BACKSTREET BRAWLER

A young man, his Hurricane and the Battle of Britain

- JAMES P. BUSHA

If Hollywood had its way with history, the Supermarine Spitfire with its long slender fuselage and graceful elliptical wing would most likely be portrayed as the lone defender over the White Cliffs of Dover during the Battle of Britain. Although the Spitfire played an important role in beating back the daily Luftwaffe raids, it was the tenacity of the pug-nosed Hawker Hurricanes of the RAF that bore the brunt of aerial combat during England’s darkest days. The Hurricane was slower than the Spit and it took longer to climb to altitude, but once it got there, the stubby little fighter jumped in and out of scrapes like a backstreet brawler.

Although the RAF Hurricane had its nose bloodied many times over by the German raiders, it was able to stay upright as it absorbed many punishing blows. British estimates credit the Hurricane with four-fifths of all German aircraft destroyed during the peak of the battle—July through October of 1940. Follow along with Hurricane pilot Robert W. “Bob” Foster as he slugs it out with the mighty Luftwaffe high over England.

Learning the ropes

I joined the RAF in 1939 because I thought it would be more glamorous to be shot down in a fighter than to be shot or bayoneted as a foot soldier in a trench! By November of 1939, I had already accumulated over 50 hours of flight time in a trainer called the Avro Cadet and progressed on to the Hawker Hart, Audax and Harvard. I only had five hours of retractable undercarriage time in the Harvard before I was “kicked out of the nest” in June of 1940 and sent on to a Hawker Hurricane operational training unit in Norfolk. My first flight in the Hurricane was almost my last as I tried to bust up a perfectly good flying machine.