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"We tangled with a 109 circus and I found myself a playmate. He had too much staff for Junior, and though he got in a deflection shot which floated across in front of me, I never got a shot at him. . I was pleased that the Spitfire was able to turn inside of the 109, but he suddenly flipped over and disappeared before I had fired a shot - a moral victory only!"
Park then detailed what steps were to be taken to correct this situation, including the formation of a special reconnaissance flight at Gravesend."I wish the squadron commanders and sector controllers to know everything humanly possible is being done by group to increase the warning received of incoming raids. ... With the prevailing cloudy skies and inaccurate heights given by the RDF the group controllers' most difficult problem is to know the height of the incoming raids."
Hptm. Walter Adolph, with a total of nine victories in the war so far, was appointed Gruppenkommandeur of II./JG 26."Whatever time permits I wish you to get the readiness squadrons in company over sector aerodromes. Spitfires 25,000 feet, Hurricanes 20,000 feet, and wait until they report they are in good position before sending them to patrol lines or to intercept raids having a good track in fairly clear weather."
JG 2 was heavily involved in the air battles over Portland and claims were made by numerous Luftwaffe pilots. Hptm. Karl-Heinz Greisert, Lt. Egon Mayer and Uffz. Kurt Bühligen from JG 2 all made claims for Hurricanes over the Dorset coastal town. Many of the Ju 88s got through to the target at Yeovil and dropped their loads. The factory was damaged and an air raid shelter was hit, killing 100 people. There were two large fires at Portsmouth - one at a furniture depository, and the other at Government House."At 15.24 hours No. 609 Squadron was ordered to patrol base at 20,000 feet. The Squadron was airborne at 16.30 hours with myself leading. Five minutes later we were told to proceed to Portland to intercept E/A flying from South. We headed for Portland, climbing on 238 Squadrons right flank. At about 19,000 feet, bandits were sighted about 15 miles south of us. 238 Squadron suddenly appeared to break up and turn towards the East, and at the same time I saw Me 109's above us and in the sun. It was extremely bright, and as we were heading into the sun it was very difficult to pick out enemy aircraft which for now were ahead of us, also we were rather embarrassed by the Me 109's still above us. I ordered the Squadron into sections line astern and turned underneath the 109's in the direction of the enemy aircraft and then saw a circle of Me 110's directly ahead of us and proceeded to attack. I broke away downwards without seeing the result of the attack and climbed up and engaged a seperated Me 110 astern. A Hurricane carried out a deflection attack between myself and the Me 110 but I went on firing when the former had broken away, and the Me 110 dived vertically down with his port motor smoking. I then climbed up and asked Bandy control for the position of any E/A. He told me E/A plotted at 15,000 feet over Lyme Regis. I proceeded to the latter place and found a cirle of Me 110's about 10 miles NW of Portland. I attacked from dead astern and it dived vertically onto the ground about 5 miles N of the Coast (Little Breedy)."
"...enemy fighter defences showed a tenacity unknown so far."