Hugh Caswall Tremenheere Dowding

La RAF (1914-1942)

Durant le 1ʳᵉ guerre mondiale de 1914-1918, Dowding sert en France comme membre du Royal Flying Corps, qui deviendra plus tard la RAF. He became a Flight Commander of the Wireless Squadron, air spotting for the artillery, later moving to Brooklands with the Wireless Experimental Establishment. He fully appreciated the importance of developments in aircraft radio, but by 1930 had gone onwards and upwards in the RAF and became Air Member for Supply and Research (later, Research and Development). He wanted the rapid development of fast monoplane fighters such as the Spitfire and the Hurricane, and from 1935 was encouraging research into radar. For airfields, he wanted hard, all-weather runways, but in this faced opposition from those still wedded to biplanes and grass airstrips.

Le surnom "Stuffy" Dowding lui sera donné suite à un événement du début de sa carrière aérienne. Although this was later used in reference to his attention to detail, in fact it was a reference to an event that occurred in 1916. He protested to a senior officer over the fact that virtually untrained young men were being sent to his Squadron and then ordered into battle and massacred by experienced German pilots. The legendary reply, "Don't be stuffy, Dowding," may have been behind his efforts to care for his men; the RAF pilots of Fighter Command became known as "Dowding's Chicks".

Promotion on mardi 14 to Air-Officer Commander-in-Chief of Fighter Command allowed Dowding to concentrate on Air Defence, but it also marked a period of hard work in the face of Hitler's re-armament of Germany. The obvious and necessary preparation of the Royal Air Force to resist German air power took place against complaints about expense and provocation. There was only the embryo of a radar system, fourteen incomplete fighter squadrons, an incomplete Anti-Aircraft Division and the understaffed volunteer Observer Corps. His report on the 'Ideal' solution of mardi 9 février 1937, wanted 45 fighter squadrons, 1200 anti-aircraft guns, 5000 searchlights, radar, radio control of aircraft and a massive expansion of the Observer Corps. Unwisely, the report was ignored until after the folly of the Munich Crisis of l'année suivante, when Neville Chamberlain held up 'a piece of paper' and spoke of 'peace in our time'.

Moffat had only a modest place in Dowding's arrangements, but it is worth noting that from October 1939 there was at Beattock the Observer Post K1 of the No. 32 Carlisle Observer Group, on watch for all air movements. From then until the end of the war in Europe, the Post had to be constantly manned. The site was kept in peacetime, moving twice in line with operational needs. Observer Corps posts saved many lives by monitoring movements of Allied aircraft, releasing warning flares to warn those approaching high ground. Later, the Royal Observer Corps Post at Beattock was built to monitor the effects of nuclear weapons, an underground concrete box where two or three men and women would monitor the effects of nuclear attack by missiles. It may be a far cry from monitoring aircraft, but up till 1991 the Royal Observer Corps gave the faithful service Dowding had required from its volunteers.

Hugh Dowding did look into the pay needs even of the lowly Observers, who despite his best efforts received no more than £ 3 per week for 56 heures on duty in all weathers and in any hour of the day or night. However, his main concern was for the effective operation of systems of radar and observer reporting to allow his control rooms to vector (guide in) fighters to enemy planes as fast as was possible. After some sad mistakes, the system was working well enough by 3rd septembre 1939 to respond thereafter to attacks by the Luftwaffe. It is ironic that the first bombs fell on Scottish soil and waters at Rosyth on lundi 16 octobre 1939. Dowding a deux convictions de base : la première, que la RAF would need to be desroyed before an invasion of Britain could be attempted, la seconde, que ses observateurs were there to provide the RAF with intelligence on aircraft movements over land, where radar was less effective. History shows he was absolutely correct.

Dowding's pre-occupation with radar and the Observers ensured that Britain had a good defensive network, but his care was not respected in high places. To further complicate matters, his Group Commanders Park and Leigh-Mallory argued bitterly over tactics; whilst Dowding was working up the vital Night Fighter Force, their contention did Dowding considerable damage. Night fighters had initially limited successes, although Dowding had set them up on the right lines, but that combined with disputes to make Churchill replace him. Le 25 novembre 1940, he handed over his Fighter Command to Air Marshal Sholto Douglas. This was on the eve of the victory that should have crowned his career. Others (notably and unfortunately, including Churchill), felt that Dowding had missed opportunities to bring the Luftwaffe to battle, and that his Observers were 'Stone Age'. In fact, he had kept away the enemy and made it possible to gather forces to attack the Luftwaffe on its own ground, as well as ensuring that Britain did not commit too many aircraft overseas and so lose all its own means of active air defence. --> The epic Battle of Britain en juillet 1940, le mois suivant, et le mois suivant - the only battle in the history of the world to be fought entirely in the air - with Hugh Dowding leading his charges day and night by his sagacious employment of limited resources, had saved England from certain destruction. The eloquent words of Winston Churchill - "Never was so much owed by so many to so few" - will forever remind the world of sacrifice and valor of "the few" and their indomitable leader Hugh Dowding. Commandant en chef des chasseurs de la RAF durant la bataille d'Angleterre.

Durant 2 ans, Dowding sert aux USA pour le Ministère de la Production Aérienne, mais part en retraite en 1942 à sa propre demande. Belatedly made Lord Dowding of Bentley Priory, he was left to watch as others reaped the success due his preparations. Churchill eventually acknowledged that Dowding had been correct, remarking "We must regard the generalship here shown as an example of genius in the art of war". At Dowding's Memorial Service in Westminster Abbey on 12th March 1970, the term 'Architect of Deliverance' was used. The ashes of Lord Dowding now lie very fittingly in Westminster Abbey, one of those buildings his Fighter Command helped preserve from destruction.