would be sent for emergency treatment

in the tunnels and then transferred to inland hospitals. Within the Annexe level were dormitories, kitchens and

mess rooms.

A statue of Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay was erected in November 2000 outside the tunnels in honour of his work

on the Dunkirk evacuation and protecting Dover during the Second World War.

If they were being attacked they would have to move quickly as the enemies were just nine minutes away from

Dover by plane. There are over three miles of these Tunnels going deep down into the chalky cliffs, some still

undiscovered. There are tunnels that are far too dangerous to walk down. Full information about these tunnels is

not due to be released until 2020-2025.

BattleofBritainMemorial,Capel-le-Ferne

Statue of a seated pilot at the Battle of Britain Memorial

The Battle of Britain Memorial is a monument to aircrew who flew in the Battle of Britain. It is sited on the White

Cliffs at Capel-le-Ferne, near Folkestone, on the coast of Kent.

It was initiated by the Battle of Britain Memorial Trust, and opened by the Queen Mother on 9 July 1993. It is

formed of a large propeller-shaped base, with the figure of a seated pilot carved by Harry Gray sitting at the centre.

The propeller shape has lead the monument to be considered a hill figure.

Also on the site are replicas of a Hawker Hurricane and Supermarine Spitfire and the Christopher Foxley-

Norris Memorial Wall, on which appears the names of the almost 3,000 fighter aircrew who flew in the Battle.

In October 2010 HRH The Duchess of Cornwall unveiled a bust of Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Park by sculptor

Will Davies at the site.

The Trust is currently raising money to build a new visitor centre. It will take the shape of a Spitfire wing and will

be called The Wing.

Spitfire

The National Memorial to the Few at Capel-le-Ferne, on the famous white cliffs between Dover and Folkestone

in Kent, occupies a special place in the hearts and minds of all those who have visited this moving site.

Maintained by the Battle of Britain Memorial Trust, the site at Capel-le-Ferne is dedicated to Churchill’s famous

“Few” who fought in the skies overhead to keep this country free from invasion.

The Memorial itself inspires quiet reflection on the bravery and sacrifice shown by the aircrew – fewer than 3,000

men – who flew, fought and sometimes died in probably the most crucial battle fought by this country in the whole

of the 20th century.

The Christopher Foxley-Norris Memorial Wall lists the names of all those who took part in the Battle of Britain,

while a replica Spitfire and Hurricane stand nearby as a reminder of the iconic machines they flew to victory.

At the edge of the car park, greeting visitors to the site, is a low wall bearing Churchill’s famous comment: “Never

in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few”.

The wall was donated by the Beaverbrook Foundation in memory of all those

who fought in the Battle of Britain and was unveiled by Lady Aitken, Sir

Max Aitken’s widow, in July 1999. Sir Max commanded 601 Squadron during the

Battle.

The Memorial, though is about the future as well as the past. Plans have been approved for The Wing, an

important new visitor centre planned for the Memorial site. This high-tech exhibition and learning centre is designed

to keep the memory of the veterans alive for many years to come.

Work on clearing the site has been carried out and archaeological investigations are due to start soon. Fund-

raising is continuing so that work on the building itself can begin next year.

The memorial is free to visit and can be accessed on foot all day, every day.

Opening times for The Wing, which includes The Scramble Experience, The Geoffrey Page Centre, the shop,

Cockpit cafe and toilets, are as follows:

1 March to 31 May, 10am – 5pm (last entry to the Experience/cafe purchase 4.30pm);

1 June to 30 September, 10am – 6pm (last entry to the Experience/cafe purchase 5.30pm);

1 October to 28 February, 10am – 4pm (last entry to the Experience/cafe purchase 3.30pm).

The site can also be opened on request for school visits or on other occasions and there are KS2 and KS3

worksheets available for school parties. See contact section for how to get in touch.

The site is approached from either Dover or Folkestone on the B2011 at Capel-le-Ferne.

The idea for a National Memorial to The Few came from one of their number. Wing Commander Geoffrey Page

had been a 20-year-old Hurricane pilot with 56 Squadron in the Battle.

On 12 August 1940 Pilot Officer Page was shot down and baled out into the sea with terrible burns. He went on

to become a founding member of the Guinea Pig Club for RAF personnel treated at the Queen Victoria Hospital

by the team of plastic surgeons led by Archie McIndoe.

Determination and courage ensured that Geoffrey returned to operational flying, becoming a wing leader. He was

awarded the DFC and bar and at the time he received the DSO in 1944 he was credited with having destroyed 15

enemy aircraft. A crash late in the war seriously injured him again and he returned to East Grinstead.

Years later, Geoffrey realised to his astonishment that there was no memorial to his comrades who had flown with

him in Fighter Command in 1940.

His determination that The Few should be remembered found a focus at “Hellfire Corner”, the area of Dover and

Folkestone over which so much of the fighting had taken place in 1940. The Battle of Britain Memorial Trust was

established and fund raising began.

On July 9 1993, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother opened the National Memorial at Capel-le-Ferne

to see Geoffrey’s dream realised. He died in August 2000, shortly after attending the Memorial Day marking the

60th anniversary of the Battle.

The National Memorial to the Few is a peaceful space, ideal for quiet reflection, atop the famous White Cliffs and

offering superb views across the Channel to France. The central statue of a lone pilot is complemented by the

Christopher Foxley-Norris Memorial Wall, two replica aircraft and other items of interest.

The Memorial is free to visit and open throughout the year to those on foot. There is a charge to enter The Scramble

experience, which is open from 10am and closes between 4pm and 6pm depending on the season.

KentBattleofBritainMuseum

Kent Battle of Britain Museum Opening Times:

Easter Good Friday to 31st October

April, May and October, 10.00 am to 4.00 pm

June to September, 10.oo am to 5.00 pm

Kent Battle of Britain Museum

The Kent Battle of Britain Museum is located on the former RAF Hawkinge, a World War II airfield 4 miles inland

from Folkestone, England. It is privately operated and is the oldest museum dedicated to the Battle of Britain.

Since opening in 1971, the museum has gained the support of a number of Battle of Britain pilots - many of whom

have donated personal items to the museum.

The museum is situated in the village of Hawkinge, only a short distance from Folkestone and is the most

comprehensive and longest serving Battle of Britain Museum in the UK. It also features a shop where one can buy

Battle of Britain memorabilia, including CDs and audio cassettes recorded and donated by Battle of Britain RAF

pilots.

Museum

Huge collection of WWII aviation-themed artifacts, aircraft hangars, planes and uniforms.

Address: Aerodrome Rd, Folkestone CT18 7AG, United Kingdom

Phone:+44 1303 893140

http://www.kbobm.org/

RAFManston-TheSpitfire&HurricaneMemorialMuseum

Opening Hours

10am - 5pm (Summer Opening Times)

The Airfield

Manston Road

Ramsgate

Kent CT12 5DF

Tel: 01843 821940

Email: [email protected]

Manston's air history dates back to the First World War. At the outset of the war, nearby St Mildred's Bay in

Westgate-on-Sea was used as a landing strip for aircraft. In the winter of 1915-16, aircraft started to use the open

farmland of Manston as a site for emergency landings. Soon the Admiralty established an aerodrome at the site.

As well as operational flights, the Handley Page bomber training school was established at the aerodrome. With

its geographical advantage being near the English Channel, Manston was integral in providing air defence,

continuing with the formation of the Royal Flying Corps in 1917.

From September 1939 and the outbreak of the Second World War, Manston was firmly on the front line. In that

month No. 3 Squadron, under the command of No. 11 Group Fighter Command, flew Hawker Hurricanes from the

airfield. In 1940 during the Battle of Britain, Manston was heavily bombed, requiring the dispersal of personnel and

resources to nearby safer locations.

Hawker Typhoon attack aircraft were based at Manston later in the war, and also the first Meteor jet squadron of

the RAF.

As well as the Battle of Britain, Manston is part of Second World War history, being the airfield in 1942 where six

Fairey Swordfish departed on a suicidal attack against the German battle cruiser Prinz Eugen and battleships

Scharnhorst and Gneisenau; an operation known as The Channel Dash. Two years later, Manston was one of the

departure points for the unsuccessful Operation Market Garden.

Being so close to the Channel, Manston was useds as an emergency landing field for returning bombers suffering

from low fuel or problems to their hydraulic systems. The airfield became something of a "graveyard" for heavy

bombers.

During the Cold War of the 1950's the US Airforce used Manston as a Strategic Air Command base for its fighter

and fighter-bomber units. From 1960, it was back under RAF control. Thanks to the long runway built during the

Second World War, it was designated one of the country's MEDAs (Master Emergency Diversion Airfield) for both

military and civilian flights.

The RAF ended their flying operations in 1999, turning it over to exclusively civilian air traffic. As Kent International

Airport, Manston still sees regular cargo and passenger flights, as well as regular small aircraft traffic.

