JANUARY

FLIGHT

IST.

1942

In the evening of May 10, Rudolph Hess, Deputy Fiihrer of the Third Reich, flew over in a Me n o and baled out over
Scotland.

1941 IN RETROSPECT
"// you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same . . . . "
-KIPLING

R. W I N S T O N C H U R C H I L L , ever since he became

Prime Minister, has warned t h e c o u n t r y t h a t there
would be ups and downs in the fortunes of war,
and when we look back on t h e tale of A.D. 1941 we find
plenty of examples of both. Fairly it m a y be claimed t h a t
the British Empire has fulfilled t h e condition laid down
b y R u d y a r d Kipling ; it has not been unduly jubilant over
its successes or depressed by its setbacks. B o t h T r i u m p h
a n d Disaster have proved themselves to be imposters, for
neither has led to t h e decision which either we or our
enemies m a y have hoped or expected. T h e E m p i r e collectively m a y claim, without undue complacency, t h a t it
has deserved Kipling's conclusion: " Y o u ' l l be a m a n ,
my s o n . "
The year started with bad weather, and the intensity of
t h e German night raiding of Great Britain was slackening.
P a r t l y on account of t h e weather, b u t even more of set
purpose, the air attacks were beginning to assume a different character. Evidently the German High Command
was beginning to a b a n d o n t h e hope t h a t intensive bombing
of the Capital would break the British moral and i n d u c e
a desire for peace a t any priceeven for surrender to

:^M'-**

Hitler and acceptance of the worst terms which he could

impose, provided only t h a t the citizens of London might
be freed from t h e fear of sudden d e a t h b y night.
T h a t German hope h a d proved vain, and t h e High Comm a n d t u r n e d its energies to t h e more hopeful (as they
thought) object of reducing Britain b y cutting its " l i f e
line " from N o r t h America. T h e night raiding was directed
more a n d more against t h e ports of Britain, chiefly those
on t h e western side of t h e island, as a help t o themselves
in t h e new phase of t h e Battle of the Atlantic. Consequently, t h e chief weight of t h e Luftwaffe's
night bombers
was t u r n e d on t o S o u t h a m p t o n , P o r t s m o u t h , P l y m o u t h ,
Bristol, Swansea, Cardiff, Liverpool, Manchester, all Merseyside, Glasgow a n d Clydeside.
T h e destruction done in these cities a n d areas was
grievous, b u t t h e citizens bore it all with t h e same fortit u d e which h a d b e \ n shown b y t h e people of London.
Moreover, t h e ports were never p u t o u t of action. W e h a d
ourselves learnt from our experiences in bombing H a m burg, Bremen, Kiel, E m d e n a n d other places in Germany,
w h a t a n enormous weight of bombs is required to m a k e a
port useless. London a n d t h e T h a m e s E s t u a r y still had
t o b e a r raids every now and t h e n , and
- Hull a n d the ports in E a s t Anglia were
also fairly regular targets for the
Germans. Birmingham also suffered.
Turning to other sections of t h e wide
battle front, the opening of the year
saw General Wavell's men pushing on
in their marvellously rapid conquest of
Cyrenaica, which reached as far as Benghazi. I t t u r n e d o u t t h a t we could not
retain our hold on t h a t province, b u t
our dash p u t o u t of action t h e large
Italian a r m y with which Marshal
The Battle of the Atlantic has gone
on for the whole 365 days.
Sinkings
during the latter part of the year were
only a fifth of those at the commencement.