Battle of Britain - Day 3

Day 3 – July 12th 1940
July 12, 2010 in 74 Squadron, July 1940
Weather: mainly cloudy

The day began with two attacks by the Luftwaffe against convoys heading south past the coast of East Anglia. The heaviest attack was against one of the convoys heading towards the North Foreland area of the Kent coast. Four squadrons from 12 Group were scrambled to intercept the more northerly of the attacks. At the same time German aircraft were intercepted off the Scottish coast near to Aberdeen. However, the city suffered 26 casualties as a result of the bombing. Then, later that morning an interception of an He111 was made off the coast of the Isle of Wight with the German aircraft being shot down.

It was a day when interception was made difficult by the persistence of fog over much of the North Sea and Channel. However, the day yielded 8 victories for the RAF whilst 6 RAF fighters were lost. The RAF flew 670 sorties.

74 Squadron Operational Record Book, 12 July, Hornchurch
At 16:30 hours Red Section left to investigate a raid 15 miles NE of Margate. AA fire was sighted from a ship which was being bombed by a He 111/ Flt Lt Malan DFC leading Red Section gave order to attack line eastern and opened attack closing to 300yds range. Heavy fire from the enemy aircraft’s rear gunner and silenced by Red Leader. Sgt Mould and PO Stevenson also attacked in turn and enemy aircraft seen to crash into the sea.