In 2013 an airshow returned to Manston for the first time in over twenty years. Throughout the summer season the

Red Arrows RAF Display Team are frequent visitors to Manston, staging between displays.

Battle of Britain

Battle of Britain

Part of the Second World War

A Royal Observer Corps spotter

scans the skies of London

Date 10 July – 31 October 1940

(3 months and 3 weeks)

Location British airspace

Result Decisive British victory

Belligerents

United Kingdom

Canada

(including the incorporated air forces):

Foreign pilots from[show]

Germany

Italy

Commanders and leaders

Winston Churchill

Hugh Dowding

Keith Park

T. Leigh-Mallory

Quintin Brand

Richard Saul

William Lyon Mackenzie King

L. Samuel Breadner

Adolf Hitler

Wilhelm Keitel

Hermann Göring

Albert Kesselring

Hugo Sperrle

Hans-Jürgen Stumpff

Benito Mussolini

R.C. Fougier

Units involved

Royal Air Force

Royal Canadian

Air Force

Luftwaffe

Regia Aeronautica

Strength

1,963 serviceable aircraft 2,550 serviceable aircraft.

Casualties and losses

544 aircrew (RAF Fighter Command), 718

(RAF Bomber Command), 280 (RAF Coastal

Command) killed

422 aircrew wounded

1,547 aircraft destroyed

2,698 aircrew killed

967 captured

638 missing bodies identified by British authorities

1,887 aircraft destroyed

Around 90,000 civilian casualties, 40,000 of them fatal.

The Battle of Britain (German: Luftschlacht um England, literally "Air battle for England") is the name given to

the Second World War air campaign waged by the German Air Force (Luftwaffe) against the United

Kingdom during the summer and autumn of 1940. The Battle of Britain was the first major campaign to be fought

entirely by air forces, and was also the largest and most sustained aerial bombing campaign to that date.

The objective of the Nazi German forces was to achieve air superiority over the Royal Air Force (RAF), especially

its Fighter Command. Beginning in July 1940, coastal shipping convoys and shipping centres, such as Portsmouth,

were the main targets; one month later, the Luftwaffe shifted its attacks to RAF airfields and infrastructure. As the

battle progressed, the Luftwaffe also targeted factories involved inWorld War II aircraft production and

ground infrastructure. Eventually the Luftwaffe resorted to attacking areas of political significance and using terror

bombing strategy.

By preventing Germany from gaining air superiority, the British forced Adolf Hitler to postpone and eventually

cancel Operation Sea Lion, a planned amphibious and airborne invasion of Britain. However, Germany continued

bombing operations on Britain, known as The Blitz. The failure of Nazi Germany to achieve its objective of

destroying Britain's air defences in order to force Britain to negotiate an armistice(or even surrender outright) is

considered by Steven Bungay to be its first major defeat in World War II, and a crucial turning point in the conflict.

The Battle of Britain has an unusual distinction in that it gained its name prior to being fought. The name is derived

from a famous speechdelivered by Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the House of Commons on June 18, more

than three weeks prior to the generally accepted date for the start of the battle:

... What General Weygand has called The Battle of France is over. The battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon

this battle depends the survival of Christian civilisation. Upon it depends our own British life and the long continuity

of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. Hitler

knows that he will have to break us in this island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free

and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including

the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made

more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of a perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves

to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years,

men will still say, "This was their finest hour".

— Winston Churchill

Background

Strategic bombing during World War I introduced air attacks intended to panic civilian targets, and led in 1918 to

the amalgamation of British army and navy air services into the Royal Air Force. Its first Chief of the Air Staff Hugh

Trenchard was among the military strategists in the 1920s like Giulio Douhet who saw air warfare as a new way

to overcome the stalemate oftrench warfare. Interception was near impossible with fighter planes no faster than

bombers. Their view (expressed vividly in 1932) was that the bomber will always get through, and the only defence

was a deterrent bomber force capable of matching retaliation. Predictions were made that a bomber offensive

would quickly cause thousands of deaths and civilian hysteria leading to capitulation, but the RAF had difficulty

getting funding.

Germany was forbidden military air forces by the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, but developed aircrew training in

civilian and sport flying. From 1923 the Deutsche Luft Hansa airline developed freight aeroplanes convertible into

bombers, and in 1926 the secret Lipetsk fighter-pilot school began operating. Following the 1933 Nazi seizure of

power, the Luftwaffe was formed and began rapid expansion. Its Chief of Staff Walther Wever favoured strategic

bombing in an air strategy with the first priority destruction of the enemy's air force, but his plans for a long range

four engined strategic bomber were set back in 1936 when he died in an air crash, and there were subsequent

difficulties in obtaining suitable engines. In the Spanish Civil War the Luftwaffe in the Condor Legion gained

experience of air fighting, and Wolfram von Richthofen become an exponent of air power providing ground support

to other services.

The RAF responded to Luftwaffe developments with its 1934 Expansion Plan A rearmament scheme, and in 1936

was restructured into Bomber Command, Coastal Command, Training Command and Fighter Command. The

latter was under Hugh Dowding, who opposed the doctrine that bombers were unstoppable: the invention of radar

at that time could allow early detection, and prototype monoplane fighters were significantly faster. Priorities were

disputed, but in December 1937 the Minister in charge of defence coordination Sir Thomas Inskipdecided in

Dowding's favour, that "The role of our air force is not an early knock-out blow" but rather was "to prevent the

Germans from knocking us out" and fighter squadrons were just as necessary as bomber squadrons.

British Prime MinisterWinston Churchill

The early stages of World War II saw successful German invasions on the continent aided decisively by the air

power of the Luftwaffe, which was able to establish tactical air superiority with great efficiency. The speed with

which German forces defeated most of the defending armies in Norway in early 1940 created a significant political

crisis in Britain. In early May 1940, the Norway Debate questioned the fitness for office of the British Prime

Minister Neville Chamberlain. On 10 May, the same day Winston Churchill became British Prime Minister, the

Germans initiated the Battle of France with an aggressive invasion of French territory. RAF Fighter Command was

desperately short of trained pilots and aircraft, but despite the objections of its commander Hugh Dowding that the

diversion of his forces would leave home defences under-strength, Churchill sent fighter squadrons to support

operations in France, where the RAF suffered heavy losses.

After the evacuation of British and French soldiers from Dunkirk and the French surrender on 22 June 1940, Hitler

mainly focused his energies on the possibility of invading the Soviet Union in the belief that the British, defeated

on the continent and without European allies, would quickly come to terms. The Germans were so convinced of

an imminent armistice that they began constructing street decorations for the homecoming parades of victorious

troops. Although the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, and certain elements of the British public favoured a

negotiated peace with an ascendant Germany, Churchill and a majority of his Cabinet refused to consider an

armistice. Instead, Churchill used his skilful rhetoric to harden public opinion against capitulation and to prepare

the British for a long war. In his "This was their finest hour" speech of 18 June 1940, he declared that "the Battle

of France is over. I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin."

German aims

After a series of military victories, Germany took control of huge territories in central, northern, and western Europe

that mainly corresponded to the boundaries of the defeated countries of Poland, France, Denmark, Norway,

Belgium, and the Netherlands. Prior to these conquests, the boundaries of Germany had already been swelled

considerably by the annexation of Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938 and 1939. Germany's position thus seemed

invincible to many Europeans. Hitler hoped for a negotiated peace with Britain, and made no preparations

foramphibious assault on a hostile shore. In any case, at the time, the only forces with experience in this type of

warfare and modern equipment to support it were the Japanese, who became adept with it at the Battle of Wuhan in

1938. On 11 July 1940, Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine (German Navy),

told Hitler that an invasion of Britain could only be contemplated as a last resort, and only after full air

superiority had been achieved. The Kriegsmarine had been nearly crippled by the Norwegian Campaign, with

many of its ships sunk or damaged, while the Royal Navy still had over 50 destroyers, 21 cruisers and eight

battleships in the British Home Fleet. There was little that the weakenedKriegsmarine could do to stop the Royal

Navy from intervening. The only alternative was to use the Luftwaffe's dive bombers and torpedo bombers, which

required air superiority to operate effectively. Grand Admiral Raeder said, "A powerful and effective air

force might create conditions favourable for an invasion, whether it could was not in the Navy War Staff's province."

Although he agreed with Raeder, Hitler ordered the preparation of a plan to invade the United Kingdom on 16

July. He hoped that news of the preparations would frighten the UK into peace negotiations. "Directive No. 16; On

the Preparation of a Landing Operation against England" read, in part, as follows:

Since England, despite its militarily hopeless situation, still has not shown any signs of being prepared to negotiate,

I have decided to prepare a landing operation against England and, if necessary, carry it out.

All preparations were to be made by mid-August. For secrecy, this directive was only issued to Commanders-in-

Chief, but Hermann Göring passed it on to his Luftwaffe Air Fleet commanders by coded radio messages that

were intercepted by Britain's Y-Service and successfully decrypted by Hut 6 at Bletchley Park.

