No. 610 (County of Chester) Squadron, from Biggin Hill, flew out to find the convoy. They kept just under the low cloud until they found it. As these Auxiliary flyers got there, they were bounced by Bf 109s. One Spitfire was shot down. The Germans, who had formed up in the manner of a bombing Staffel, were entirely fighters. They escaped without a scratch.

By now RAF loss rates were rising fast enough to draw on a graph and prove that Fighter Command would cease to exist within six weeks. And this was before the promised Adlerangriff had even started. That no one at Fighter Command drew such a graph as far as we know must have been partly due to the exaggerated RAF claims. These persuaded even some senior RAF officers that the German Air Fleets were taking severe punishment. But on 19 July those RAF optimists might have had second thoughts. Although the size of the air battle was very small, the casualty types were significant. Of five German aircraft lost, only one was a fighter. The others were, in effect, stragglers, including one old He 115 float-plane. The RAF loss, on the other hand, was ten fighters. In fighter to-fighter combat, the RAF were proving markedly inferior to the Germans.

This was the day when the RAF sent into battle the Boulton Paul Defiant two-seater. The Defiant was an updated version of the Bristol Fighter that had proved so successful in the First World War, but in 1940 it was a disaster.

Oberleutnant Hannes Trautloft, a veteran of Spain and an outstanding pilot, was leading the third Gruppe of JC 51. There were now only fifteen fighters left of his original forty. Trautloft saw nine strange-looking aircraft and noticed the gun turret behind the cockpits. He designed his attack accordingly. The Boulton Paul Defiant had no forward-facing armament. As one pilot put it, "The Defiant could only attack another plane after it had passed it." But with a power-operated turret that weighed three-quarters of a ton, and an extra man, the Defiants didn't pass many other aircraft. Of the formation of nine, only three got back to Hawking and one of those was so badly damaged that its gunner baled out.

None of 141 Squadron's Defiants would have survived had 111 Squadron not arrived. This Hurricane Squadron was making a name for itself by using a new tactic. The German fighter pilots favoured nose-to-nose, fighter-versus fighter attacks. Now the Hurricanes were flying line abreast, head-on through German bomber formations Although this tactic usually succeeded in forcing the bombers to break formation, 111 Squadron was losing enough Hurricanes in head-on collisions with the enemy to make the pilots doubt its value.

Ever since 'Dolfo' Galland had submitted his excellent reports about the employment of aircraft in the army-support role, he had been assigned to this specialization. Much to his disgust he had been given a job in the Berlin Air Ministry. He returned to operational flying only in close-support units (Schlachtgeschwader). This meant flying antiquated biplanes, such as the Heinkel He 45 and Heinkel He 51. Even when Germany invaded Poland, Galland could not get an aeroplane any better than a Henschel Hs 123, a close-attack biplane with radial engine. Eventually, by conspiring with a friendly physician, he was able to get his medical records endorsed with a note to say that he should not fly in open-cockpit aircraft. What might have sentenced him to a short life with the Stukas got him a job with fighters. But as Operations Officer with JG 27, paperwork left him little time for combat flying until, on 12 May, he flew as part of the great German thrust westwards into France and the Low Countries. He shot down three Hurricanes in one day.

Galland was very conscious of the way in which Molders — the subordinate who had taken over from him in Spain — was now recognized as Germany's ace fighter pilot. Galland was not too proud to ask Molders for advice and now says, "Werner Molders taught me how to shoot and bring down aircraft." In June, as the Luftwaffe lined up for the air war against England, Galland was assigned to command III/JG 26. He shot down two enemy fighters on the first day with his new command. During July, says Galland sardonically, Hitler's creation of a dozen new Field Marshals in the Kroll Opera House, Berlin, filtered down as far as him. Galland was made Major. This had no effect upon Galland's command of his Gruppe (about thirty fighters). In the German armed forces, a new appointment gave no entitlement to new rank.[10]

By now Galland was a well-known face among the fighter pilots. His jet-black hair, combed straight back from a high forehead, and the large Groucho Marx moustache and easy grin reassured the fighter pilots that their Gruppenkommandeur[11] was still "one of the boys". And so did the big black cigars, to which he was so addicted that he had an ashtray installed in the cockpit, enabling him to smoke right up until the moment he went on to oxygen. But only a fool would fail to see that behind the grin there was a cold, calm, and calculating fighter who, at this date, was determined to beat the score of Molders.

His rival had claimed his twenty-fifth victim about seven weeks previously, over France, but afterwards he was shot down and made a POW until the French armistice. Galland was determined to make the best of Molders' set-back. At midday on 24 July, Galland led his Messerschmitts into battle again, but the Luftwaffe were beginning to find the Spitfire a tough one to down. This morning, as we shall see, the Spitfires handed out rather more punishment than they took.

July was a month of experiments. Kesselring discovered that attacking two coastal convoys at the same time forced the defence to divide. This worked well about 8 a.m. on 24 July, when two coordinated attacks were made: one on a convoy off Dover and the other on one that was entering the Thames Estuary. The defence, which 54 Squadron from Rochford sent after one raid, saw both, and had to split up to attack them. The raiders escaped without casualties but the bombing failed to hit any of the ships. About 11 a.m. two Staffeln of Do 17s returned to the Thames Estuary to attack a convoy. ‘Dolfo’ Galland's Bf 109s were assigned as escort. Park sent 54 Squadron to attack them, and then, knowing that Galland's fighter escort would soon run short of fuel, he ordered 610 Squadron (Biggin Hill) to patrol Dover, and so cut off their escape route. In fact, 610 ran into JG 52, who were coming north to help the returning Messerschmitts. There was a fight. The raid's escort — Galland's III/JG 26 and JG 52—each lost three fighters. The two RAF squadrons lost three Spitfires.[12]

As the engagement ended, the elated Spitfire pilots dived upon another formation, and shot down one of them. The victorious pilot reported that there had been no return fire and identified his victim as a Chance Vought V.I56. RAF intelligence thought the Germans were so short of aircraft that they were now using captured French ones, until the Royal Navy reported the loss of a Blackburn Skua of 806 Squadron, Fleet Air Arm.

The fighter pilots were learning about their adversaries The Bf 109, with its fuel-injection engine, not only dived without missing a beat or two (unlike the carburettor-fed Merlins) but could out dive the RAF fighters. Galland's Messerschmitts had dived out of combat and escaped that morning when their fuel ran low.

But the Luftwaffe had never before faced a fighter as good as the Spitfire. This was acknowledged by the disproportionate number of Messerschmitt fighter pilots who, on becoming POWs, insisted that they had been shot down by Spitfires. The Hurricane pilots, who sometimes had their claims disallowed because of it, called it "Spitfire snobbery."