On Göring's advice, Udet took some sick leave. During the time he was in hospital Milch had Udet's unfortunate Chief of Staff a close friend of Udet banished to the eastern front. And he replaced Udet's chief engineer with a man of his own choice. When Udet came out of hospital he was upset. He clashed with Milch on the subject of fighter production (Bf 109 versus FW 190). Milch won the fight but diplomatically suggested that Udet go with him to Paris for a few days' vacation, 'to straighten things out again." Udet agreed that they would meet at Tempelhof airport at Monday noon, and then went to spend the weekend with his mistress and with his one-time Chief of Staff, who still owed gambling debts and was now on leave before departing to the Russian front.

On Monday morning, Udet was found dead with two empty cognac bottles and a revolver. On the wall he had scrawled a message accusing Göring of selling out to 'the Jew' Milch: "Iron Man, you deserted me!" he'd written.

Göring dictated a press notice that said that Udet had died from injuries suffered while testing a new weapon. In his diary Milch blamed everything on Udet's one-time Chief of Staff, adding as a contributory cause a rumour that Udet's mistress had threatened to leave him.

Hitler was present at the state funeral. Werner Molders was summoned to be a pall-bearer for Udet (who after Von Richthofen was the most successful fighter pilot of the First World War). His aircraft hit a factory chimney. Molders died.

Milch took over Udet's department, in addition to his own.

Acknowledgments: It was A. J. P. Taylor who suggested initially that I should write a history book. My first thanks, therefore, must go to him for his sustaining encouragement throughout the six years it has taken to produce Fighter. I also thank Albert Speer for our talks and for reading the manuscript.

Some years ago, Derek Coyte arranged for me to fly as one of the crew delivering a Heinkel He 111 to a museum in Germany. It was the first aircraft to fly over Germany in Luftwaffe colours since the end of the war. Adolf Galland, the fighter ace, was waiting to greet us when we landed, and from that moment many doors were opened to me for my enquiries. So to all the many RAF and Luftwaffe flyers, too numerous to mention by name, who recollected for me their experiences and adventures, and discussed with me details of the battle, go my grateful thanks. In particular, I am indebted to those who brought me long-forgotten diaries and documents, finished and unfinished memoirs, and other valuable material, and to those war-gamers who tested out ideas and drew my attention to new ways of looking at the course of events.

I would also like to thank the staff at the Imperial War Museum and Group Captain E. B. Haslam, F.R. Hist. Soc, and Denis Bateman of the Ministry of Defence (Historical Branch), all of whom gave me every possible assistance with research.

For permission to reproduce the photographs in this book, some of which have never been published before, I acknowledge Associated Press, Flight International, Imperial War Museum, Keystone Press Agency, Orbis Publishing Ltd, Popperfoto, Radio Times Picture Library, Rairpix, Robert Hunt Library, Syndication International, and U.S. Information Agency.

I thank Group Captain John A. Kent and his publishers, William Kimber, for permission to quote from One of the Few on pages. I also acknowledge my debt to Robert Wright and his publishers, Macdonald, whose book Dowding and the Battle of Britain was a most valued research source.

Finally, I thank Derek Jewell and Peter Giddy for help and encouragement, Ellenor Handley, who for many years has helped to transform my scribbling into proper text, Ray Hawkey, Anton Felton and everyone at Jonathan Cape who worked on the book. Some additions and changes I made to the text when the book was later published in America have also been embodied in this paperback edition.

Bibliography

Books

Anon." Psychological Disorders in Flying Personnel of the RAF, 1939–1945, HMSO, 1946

Anon." The Origins and Development of Operational Research in the RAF, HMSO, 1963

Anon." Radar: A Report on Science at War, Government Printing Office, Washington, nd.

Anon." The Rise and Fall of the German Air Force, Ministry of Defence (restricted access), nd. Bekker, C. The Luftwaffe War Diaries, translated from the German by F. Ziegler, Macdonald, 1967

Churchill, Winston S." The Second World War, six volumes, Cassell, 1960

Collier, Basil, Leader of the Few, the authorized biography of Air Chief Marshal the Lord Dowding, Jarrolds, 1957

The Battle of Britain, Batsford, 1962 Collier, Richard, Eagle Day, Pan, 1968

Cross, Roy, and Scarborough, Gerald, Classic Aircraft, Their History and How to Model Them, four series, P. Stephens, 1971-4 Crowther, J. G." and Whiddington, R." Science at War, HMSO, 1947

Deere, Alan C, Nine Lives, Hodder and Stoughton, 1969

Douhet, Giulio, The Command of the Air, translated from the Italian by Dino Ferrari, Faber and Faber, 1943

Fest, Joachim, Hitler, translated from the German by R. and C. Winston, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1974

Galland, Adolf, The First and the Last: German Fighter Force in World War II, translated from the German by M. Savill, Eyre Methuen, 1973

Green, William, War Planes of the Third Reich, Macdonald 1970

Hillary, Richard, The Last Enemy, Macmillan, 1942

Irving, David, Destruction of Dresden, Elmfield Press, 1974

The Rise and Fall of the Luftwaffe, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1974

Kent, John, One of the Few, Kimber, 1971 Lewis, Peter, The British Fighter Since 1912, Putnam and Co." 1974

Mason, Francis K." Battle Over Britain, McWhirter, 1969

Olmsted, Merle, Aircraft Armament, Modern Aircraft Series, Sports Car Press, 1970

Postan, M. M." Design and Development of Weapons: Studies in Government and Industry Organization, HMSO, 1964

Price, Alfred W." Instruments of Darkness, Kimber, 1967

Speer, Albert, Inside the Third Reich, translated from the German by R. and C. Winston, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1970

Spandau: Secret Diaries, translated from the German by R. and C. Winston, Collins, 1976

Taylor, A. J. P." The Origins of the Second World War, Hamish Hamilton, 1963

English History 1914–1945. O.U.P." 1965

Beaverbrook, Hamish Hamilton, 1972

The Second World War. Hamish Hamilton, 1975

Essays in English History, Hamish Hamilton, 1976

Taylor, J. W. R." Combat Aircraft of the World, Ebury Press and Michael Joseph, 1969

(ed.) The Lore of Flight. Nelson, 1975

Taylor, Telford, The March of Conquest: The German Victories in Western Europe, 1940, Edward Hulton,

The Breaking Wave: The German Defeat in the Summer of 1940, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1967

Townsend, Peter, Duel of Eagles, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1970

Wallace, G. F." Guns of the RAF, Kimber, 1972

Watson-Watt, Sir Robert, Three Steps to Victory, a personal account by radar's greatest pioneer, Odhams, 1957

Webster, Sir Charles, The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany, 1939-45. four volumes, HMSO, 1961

Wood, Derek, and Dempster, D." The Narrow Margin. Arrow Books, 1969

Wright, Robert, Dowding and the Battle of Britain, Macdonald, 1969

Ziegler, Frank H." Under the White Rose: The Story of 609 Squadron. Macdonald, 1971

Journals and Documents

Adler

Aeroplane

Aircraft Profiles

Fighter Command Intelligence Summaries, Public Record Office

Flight

Icare

Signal

Die Wehrmacht

Note: This is a selected bibliography of English publications. For a more exhaustive list of reading matter I strongly recommend the bibliography in Richard Collier's Eagle Day, listed above.