The Kriegsmarine produced a draft plan for achieving a narrow beachhead near Dover. On 28 July the army

responded that they wanted landings all along the south coast of England. Hitler held a meeting of his army and

navy chiefs on 31 July in his residence of Berghof, and on 1 August the OKW (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht or

"High Command of the Armed Forces") issued its plan. The plan, code named Operation Sea Lion, was scheduled

to take place in mid-September 1940. Operation Sea Lion called for landings on the south coast of Great Britain

backed by an airborne assault. Neither Hitler nor OKW believed it would be possible to carry out a successful

amphibious assault on Britain until the RAF had been neutralised. Raeder believed that air superiority might make

a successful landing possible although it would be a risky operation and require "absolute mastery over

the Channel by our air forces".

For his part, Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz believed that air superiority was "not enough". Dönitz later stated, "we

possessed neither control of the air or the sea; nor were we in any position to gain it." Some writers, such as Derek

Robinson, have agreed with Dönitz. Robinson argues that the massive superiority of the Royal Navy over

the Kriegsmarine would have made Sea Lion a disaster and the Luftwaffe could not have prevented decisive

intervention by British cruisers and destroyers, even with air superiority. Williamson Murray argued that the task

facing the Germans in summer 1940 was beyond their capabilities; the three German armed services were not

capable of solving the problem of invading the British Isles. Murray contends that the Kriegsmarine had been

effectively eliminated owing to heavy losses during the Norwegian Campaign and states that it is doubtful that

the Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe could have prevented the Royal Navy from engaging the invasion fleet.

The Luftwaffe had not been represented at the Berghof, but Göring was confident that air victory was possible.

Like many commanders in other air forces, including the RAF, he was convinced by the ideas of Giulio Douhet that

"The bomber will always get through" and if attacks on military targets failed, the bombing of civilians could force

the British government to surrender.

Fighters

The Luftwaffe's Messerschmitt Bf 109E and Bf 110C fought against the RAF's workhorse Hurricane Mk I and the

less numerous Spitfire Mk I; Hurricanes outnumbered Spitfires in RAF Fighter Command by about two to one

when war broke out. The Bf 109E had a better climb rate and was up to 40 mph faster in level flight than the Rotol

(constant speed propellor) equipped Hurricane Mk I, depending on altitude. The speed and climb disparity with

the original non-Rotol Hurricane was even greater. In spring and summer 1940, all RAF Spitfire and Hurricane

fighter squadrons converted to 100 octane aviation fuel, which allowed their Merlin engines to generate

significantly more power and an approximately 30 mph increase in speed at low altitudes through the use of

an Emergency Boost Override. In September 1940, the more powerful Mk IIa series 1 Hurricanes started entering

service in small numbers. This version was capable of a maximum speed of 342 mph (550 km/h), some 20 mph

more than the original (non-Rotol) Mk I, though it was still 15 to 20 mph slower than a Bf 109 (depending on

altitude).

Hawker Hurricane R4118 fought in the Battle of Britain. Here it arrives at the 2014 Royal International Air

Tattoo,England (left)

X4382, a late production Spitfire Mk I of 602 Squadron flown by P/O Osgood Hanbury, Westhampnett, September

1940 (right)

The performance of the Spitfire over Dunkirk came as a surprise to the Jagdwaffe, although the German pilots

retained a strong belief that the 109 was the superior fighter. The British fighters were equipped with eight

Browning .303 (7.7mm) machine guns, while most Bf 109Es had two 7.92mm machine guns supplemented by two

20mm cannons. The latter was much more effective than the .303; many German planes landed despite large

numbers of .303 hits. At some altitudes, the Bf 109 could outclimb the British fighter. It could also engage in

vertical-plane negative-gmanoeuvres without the engine cutting out because its DB 601 engine used fuel injection;

this allowed the 109 to dive away from attackers more readily than the carburettor-equipped Merlin. On the other

hand, the Bf 109E had a much larger turning circle than its two foes. In general, though, as Alfred Price noted

in The Spitfire Story:

... the differences between the Spitfire and the Me 109 in performance and handling were only marginal, and in a

combat they were almost always surmounted by tactical considerations of which side had seen the other first,

which had the advantage of sun, altitude, numbers, pilot ability, tactical situation, tactical co-ordination, amount of

fuel remaining, etc.

Messerschmitt Bf 109E-4.

The Bf 109E was also used as a Jabo (jagdbomber, fighter-bomber)—the E-4/B and E-7 models could carry a

250 kg bomb underneath the fuselage, the later model arriving during the battle. The Bf 109, unlike the Stuka,

could fight on equal terms with RAF fighters after releasing its ordnance.

At the start of the battle, the twin-engined Messerschmitt Bf 110C long range Zerstörer ("Destroyer") was also

expected to engage in air-to-air combat while escorting the Luftwaffe bomber fleet. Although the 110 was faster

than the Hurricane and almost as fast as the Spitfire, its lack of manoeuvrability and acceleration meant that it was

a failure as a long-range escort fighter. On 13 and 15 August, 13 and 30 aircraft were lost, the equivalent of an

entire Gruppe, and the type's worst losses during the campaign. This trend continued with a further eight and

fifteen lost on 16 and 17 August. Göring ordered the Bf 110 units to operate "where the range of the single-engined

machines were not sufficient"

The most successful role of the Bf 110 during the battle was as a Schnellbomber (fast bomber). The Bf 110 usually

used a shallow dive to bomb the target and escape at high speed.[69][70] One unit, Erprobungsgruppe 210 – initially

formed as the service test unit (Erprobungskommando) for the emerging successor to the 110, the Me 210 –

proved that the Bf 110 could still be used to good effect in attacking small or "pinpoint" targets.

Four 264 Squadron Defiants (PS-V was shot down on 28 August 1940 overKent by Bf 109s.)

The RAF's Boulton Paul Defiant had some initial success over Dunkirk because of its resemblance to the

Hurricane; Luftwaffe fighters attacking from the rear were surprised by its unusual gun turret. However, during the

Battle of Britain, this single-engined two-seater proved hopelessly outclassed. For various reasons, the Defiant

lacked any form of forward-firing armament, and the heavy turret and second crewman meant it could not outrun

or outmanoeuvre either the Bf 109 or Bf 110. By the end of August, after disastrous losses, the aircraft was

withdrawn from daylight service.

Bombers

Heinkel He 111 bombers during the Battle of Britain

The Luftwaffe's primary bombers were the Heinkel He 111, Dornier Do 17, and Junkers Ju 88 for level bombing

at medium to high altitudes, and the Junkers Ju 87 Stuka for dive bombing tactics. The He 111 was used in greater

numbers than the others during the conflict, and was better known, partly due to its distinctive wing shape. Each

level bomber also had a few reconnaissance versions accompanying them that were used during the battle.

Although it was successful in previous Luftwaffe engagements, the Stuka suffered heavy losses in the Battle of

Britain, particularly on 18 August, due to its slow speed and vulnerability to fighter interception after dive bombing

a target. As the losses went up along with their limited payload and range,Stuka units were largely removed from

operations over England and diverted to concentrate on shipping instead until they were eventually re-deployed

to the Eastern Front in 1941. However, for some raids, they were called back, such as on 13 September to

attack Tangmere airfield.

The remaining three bomber types differed in their capabilities; the Heinkel 111 was the slowest; the Ju 88 was

the fastest once its mainly external bomb load was dropped; and the Do 17 had the smallest bomb load. All three

bomber types suffered heavy losses from the home-based British fighters, but the Ju 88 disproportionately so. The

German bombers required constant protection by the Luftwaffe's fighter force. German escorts, however, were

not enough. Bf 109Es were ordered to support more than 300–400 bombers on any given day. Later in the conflict,

when night bombing became more frequent, all three were used. However, due to its reduced bomb load, the

lighter Do 17 was used less than the He 111 and Ju 88 for this purpose.

German propaganda photo purporting to show a Spitfire I flying very close to a Dornier 17Z.

On the British side, three bomber types were mostly used on night operations against targets such as factories,

invasion ports and railway centres; the Armstrong Whitworth Whitley, the Handley-Page Hampden and the Vickers

Wellington were classified as heavy bombers by the RAF, although the Hampden was a medium bomber

comparable to the He 111. The twin-engined Bristol Blenheim and the obsolescent single-engined Fairey

Battlewere both light bombers; the Blenheim was the most numerous of the aircraft equipping RAF Bomber

Command and was used in attacks against shipping, ports, airfields and factories on the continent by day and by

night. The Fairey Battle squadrons, which had suffered heavy losses in daylight attacks during the Battle of France,

were brought up to strength with reserve aircraft and continued to operate at night in attacks against the invasion

ports, until the Battle was withdrawn from UK front line service in October 1940.

