WHILE LONDON BURNED

New Zealand Listener, Volume 39, Issue 989, 1 August 1958, Page 11

WHILE LONDON BURNED

Sir,-Anti-aircraft gunners deployed in the defence of London and S.E. England hardly deserve the contemptuous teference to a "handful of wildly inaccurate anti-aircraft guns,’ employed in the article entitled "While London Burned." The German pilots engaged in the Battle of Britain did not so regard them, according to General Werner Kreipe, commanding one of the Luftwaffe fleets taking part. The total of enemy aircraft known to have been destroyed by A.A. gunners in Great Britain is sufficient testimony to their efficiency. Picturesque writing need not be at variance with the facts, especially when less than justice has been done to the many thousands of Territorial Ack-Ack gunners of both sexes who pursued their un-spectacular task with great devotion to duty.

R. E. DAVY. formerly Lt.-Col.. R.A..

T.

A.

(Henderson)

(The gunners tried valiantly, but according to General Sir Frederick Pile, G.O.C., AntiAircraft Command, "During the three days from September 8 to 10, the Command shot down 15 planes, but only four of them were destroyed at night." In those three nights alone, no fewer than 600 bombers attacked the city. The gun control system, according to the General, "was based on our old assumption that the enemy would fly on a straight course and at a constant height and speed, and as the information depended on sound (with its consequent inaccuracy), and as the cumbersome machinery produced only a small volume of fire from a large number of ‘guns, it failed lamentably." Pile says further that "after three bad nights’ bombing in London, in which it was obvious to me, sleeping in my bed, that our system was no good, I became both angry and frightened at the same time, and lay awake the rest of the night thinking how to deal with this business." Accuracy did, of course, improve, In September the number of shells’ fired per aircraft shot down was 30,000, in October 11,000, in November and December 7000 and in January 4000. London however received 19,000 of the total of 24,000 of bombs dropped on it during the Blitz before November 14.-Ed.)