The Battle of Britain was the Hurricane’s finest hour, as its pilots bravely flew sortie after sortie to repulse the Luftwaffe.
All the assets of the plane — its firepower from eight Browning guns, its robustness, its ease of maintenance and its agility — were marshalled in the cause of national salvation.
The excitement of combat was well captured by Tom Neil, of 249 Squadron, when he took on a formation of German bombers on the morning of September 7. As Neil surged forward, he opened fire. ‘The Hurricane’s eight Brownings did not chatter, the noise was of a thick coarse fabric being ripped, a concentrated tearing which shook the aircraft with a vibration that was indescribably pleasant . . . the briefest ripple of twinkling lights. Like a child’s sparkler. I was hitting them! I couldn’t miss.’
The Battle of Britain saw the Hurricane at the peak of its performance. ‘It was the aircraft for the right season. It came at a time when it literally saved the country and it performed magnificently,’ said renowned test pilot Eric ‘Winkle’ Brown.
But after that, it went into decline as it became increasingly outdated. Like the British Armed Forces, it suffered a desperate period from late 1940 until mid-1942, when it took part in a catalogue of grim defeats, including Greece, Crete, Tobruk and Singapore.
It proved hopeless as a night fighter during the Blitz and ineffectual against the Germans during the siege of Malta. The only bright point was the continuing heroism of its pilots such as Pat Pattle, the highest scoring ace in the Hurricane, who scored probably 35 kills before he was shot down and killed over Greece in April 1941.
But, just as with Britain, the tide turned for the Hurricane from 1942 as the plane became increasingly effective as a fast fighter-bomber, its thick wings ideal for carrying the extra load.
It was invaluable in attacks on German lines during the victorious North Africa campaign, while it also inflicted serious damage on the Japanese in Burma. Right up until the final Allied victory it was in action.
Sydney Camm’s doughty fighter, rejected by the Air Ministry in early 1934, had made it through to the end of the war.
The Hawker engineer put it well in a post-war interview: ‘Without those Hurricanes, you and I would not be sitting where we are today.’
HURRICANE: Victor Of The Battle Of Britain, by Leo McKinstry, £9.99, John Murray.