Allies

126 German aircraft or "Adolfs" were claimed by Polish pilots of 303 Squadron during the Battle

Main article: Non-British personnel in the RAF during the Battle of Britain

The Royal Air Force roll of honour for the Battle of Britain recognises 595 non-British pilots (out of 2,936) as flying

at least one authorised operationalsortie with an eligible unit of the RAF or Fleet Air Arm between 10 July and 31

October 1940. These included 145 Poles, 127 New Zealanders, 112 Canadians, 88 Czechoslovaks, 10 Irish,

32 Australians, 28 Belgians, 25 South Africans, 13 French, 7 Americans, 3 Southern Rhodesians and one each

from Jamaica and Mandatory Palestine. "Altogether in the fighter battles, the bombing raids, and the various

patrols flown between 10 July and 31 October 1940 by the Royal Air Force, 1495 aircrew were killed, of whom

449 were fighter pilots, 718 aircrew from Bomber Command, and 280 from Coastal Command. Among those killed

were 47 airmen from Canada, 24 from Australia, 17 from South Africa, 35 from Poland, 20 from Czechoslovakia

and six from Belgium. Forty-seven New Zealanders lost their lives, including 15 fighter pilots, 24 bomber and eight

coastal aircrew. The names of these Allied and Commonwealth airmen are inscribed in a memorial book which

rests in the Battle of Britain Chapel in Westminster Abbey. In the chapel is a stained glass window which contains

the badges of the fighter squadrons which operated during the battle and the flags of the nations to which the

pilots and aircrew belonged."

Luftwaffe strategy

Hermann Göring, the commander of the Luftwaffe (left)

Hugo Sperrle, the commander of Luftflotte 3 (right)

The Luftwaffe strategy was devised to provide tactical support for the army on the battlefield. During

the blitzkrieg offensives against Poland, Denmark and Norway, France and the Low Countries, the Luftwaffe had

co-operated fully with the Wehrmacht. Its main task was to ensure air supremacy over southeast England, to pave

the way for an invasion fleet. To achieve air supremacy, the Luftwaffe resorted to bombing British air fields. Unlike

British (and U.S.) air forces, the Luftwaffe had not invested in fleets of long-range heavy bombers, so the task of

bombing was made much more difficult.

Adolf Galland, the successful leader of III./JG 26, becameGeschwaderkommodore ofJG 26 on 22 August

Adolf Galland noted:

We had the impression that, whatever we did, we were bound to be wrong. Fighter protection for bombers created

many problems which had to be solved in action. Bomber pilots preferred close screening in which their formation

was surrounded by pairs of fighters pursuing a zigzag course. Obviously, the visible presence of the protective

fighters gave the bomber pilots a greater sense of security. However, this was a faulty conclusion, because a

fighter can only carry out this purely defensive task by taking the initiative in the offensive. He must never wait until

attacked because he then loses the chance of acting.

We fighter pilots certainly preferred the free chase during the approach and over the target area. This gives the

greatest relief and the best protection for the bomber force.

The biggest disadvantage faced by Bf 109 pilots was that without the benefit of long-range drop tanks (which were

introduced in limited numbers in the late stages of the battle), usually of 300 litres (66 imp gal; 79 US gal) capacity,

the 109s had an endurance of just over an hour and, for the 109E, a 600 km (370 mi) range. Once over Britain, a

109 pilot had to keep an eye on a red "low fuel" light on the instrument panel: once this was illuminated, he was

forced to turn back and head for France. With the prospect of two long flights over water, and knowing their range

was substantially reduced when escorting bombers or during combat, the Jagdflieger coined the

term Kanalkrankheit or "Channel sickness".

Dowding system

Chain Home radar cover, bases and group boundaries

During early tests of the Chain Home system, the slow flow of information from the CH radars and observers to

the aircraft often caused them to miss their "bandits". The solution, today known as the "Dowding system", was to

create a set of reporting chains to move information from the various observation points to the pilots in their fighters.

It was named after its chief architect, "Stuffy" Dowding.

Reports from CH radars and the Observer Corps were sent directly to Fighter Command Headquarters (FCHQ)

at Bentley Priory where they were "filtered" to combine multiple reports of the same formations into single tracks.

Telephone operators would then forward only the information of interest to the Group headquarters, where the

map would be re-created. This process was repeated to produce another version of the map at the Sector level,

covering a much smaller area. Looking over their maps, Group level commanders could select squadrons to attack

particular targets. From that point the Sector operators would give commands to the fighters to arrange an

interception, as well as return them to base. Sector stations also controlled the anti-aircraft batteries in their area;

an army officer sat beside each fighter controller and directed the gun crews when to open and cease fire.

The Dowding system dramatically improved the speed and accuracy of the information that flowed to the pilots.

During the early war period it was expected that an average interception mission might have a 30% chance of

ever seeing their target. During the battle, the Dowding system maintained an average rate over 75%, with several

examples of 100% rates - every fighter dispatched found and intercepted its target. In contrast, Luftwaffe fighters

attempting to intercept raids had to randomly seek their targets and often returned home having never seen enemy

aircraft. The result is what is now known as an example of "force multiplication"; RAF fighters were as effective as

two or more Luftwaffe fighters, greatly offsetting, or overturning, the disparity in actual numbers.

Phases of the battle

German Heinkel He 111 bombers over the English Channel 1940

The battle can be roughly divided into four phases:

• 10 July – 11 August: Kanalkampf ("the Channel battles")

• 12–23 August: Adlerangriff ("Eagle Attack"), the early assault against the coastal airfields

• 24 August – 6 September: the Luftwaffe targets the airfields. The critical phase of the battle.

• 7 September onwards: the day attacks switch to British towns and cities.

Raids on British cities

Calais, September 1940. Göring giving a speech to pilots about the change in tactics: to bomb the towns instead

of the airfields

Hitler's No. 17 Directive on the conduct of war against the United Kingdom, issued on 1 August 1940, specifically

prohibited the Luftwaffe from conducting terror raids on its own initiative, and reserved the right of ordering terror

attacks as means of reprisal for the Führer himself:

The war against England is to be restricted to destructive attacks against industry and air force targets which have

weak defensive forces ... The most thorough study of the target concerned, that is vital points of the target, is a

pre-requisite for success. It is also stressed that every effort should be made to avoid unnecessary loss of life

amongst the civilian population.

The Luftwaffe offensive against Britain had included numerous raids on major ports since August, but Hitler had

issued a directive that London was not to be bombed save on his sole instruction. However, on the afternoon of

15 August, Hauptmann Walter Rubensdörffer leading Erprobungsgruppe 210 mistakenly bombed the Croydon

airfield (on the outskirts of London) instead of the intended target, RAF Kenley; this was followed on the night of

23/24 August by the accidental bombing ofHarrow, also on the outskirts of London, as well as raids on Aberdeen,

Bristol, and South Wales. The focus on attacking airfields had also been accompanied by a sustained bombing

campaign which began on 24 August with the largest raid so far, killing 100 in Portsmouth, and that evening the

first night raid on London as described above. On 25 August 1940, 81 bombers of Bomber Command were sent

out to raid industrial and commercial targets in Berlin. Clouds prevented accurate identification and the bombs fell

across the city, causing some casualties among the civilian population as well as damage to residential

areas. Continuing RAF raids on Berlin in retaliation led to Hitler withdrawing his directive, and on 3 September

Göring planned to bomb London daily, with General Albert Kesselring's enthusiastic support, having received

reports the average strength of RAF squadrons was down to five or seven fighters out of twelve and their airfields

in the area were out of action. Hitler issued a directive on 5 September to attack cities including London. In his

speech delivered on 4 September 1940, Hitler threatened to obliterate (ausradieren) British cities if British bombing

runs against Germany did not stop.

Bombing of London

On 7 September, a massive series of raids involving nearly four hundred bombers and more than six hundred

fighters targeted docks in the East End of London, day and night. The raids were code named Operation Loge.

The RAF anticipated attacks on airfields and 11 Group rose to meet them, in greater numbers than the Luftwaffe

expected. The first official deployment of 12 Group's Lee-Mallory's Big Wing took twenty minutes to form up,

missing its intended target, but encountering another formation of bombers while still climbing. They returned,

apologetic about their limited success, and blamed the delay on being scrambled too late. Fighter Command had

been at its lowest ebb, short of men and machines, and the break from airfield attacks allowed them to recover.

11 Group had considerable success in breaking up daytime raids. 12 Group repeatedly disobeyed orders and

failed to meet requests to protect 11 Group airfields, but their experiments with increasingly large Big Wings had

some success. The Luftwaffe began to abandon their morning raids, with attacks on London starting late in the

afternoon for fifty-seven consecutive nights.

Members of the London Auxiliary Firefighting Service

The most damaging aspect to the Luftwaffe of targeting London was the increase in range. The Bf 109E escorts

had a limited fuel capacity resulting in only a 660 km (410 mile) maximum range solely on internal fuel, and when

they arrived had only 10 minutes of flying time before turning for home, leaving the bombers undefended by fighter

escorts. Its eventual stablemate, the Focke-Wulf Fw 190A, was only flying in prototype form in the summer of

1940; the first 28 Fw 190s were not delivered until November 1940. The Fw 190A-1 had a maximum range of

940 km (584 miles) on internal fuel, 40% greater than the Bf 109E. The Messerschmitt Bf 109E-7 corrected this

deficiency by adding a ventral center-line ordnance rack to take either an SC 250 bomb or a standard 300 litre

Luftwaffe drop tank to double the range to 1,325 km (820 mi). The ordnance rack was not retrofitted to earlier Bf

109Es until October 1940.

