Dowding of Fighter Command: Victor of the Battle of Britain
- ISBN-10
- 1908117745
- ISBN-13
- 9781908117748
- Category
- Biography & Autobiography
- Pages
- 352
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2008-10-30
- Publisher
- Grub Street
- Author
- Vincent Orange
Description
Making full use of archival sources, studies by other scholars, and information provided by family members, Vincent Orange has completed the first biography of Air Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding to cover his entire life. Soldier, pilot, wireless pioneer, squadron commander, spiritualist, champion skier, ‘Stuffy’ Dowding is perhaps best known as the creator of the first radar-based air defense system and his no less remarkable management of such throughout the Battle of Britain. Dowding served in ‘delightful and dangerous Iraq’, helped to pacify unrest in the Holy Land, was involved in the R.101 airship disaster and oversaw the creation of Britain’s first eight-gun monoplanes, the Hurricane and Spitfire. Controversially dismissed from Fighter Command and refused the R.A.F.’s highest rank, he nevertheless became the first airman elevated to the peerage since Trenchard. Westminster Abbey was packed for his memorial service in March 1970 with more that 46 air marshals in attendance; and in 1988 H.M. the Queen Mother unveiled a statue in his honor. With his expert eye, respected historian Orange has analyzed and evaluated every episode of Dowding’s exceptional career to produce what will be seen as the definitive biography.
Get the book
Similar books
-
Dowding and Churchill: The Dark Side of the Battle of Britain
By Jack DixonSir John: The Profession of Arms (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1983) Horne, Alistair: To Lose a Battle. France 1940 (Boston, Little, Brown and Co., 1969) — The Longest Battle. The War at Sea 1939-45 (London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson) ...
-
Air Officer Commanding: Hugh Dowding, Architect of the Battle of Britain
By Jr., John T. LaSaineCampion, The Battle of Britain, 1945–1965: The Air Ministry and the Few (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015), 91–115. ... Committee report quoted in Jenny Hazelgrove, Spiritualism and British Society between the Wars (Manchester and New ...
-
RAF Fighter Command 1936-1968
By Norman L. R. FranksRAF Fighter Command 1936-1968
-
Honour Restored: The Battle of Britain, Dowding and the Fight for Freedom
By Sqn Ldr Peter Brown AFCPeter Brown, former Battle of Britain Spitfire pilot, presents a vivid account of Britain under the threat of invasion, reminding us of the bravery of our fighter pilots and the courage of the people of Britain who endured the hardships of ...
-
Dowding and Headquarters Fighter Command
By Peter FlintThis story of HQ Fighter Command at Bentley Priory takes in the fighter offensive, the planning and preparation of the D-Day assault. It also comes to some surprising conclusions about the dismissal of Air Chief Marshal Dowding.
-
Air Officer Commanding: Hugh Dowding, Architect of the Battle of Britain
By John T. LaSaineA new biography of the architect of RAF Fighter Command in the centennial year of the Royal Air Force
-
Growth of Fighter Command, 1936-1940: Air Defence of Great Britain
By T.C.G. JamesThe first of two volumes of the classified Air Historical Branch study of Fighter Command and the Air Defence of the United Kingdom.
-
Dowding and the Battle of Britain
By Robert WrightDowding and the Battle of Britain
-
The Dowding Papers
By D. M. SpiersThe previously unpublished personal memoir of Air Chief Marshal Lord Dowding written for a biographer.
-
The Dowding Papers
By D. M. Spiers andThe papers cover his early life at School, in the Army and later the Royal Air Force, including the termination of his tenure as C-in-C Fighter Command, and his subsequent interest in Spiritualism.