On 14 September, Hitler chaired a meeting with the OKW staff. Göring was in France directing the decisive battle,

so Erhard Milch deputized for him. Hitler asked "Should we call it off altogether?". General Hans Jeschonnek,

Luftwaffe Chief of Staff, begged for a last chance to defeat the RAF and for permission to launch attacks on civilian

residential areas to cause mass panic. Hitler refused the latter, perhaps unaware of how much damage had

already been done to civilian targets. He reserved for himself the power to unleash the terror weapon. Instead

political will was to be broken by destroying the material infrastructure, the weapons industry, and stocks of fuel

and food.

On 15 September, two massive waves of German attacks were decisively repulsed by the RAF by deploying every

aircraft in 11 Group. Sixty German and 26 RAF aircraft were shot down. Two days after the German defeat Hitler

postponed preparations for the invasion of Britain. Henceforth, in the face of mounting losses in men, aircraft and

the lack of adequate replacements, the Luftwaffe switched from daylight to nighttime bombing. 15 September is

commemorated as Battle of Britain Day.

On 16 September, Göring ordered the air fleets to begin the new phase of the battle. Hitler hoped this might result

in "eight million going mad" (referring to the population of London in 1940), which would "cause a catastrophe" for

the British. In those circumstances, Hitler said, "even a small invasion might go a long way". Hitler was against

cancelling the invasion as "the cancellation would reach the ears of the enemy and strengthen his resolve".

Gun camera film shows tracer ammunition from a Supermarine Spitfire Mark I of 609 Squadron, flown by Flight

Lieutenant J H G McArthur, hitting aHeinkel He 111 on its starboard quarter. These aircraft were part of a large

formation from KG 53 and 55 which attacked the Bristol Aeroplane Company's works at Filton, Bristol, just before

midday on 25 September 1940.

A Junkers Ju 88 returning from a raid on London was shot down in Kent on 27 September resulting in the Battle

of Graveney Marsh, the last action between British and foreign military forces on British mainland soil.

Hitler postponed the invasion on 13 October "until the spring of 1941", and October is regarded as the month

regular bombing of Britain ended. It was not until Hitler's Directive 21 was issued, on 18 December 1940, that the

threat of invasion finally ended.

During the battle, and for the rest of the war, an important factor in keeping public morale high was the continued

presence in London of King George VI and his wife Queen Elizabeth. When war broke out in 1939, the King and

Queen decided to stay in London and not flee to Canada, as had been suggested. George VI and Elizabeth

officially stayed in Buckingham Palace throughout the war, although they often spent weekends at Windsor

Castle to visit their daughters, Elizabeth (the future queen) and Margaret. Buckingham Palace was damaged by

bombs which landed in the grounds on 10 September and, on 13 September, more serious damage was caused

by two bombs which destroyed the Royal Chapel. The royal couple were in a small sitting room about 80 yards

from where the bombs exploded. On 24 September, in recognition of the bravery of civilians, King George VI

inaugurated the award of the George Cross.

Attrition statistics

Overall, by 2 November, the RAF fielded 1,796 pilots, an increase of over 40% from July 1940's count of 1,259

pilots. Based on German sources (from a Luftwaffe intelligence officer Otto Bechtle attached to KG 2 in February

1944) translated by the Air Historical Branch, Stephen Bungay asserts German fighter and bomber "strength"

declined without recovery, and that from August – December 1940, the German fighter and bomber strength

declined by 30 and 25 percent. In contrast, Williamson Murray, argues (using translations by the Air Historical

Branch) that 1,380 German bombers were on strength on 29 June 1940, 1,420 bombers on 28 September, 1,423

level bombers on 2 November and 1,393 bombers on 30 November 1940. In July – September the number of

Luftwaffe pilots available fell by 136, but the number of operational pilots had shrunk by 171 by September. The

training organisation of the Luftwaffe was failing to replace losses. German fighter pilots, in contrast to popular

perception, were not afforded training or rest rotations unlike their British counterparts. The first week of September

accounted for 25% of the Fighter Command, and 24% of theLuftwaffe's overall losses. Between the dates 26

August – 6 September, on only one day (1 September) did the Germans destroy more aircraft than they lost.

Losses were 325 German and 248 British.

Luftwaffe losses for August numbered 774 aircraft to all causes, representing 18.5% of all combat aircraft at the

beginning of the month. Fighter Command's losses in August were 426 fighters destroyed, amounting to 40 per

cent of 1,061 fighters available on 3 August. In addition, 99 German bombers and 27 other types were destroyed

between 1 and 29 August.

From July to September, the Luftwaffe's loss records indicate the loss of 1,636 aircraft, 1,184 to enemy action. This

represented 47% of the initial strength of single-engined fighters, 66% of twin-engined fighters, and 45% of

bombers. This indicates the Germans were running out of aircrews as well as aircraft.

Throughout the battle, the Germans greatly underestimated the size of the RAF and the scale of British aircraft

production. Across the Channel, the Air Intelligence division of the Air Ministryconsistently overestimated the size

of the German air enemy and the productive capacity of the German aviation industry. As the battle was fought,

both sides exaggerated the losses inflicted on the other by an equally large margin. However, the intelligence

picture formed before the battle encouraged the Luftwaffe to believe that such losses pushed Fighter Command

to the very edge of defeat, while the exaggerated picture of German air strength persuaded the RAF that the threat

it faced was larger and more dangerous than was the case. This led the British to the conclusion that another

fortnight of attacks on airfields might force Fighter Command to withdraw their squadrons from the south of

England. The German misconception, on the other hand, encouraged first complacency, then strategic

misjudgement. The shift of targets from air bases to industry and communications was taken because it was

assumed that Fighter Command was virtually eliminated.

Between the 24 August and 4 September, German serviceability rates, which were acceptable at Stuka units,

were running at 75% with Bf 109s, 70% with bombers and 65% with Bf 110s, indicating a shortage of spare parts.

All units were well below established strength. The attrition was beginning to affect the fighters in particular." By

14 September, the Luftwaffe's Bf 109Geschwader possessed only 67% of their operational crews against

authorised aircraft. For Bf 110 units it was 46 per cent; and for bombers it was 59 per cent. A week later the figures

had dropped to 64 per cent, 52% and 52 per cent. Serviceability rates in Fighter Command's fighter squadrons,

between the 24 August and 7 September, were listed as: 64.8% on 24 August; 64.7% on 31 August and 64.25%

on 7 September 1940.

Due to the failure of the Luftwaffe to establish air supremacy, a conference assembled on 14 September at Hitler's

headquarters. Hitler concluded that air superiority had not yet been established and "promised to review the

situation on 17 September for possible landings on 27 September or 8 October. Three days later, when the

evidence was clear that the German Air Force had greatly exaggerated the extent of their successes against the

RAF, Hitler postponed Sea Lion indefinitely."

The British victory in the Battle of Britain was achieved at a heavy cost. Total British civilian losses from July to

December 1940 were 23,002 dead and 32,138 wounded, with one of the largest single raids on 19 December

1940, in which almost 3,000 civilians died. With the culmination of the concentrated daylight raids, Britain was able

to rebuild its military forces and establish itself as an Allied stronghold, later serving as a base from which the

Liberation of Western Europe was launched.[20]

Battle of Britain Day

Winston Churchill summed up the effect of the battle and the contribution of RAF Fighter Command, RAF Bomber

Command, RAF Coastal Command and the Fleet Air Arm with the words, "Never in the field of human conflict

was so much owed by so many to so few". Pilots who fought in the battle have been known as The Few ever

since; at times being specially commemorated on 15 September, "Battle of Britain Day". On this day in 1940, the

Luftwaffe embarked on their largest bombing attack yet, forcing the engagement of the entirety of the RAF in

defence of London and the South East, which resulted in a decisive British victory that proved to mark a turning

point in Britain's favour.

Within the Commonwealth, Battle of Britain Day has been observed more usually on the third Sunday in

September, and even on the 2nd Thursday in September in some areas in the BritishChannel Islands.

The day has been observed by many artists over the years, often with works that show the battle itself. Many

Mixed Media artists have also created pieces in honor of the Battle of Britain.

Memorials and museums

There are numerous memorials to the battle. The most important ones are the Battle of Britain Monument in

London and the Battle of Britain Memorial at Capel-le-Ferne in Kent.Westminster Abbey and St James's Church

in Paddington both have memorial windows to the battle, replacing windows that were destroyed during it. There

is also a memorial at the former Croydon Airport, one of the RAF bases during the battle, and a memorial to the

pilots at Armadale Castle on the Isle of Skye in Scotland, which is topped by a raven sculpture.

There are also two museums to the battle: one at Hawkinge in Kent and one at Stanmore in London, at the

former RAF Bentley Priory.

In 2015 the RAF created an online 'Battle of Britain 75th Anniversary Commemorative Mosaic' composed of

pictures of “the few” - the pilots and aircrew who fought in the battle - and “the many” - 'the often unsung others

whose contribution during the Battle of Britain was also vital to the RAF’s victory in the skies above Britain',

submitted by participants and their families.

• Battle in contemporary history

• The Darkest Hour

• The Few

• Coventry Blitz

• Polish Air Forces in France and Great Britain

• Evacuations of civilians in Britain during World War II

• Air Transport Auxiliary

• Post-war memorials

• Battle of Britain Memorial Flight

• Battle of Britain Memorial, Capel-le-Ferne

• Battle of Britain Monument in London

• Kent Battle of Britain Museum

• Battle of Britain Class steam locomotives of the Southern Railway

• Polish War Memorial

4.day

A. Dover, England

B. Memorial du Souvenir Dunkirk 1940 museum, France

C. The Fort Des Dunes, France

D. Dunkirk 1940 – 1945 at the port museum, France

E. Brussels, Belgium

DunkirkinWorldWarII

Battle of Dunkirk, Dunkirk evacuation and Siege of Dunkirk (1944)

In May 1940, during the Battle of France, the British Expeditionary Force in France aiding the French, was cut off

from the rest of the French Army by the German advance. Encircled by the Germans they retreated to the area

around the port of Dunkirk. The German land forces could have easily destroyed the British Expeditionary Force,

especially when many of the British troops, in their haste to withdraw, had left behind their heavy equipment. For

years, it was assumed that Adolf Hitler ordered the German Army to stop the attack, favouring bombardment by

the Luftwaffe. However, according to the Official War Diary of Army Group A, its commander, Generaloberst Gerd

von Rundstedt, ordered the halt. Hitler merely validated the order several hours after the fact. This lull in the action

gave the British a few days to evacuate by sea. Winston Churchill ordered any ship or boat available, large or

small, to pick up the stranded soldiers, and 338,226 men (including 123,000 French soldiers) were evacuated –

the miracle of Dunkirk, as Churchill called it. It took over 900 vessels to evacuate the Allied forces and although

over two-thirds of those rescued embarked via the harbour, almost 100,000 were taken off the beaches. More

than 40,000 vehicles as well as massive amounts of other military equipment and supplies were left behind; their

value being less than that of trained fighting men. The British evacuation of Dunkirk through the English

Channel was codenamed Operation Dynamo. Forty thousand Allied soldiers (some who carried on fighting after

the official evacuation) were captured or forced to make their own way home through a variety of routes including

via neutral Spain.

The city was again contested in 1944, and the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division attempted to liberate the city in

September, as Allied forces surged northeast after their victory in the Battle of Normandy. However, German

forces refused to relinquish their control of the city, which had been converted into a fortress, and the garrison

there was "masked" by Allied troops, notably 1st Czechoslovak Armoured Brigade. The fortress under command

of German Admiral Friedrich Frisius eventually unconditionally surrendered to the commander of the

Czechoslovak forces, Brigade GeneralAlois Liška, on 9 May 1945.

During the German occupation, Dunkirk was largely destroyed by Allied bombings; the artillery siege of Dunkirk

was directed on the final day of the war by pilots from No. 652 Squadron RAF, and No. 665 Squadron RCAF.

Settled in the Bastion 32 bunker, the Memorial du Souvenir museum tells the incredible story of Operation

Dynamo and the evacuation of 338 000 allied soldiers. The Memorial houses a rich collection of weapons,

uniforms, models, photos and maps of the military operations.

The museum is open every day from 1st April to 30th September from 10am to 5pm.

Built in 1878, the Fort des Dunes is a remarkable example of a military installation designed by General Séré de

Rivières. It was to protect Dunkirk and its port from any attack from the east. The exhibitions present the tragic

events of the years 1939-40 explains the situation and the events which led to the outbreak of war in Europe to

the invasion of France in 1940. One of the rooms is dedicated to Operation Dynamo. You can also tour the exterior

of the fort with the help of an audio-guide.

Open from Tuesday to Sunday from 2:30pm to 6pm.

The exhibition at the Port Museum highlights two major episodes of World War II: the defense of the pocket of

Dunkirk at the time of Operation Dynamo, but also the occupation of the town until the bitter end.

The exhibition focuses on the fate of the civilians, on traces of the events that still show in the urban landscape,

and on what we do with that particular history today, in sculpture, photography and music.

During the French summer holidays: Every day from 10am to 12:30 and from 1:30 to 6pm. Closed on Tuesdays

outside the holidays.

MemorialduSouvenirDunkirk1940museum

The museum is located in the fortifications that were built in 1874 to reinforce France’s coastal defence. Bastion

32 served as the headquarters for the French and Allied forces during the Battle of Dunkirk and Operation Dynamo.

The Mémorial du Souvenir tells the incredible story of the battle and of the evacuation of more than 338.000 allied

soldiers from the « Pocket of Dunkirk ». In the museum, you will discover a rich exhibition of maps, pictures and

both allied and German military material. Scale models of the sites of the operation, uniforms and weapons

complete the collection. A film using dramatic period footage, with a duration of approximately 15 minutes, gives

an excellent overall view of the events of May-June 1940.

Mémorial du Souvenir Musée de la Bataille de Dunkerque et de l’Opération Dynamo

Rue des Chantiers de France

59140 Dunkerque France

Email: [email protected]

Tél: +33 (0)3 28 66 79 21

Opening hours

Daily from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm from 1st April to 30th September.

Admission 2015

Adults: € 5,00

Free for children under 12 accompanied by their parents

Groups: adultes € 4,00 / school groups € 3,5 per pupil

TheFortDesDunes

With its buildings buried under the sand, the Fort des Dunes is a remarkable example of a military installation

designed by General Séré de Rivières. It was built in 1878 to protect Dunkirk and its port from any attack from the

east. Following the invention of a new type of explosive, the fort lost its strategic importance and was then used

as barrack accommodation, able to house 450 soldiers.

In 1940, about a hundred soldiers perished under the intense German bombing and among them was General

Janssen, commander of the 12th Motorised Infantry Division. Other dramatic events took place during the war, in

particular, the execution of 8 members of the French resistance in 1944.

Exhibitions

There are several permanent exhibitions in the barrack blocks; they present the context in which the Fort des

Dunes was built, as well as the events that were played out here.

The exhibition - From peace to war - the tragic events of the years 1939-40 explains the situation and the events

which led to the outbreak of war in Europe, from the growth of Nazism to the invasion of France in 1940. It is

illustrated with a large number of photographs and reproductions of drawings by artists who witnessed the events.

The last exhibition room houses an exceptional animated mock-up showing how the largest embarkation in history

of all time took place, illustrated with a large number of photographs taken at the time.

After visiting the exhibition in the barrack block, why not tour the exterior of the fort with the help of an audio-guide.

This will take you onto a newly laid out circuit marked with explanatory stands. This will enable you to understand

the strategic and defensive organisation of the fort, the design of General Séré de Rivière's military architecture

and see the changes made during the German occupation.

The circuit leads to the roofs of the fort's buildings and there are magnificent views over the North Sea and the

dunes, the maritime plain, the hills of Flanders and the city of Dunkirk.

Dunkerque Dunes de Flandre

Le Beffroi, rue de l'Amiral Ronarc'

Dunkerque France

Phone: +33 (0)3 28 26 27 31

[email protected]

Dunkirk1940–1945attheportmuseum

Four years, eleven months, five days… that’s the exact duration of the German occupation of Dunkirk.

The inhabitants found themselves trapped, surrounded and eventually under house arrest in their own town.

The exhibition at the Port Museum highlights two major episodes of World War II : the defense of the pocket of

Dunkirk at the time of Operation Dynamo, but also the occupation of the town until the bitter end.

The exhibition focuses on the fate of the civilians, on traces of the events that still show in the urban landscape,

and on what we do with that particular history today, in sculpture, photography and music.

Musée Portuaire

9 quai de la Citadelle

59140 Dunkerque France

http://www.museeportuaire.fr

Optional

MIMOYECQUESFORTRESS

As an underground launch site, the Forteresse de Mimoyecques is one of the most impressive edifices imagined

by Hitler. Located a few kilometres from Cap Gris-Nez, in Landrethun-le-Nord, at locality of "Mimoyecques", this

secret base was expected to be used for the installation of the giant underground V3 super gun. Like other V-

weapons (Vergelstungwaffe), the V3 was foreseen to bomb England, especially London. The site wes shelled by

the Royal Air Force, on July 6th 1944 with Tallboy bombs, which put an end to the grave threat for Londoners. In

2013, the Forteresse de Mimoyecques open from the 19th of April to 12th of October for a new visit.

MIMOYECQUES FORTRESS is open from 18th April until 11th October 2015

From 9AM to 6PM non-stop

In July and August : from 10AM to 7PM

Bring a warm jacket

Events Critically damaged 6 July 1944;

Captured 5 September 1944;

Opened as museum 1984, reopened 1 July 2010

The Fortress of Mimoyecques is the modern name for a Second World War underground military complex built by

the forces of Nazi Germany between 1943 and 1944. It was intended to house a battery of V-3 cannons aimed at

London, 165 kilometres (103 mi) away. Originally codenamed Wiese ("Meadow") or Bauvorhaben

711 ("Construction Project 711"), it is located in the commune ofLandrethun-le-Nord in the Pas-de-Calais region

of northern France, near the hamlet of Mimoyecques about 20 kilometres (12 mi) fromBoulogne-sur-Mer. It was

constructed by a mostly German workforce recruited from major engineering and mining concerns.

The complex consists of a network of tunnels dug under a chalk hill, linked to five inclined shafts in which 25 V-3

guns would have been installed, all targeted on London. The guns would have been able to fire ten dart-like

explosive projectiles a minute – 600 rounds every hour – into the British capital, which Winston Churchill later

commented would have constituted "the most devastating attack of all". The Allies knew nothing about the V-3 but

identified the site as a possible launching base for V-2 ballistic missiles, based on reconnaissance photographs

and fragmentary intelligence from French sources.

Mimoyecques was targeted for intensive bombardment by the Allied air forces from late 1943 onwards.

Construction work was seriously disrupted, forcing the Germans to abandon work on part of the complex. The rest

was partly destroyed on 6 July 1944 by No. 617 Squadron RAF, which used ground-penetrating 5,400-kilogram

(11,900 lb) "Tallboy" earthquake bombs to collapse tunnels and shafts, entombing hundreds of workers

underground. The Germans halted construction work at Mimoyecques as the Allies advanced up the coast

following the Normandy landings. It fell to the Canadian 3rd Infantry Division on 5 September 1944 without

resistance, a few days after the Germans withdrew from the area.

The complex was partly demolished just after the war on Churchill's direct orders (and to the great annoyance of

the French, who were not consulted), as it was still seen as a threat to the United Kingdom. It was later reopened

by private owners, first in 1969 to serve as amushroom farm and subsequently as a museum in 1984. A nature

conservation organisation acquired the Fortress of Mimoyecques in 2010 and La Coupole, a former V-2 rocket

base turned museum near Saint-Omer, took over its management. It continues to be open to the public as a

museum.

For more details on this topic, see V-3 cannon.

Map of the Pas-de-Calais and south-eastern England showing the location of Mimoyecques and other major V-

weapons sites

The prototypeHochdruckpumpe gun in 1942 at Laatziger Ablage (Misdroy), today Zalesie (Międzyzdroje), Poland.

In May 1943 Albert Speer, the Reich Minister of Armaments and War Production, informed Adolf Hitler of work

that was being carried out to produce a supergun capable of firing hundreds of shells an hour over long distances.

The newly designed gun, codenamed the Hochdruckpumpe("High Pressure Pump", HDP for short) and later

designated as the V-3, was one of the V-weapons – Vergeltungswaffen ("retaliation weapons") – developed by

Nazi Germany in the later stages of the war to attack Allied targets. Long-range guns were not a new development,

but the high pressure detonations used to fire shells from previous such weapons, including the Paris gun, rapidly

wore out their barrels. In 1942, August Coenders, inspired by previous designs of multi-chamber guns, suggested

that the gradual acceleration of the shell by a series of small charges spread over the length of the barrel might

be the solution to the problem of designing very long-range guns. Coenders proposed the use of electrically

activated charges to eliminate the problem of the premature ignition of the subsidiary charges experienced by

previous multi-chamber guns. The HDP would have a smooth barrel over 100 metres (330 ft) long, along which a

97-kilogram (214 lb) finned shell (known as the Sprenggranate 4481) would be accelerated by numerous small

low-pressure detonations from charges in branches off the barrel, each fired electrically in sequence. Each barrel

would be 15 cm (5.9 in) in diameter.

The gun was still in its prototype stages, but Hitler was an enthusiastic supporter of the idea and ordered that

maximum support be given to its development and deployment. In August 1943 he approved the construction of

a battery of HDP guns in France to supplement the planned V-1 and V-2 missile campaigns against London and

the south-east of England. Speer noted afterwards:

On my suggestion, the Führer has decided that the risk must be stood to award contracts at once for the "high-

pressure pump," without waiting for the results of firing trials. Maximum support is to be accorded to the

experimental ranges at Hillersleben and Misdroy, and especially to the completion of the actual battery.

To reach England, the weapon needed barrels 127 metres (417 ft) long, so it could not be moved; it would have

to be deployed from a fixed site. A study carried out in early 1943 had shown that the optimal location for its

deployment would be within a hill with a rock core into which inclined drifts could be tunneled to support the barrels.

The site was identified by a fortification expert, Major Bock of the Festungs-Pionier-Stab 27 of the Fifteenth

Army LVII Corps based in the Dieppearea. A limestone hill near the hamlet of Mimoyecques, 158 metres (518 ft)

high and 165 kilometres (103 mi) from London, was chosen to house the gun. It had been selected with care; the

hill in which the facility was built is primarily chalk with very little topsoil cover, and the chalk layer extends several

hundred metres below the surface, providing a deep but easily tunnelled rock layer. The chalk is easy to excavate

and strong enough to dig tunnels without using timber supports. Although the site's road links were poor, it was

only a few kilometres west of the main railway line between Calais and Boulogne-sur-Mer. The area was already

heavily militarised; as well as the fortifications of the Atlantic Wall on the cliffs of Cap Gris Nez to the north-west,

there was a firing base for at least one conventional Krupp K5 railway gun about 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) to the south

in the nearby quarries of Hidrequent-Rinxent.

Design and construction

Construction began in September 1943 with the building of railway lines to support the work, and excavation of

the gun shafts began in October. The initial layout comprised two parallel complexes approximately 1,000 metres

(3,300 ft) apart, each with five drifts which were to hold a stacked cluster of five HDP gun tubes, for a total of 25

guns. The smoothbore design of the HDP would enable a much higher rate of fire than was possible with

conventional guns. The entire battery would be able to fire up to 10 shots a minute, capable in theory of hitting

London with 600 projectiles every hour. Both facilities were to be served by an underground railway tunnel of

standard gauge, connected to the Calais-Boulogne main line and underground ammunition storage galleries which

were tunneled at a depth of about 33 m (108 ft). The western site was abandoned at an early stage after being

disrupted by Allied bombing, and only the eastern complex was built.

The drifts were angled at 50 degrees, reaching a depth of 105 m (344 ft). Owing to technical problems with the

gun prototype, the scope of the project was reduced; drifts I and II were abandoned at an early date and only III,

IV and V were taken forward. They came to the surface at a concrete slab or Platte 30 m (98 ft) wide and 5.5 m

(18 ft) thick, in which there were narrow openings to allow the projectiles to pass through. The openings in the slab

were protected by large steel plates, and the railway tunnel entrances were further protected by armoured steel

doors. Each drift was oriented on a bearing of 299°, to the nearest degree – a direct line on Westminster Bridge.

Although the elevation and direction of the guns could not be changed, it would have been possible to alter the

range by varying the amount of propellant used in each shot. This would have brought much of London within

range.

The railway tunnel ran in a straight line for a distance of about 630 m (2,070 ft). Along its west side was an

unloading platform which gave access to ten cross galleries (numbered 3–13 by the Germans), driven at right

angles to the main tunnel at intervals of 24 metres (79 ft). Each gallery was fitted with a 600 mm (1 ft 11 5⁄8 in)

gauge railway track. On the east side of the tunnel were chambers intended to be used as store rooms, offices

and quarters for the garrison. Trains would have entered the facility and unloaded shells and propellant for the

guns.

Discovery and destruction

An RAF Handley Page Halifax flies over Mimoyecques on 6 July 1944 as exploding bombs send smoke and clouds

of dust into the air.

Two US Army soldiers with a captured Sprenggranate 4481 projectile, which would have been fired from the V-3

at a rate of 1 every 6 seconds.

In 1943 French agents reported that the Germans were planning to mount an offensive against the United Kingdom

that would involve the use of secret weapons resembling giant mortars sunk in the ground and served by rail

links. The first signs of abnormal activity at Mimoyecques were spotted by analysts at the Allied Central

Interpretation Unit in September 1943, when aerial reconnaissance revealed that the Germans were building

railway loops leading to the tunnels into the eastern and western sites. Further reconnaissance flights in October

1943 photographed large-scale activity around the tunnels. An analyst named André Kenny discovered a series

of shafts when he saw from a reconnaissance photograph that a haystack concealing one of them had

disintegrated, perhaps through the effects of a gale, revealing the entrance, a windlass and pulley. The purpose

of the site was unclear, but it was thought to be some kind of shelter for launching rockets or flying bombs.

An MI6 agent reported that "a concrete chamber was to be built near one of the tunnels for the installation of a

tube, 40 to 50 metres long, which he referred to as a 'rocket launching cannon'". The shafts were interpreted as

"air holes to allow for the expansion of the gases released by the explosion of the launching charge." The Allies

were unaware of the HDP gun and therefore of the Mimoyecques site's true purpose. Allied intelligence believed

at the time that the V-2 rocket had to be launched from tubes or "projectors", so it was assumed that the inclined

shafts at Mimoyecques were intended to house such devices.

The lack of intelligence on Mimoyecques was frustrating for those involved in Operation Crossbow, the Allied effort

to counter the V-weapons. On 21 March 1944 the British Chiefs of Staff discussed the shortage of intelligence but

were told by Reginald Victor Jones, one of the "Crossbow Committee" members, that little information was leaking

out because the workforce was predominantly German. The Committee's head, Duncan Sandys, pressed for

greater efforts and proposed that the Special Operations Executive be tasked to kidnap a German technician who

could be interrogated for information. The suggestion was approved, but was never put into effect. In the end the

Chiefs of Staff instructed General Eisenhower to begin intensive attacks on the so-called "Heavy Crossbow" sites,

including Mimoyecques, which was still believed to be intended for use as a rocket-launching site.

The Allied air forces carried out several bombing raids on Mimoyecques between November 1943 and June 1944

but caused little damage. The bombing disrupted the construction project and the initial raids of 5 and 8 November

1943 caused work to be delayed for about a month. The Germans subsequently decided to abandon the western

site, where work had not progressed very far, and concentrated on the eastern site. On 6 July 1944 the Royal Air

Forcebegan bombing the site with ground-penetrating Tallboy bombs. One Tallboy hit the concrete slab on top of

Drift IV, collapsing the drift. Three others penetrated the tunnels below and substantially damaged the facility,

causing several of the galleries to collapse in places. Around 300 Germans and forced labourers were buried alive

by the collapses. Adding to the Germans' difficulties, major technical problems were discovered with the HDP gun

projectiles. They had been designed to exit the barrels at a speed of about 1,500 m (4,900 ft) per second, but the

Germans found that a design fault caused the projectiles to begin "tumbling" in flight at speeds above 1,000 m

(3,300 ft) per second, causing them to fall well short of the target. This was not discovered until over 20,000

projectiles had already been manufactured.

After the devastating raid of 6 July, the Germans held a high-level meeting on the site's future at which Hitler

ordered major changes to the site's development. On 12 July 1944 he signed an order instructing that only five

HDP guns were to be installed in a single drift. The two others were to be reused to house a pair of Krupp K5

artillery pieces, reamed out to a smooth bore with a diameter of 310 millimetres (12 in), which were to use a new

type of long-range rocket-propelled shell. A pair of Rheinbote missile launchers were to be installed at the tunnel

entrances. These plans were soon abandoned as Allied ground forces advanced towards Mimoyecques, and on

30 July the Organisation Todt engineers were ordered to end construction work.

The Allies were unaware of this and mounted further attacks on the site as part of the United States Army Air

Forces experimental Operation Aphrodite, involving radio-controlled B-24 Liberators packed with explosives. Two

such attacks were mounted but failed; in the second such attack, on 12 August, Lt Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. – the

elder brother of future US President John F. Kennedy – was killed when the drone aircraft exploded

prematurely. By the end of the bombing campaign, over 4,100 tons of bombs had been dropped on Mimoyecques,

more than on any other V-weapons site.

The Mimoyecques site was never formally abandoned, but German forces left it at the start of September 1944 as

the Allies advanced north-east from Normandy towards the Pas-de-Calais. It was captured on 5 September by the

Canadian 3rd Infantry Division.

Subsequent investigations and attempted demolition

One of the concrete slabs through which the V-3 guns would have been fired. It was demolished in May 1945 by

the Royal Engineers.

In September 1944, Duncan Sandys ordered the constitution of a Technical Inter-Services Mission under

Colonel T.R.B. Sanders. It was given the task of investigating the V-weapons sites at

Mimoyecques, Siracourt, Watten, and Wizernes, collectively known to the Allies as the "Heavy Crossbow" sites.

Sanders' report was submitted to the War Cabinet on 19 March 1945.

Even at this stage the true purpose of the site was unclear. Claims that it had been intended to be used for "electro-

magnetic projectors" (railguns), firing huge shells at London, were debunked by Lord Cherwell, Winston Churchill's

scientific adviser, who calculated that it would take sixty times the output of Battersea Power Station to fire a one-

ton shell. Sanders' investigation brought to light the V-3 project for the first time, to the alarm of the British

government. He concluded that although the site had been damaged it "could be completed or adapted for

offensive action against this country at some future date, and [its] destruction is a matter of importance." Sandys

brought the matter to the attention of Churchill and advised: "Since this installation constitutes a potential threat to

London, it would be wise to ensure that it is demolished whilst our forces are still in France." Churchill later

commented that the V-3 installation at Mimoyecques "might well have launched the most devastating attack of all

on London."

The discovery of the site's true purpose produced some recriminations in London, as – unlike the V-1 and V-2

projects – the V-3 had not been uncovered by Allied intelligence before the war's end. The British scientist and

military intelligence expert Reginald Victor Jones later commented that "techniques that had been used against

the flying bomb and the rocket appeared to have failed against HDP [V-3], and there had to be a reason. Basically

it was that with our limited effort we had to concentrate on the most urgent problem, and thus on catching weapons

not so much at the research stage (although we sometimes achieved this) as in the development stage – which

usually meant when trials were showing promise." He concluded at the time, in April 1945, that the intelligence

failure had not made much practical difference given the fact that the Germans had failed to develop the HDP into

an effective weapon: "there was little warning; [but] there was little danger."

Following the recommendation that the site should be destroyed, the Royal Engineers stacked ten tons of British

500 lb (230 kg) bombs and captured German plastic explosive in the tunnels at Mimoyecques and detonated them

on 9 May. This failed to achieve the desired effect, and on 14 May, a further 25 tons of explosives were used to

bring down the north and south entrances to the railway tunnel into the site. A subsequent investigation by the

British Bombing Research Mission concluded that the entrances had been heavily blocked and that it would be a

very difficult and lengthy engineering task to reinstate them. The British action was taken without informing the

French beforehand and infuriated Charles de Gaulle, who considered it a violation of France's national sovereignty.

Reopening as a museum

After the war, the Mimoyecques site lay abandoned. Much of the equipment left by the Germans was disposed of

as scrap metal. A complete set of four steel plates, weighing 60 tons, that were intended to protect the entrances

to the drifts were bought by the manager of the Hidrequent-Rixent quarries to be cut up for use in rock-crushing

machinery. Rediscovered by local historians in the 1990s, they remained at the quarries until 2010, when the

surviving plates were returned to Mimoyecques, where they are now on display.

The Mimoyecques site today

Despite the closure of the railway tunnel entrances it was still possible for many years to get into the complex by

climbing down one of the inclined drifts. In 1969, Marie-Madeleine Vasseur, a farmer from Landrethun, had the

southern entrance excavated so that the tunnels could be used as a mushroom farm. 30 metres (98 ft) of the

southern tunnel had to be removed to clear the blockage; the entrance now visible is not the original one built by

the Germans. The southern entrance had been bricked up again by the 1970s. Moved to discover this forgotten

construction, Vasseur, helped by family and friends, cleared the tunnels and installed an electricity supply.

The société à responsabilité limitée "La Forteresse de Mimoyecques"was constituted in 1984 to operate the site

as a museum under the name of Forteresse de Mimoyecques — Un Mémorial International.[29] The museum

closed at the end of the 2008 season when the owner retired. Subsequently, the nonprofit

organisation Conservatoire d'espaces naturels du Nord et Pas-de-Calais (Conservatory of natural sites of the Nord

and Pas-de-Calais) purchased it at a cost of €330,000, with funding provided by the Nord-Pas-de-Calais regional

council, the European Union and a private benefactor. The Conservatory's interest was due to the presence on

the site of a large bat colony that included rare species, such as the Greater Horseshoe Bat, Geoffroy's Bat and

the Pond Bat.

The intercommunality of the Terre des Deux Caps and the authorities in nearly Landrethun set up a partnership

to operate the site under the management of the existing museum of La Coupole near Saint-Omer. The director

of the latter, historian Yves le Maner, designed the contents of a new museum that was constructed at a cost of

€360,000.

The site reopened to the public on 1 July 2010. As well as presenting a history of the V-weapons and of the site,

the museum enables visitors to see some of the tunnels and a mock-up of the HDP gun. The tunnels also house

memorials to Joseph Kennedy, the other bomber crew members killed during raids on the site, and the forced

labourers who lost their lives during construction. In 2011, the museum had about 11,000 visitors, of whom 53%

were French, 18% Belgian and 16% British.

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