Operation Heligoland Bight
18 December 1939 — Heligoland Bight
- Date
- 18 December 1939
- Target
- Heligoland Bight, Germany
- Force dispatched
- 24 aircraft
- Aircraft lost
- 12
Narrative
On 18 December 1939, in one of the first air battles of the war, Bomber Command sent twenty-four Vickers Wellingtons in daylight to attack German warships in the Heligoland Bight off Wilhelmshaven. The crews had been assured that tight formation flying and their gun turrets would see off any fighters. Instead, Messerschmitt Bf 109s and Bf 110s tore into the unescorted bombers, which had no self-sealing fuel tanks and no guns to meet an attack from the beam. About half the force was destroyed — some twelve Wellingtons shot down outright and others lost ditching or crash-landing on the way home. The disaster shattered the pre-war faith in the self-defending daylight bomber and pushed Bomber Command decisively towards the night offensive it would wage for the rest of the war.
Sortie details (which aircraft from which squadron, which crew flew, the outcome) will populate this page once the TNA AIR 27 squadron-diary importer arrives.
The fallen
70 airmen in this archive died on 18 December 1939 or the day that followed. For a raid of this kind these are overwhelmingly the night's losses, though a death-date match is not by itself proof an individual flew this operation.
- Flying Officer Douglas Bellamy Allison
- Flight Lieutenant Thomas Gaufrey Wearmouth Appleby
- Flying Officer John Edgar Atkinson (21)
- Flying Officer Donald Charles Ephraim Bailey (25)
- Sergeant Maurice William Barrington-taylor (26)
- Leading Aircraftman John Arundel Barstow
- Corporal Reginald Thomas Black (20)
- Pilot Officer Alistair Hugh Richmond Bourne
- Flying Officer Michael Franklin Briden (22)
- Sergeant John Archibald Brister (19)
- Pilot Officer William Stanley Francis Brown (21)
- Flying Officer John Thomas Irvine Challes
- Sergeant Albert Coe (23)
- Pilot Officer Francis Aloysius Connolly (24)
- Leading Aircraftman Gurth Ernest Cox
- Leading Aircraftman Alex Morrison Dickie (21)
- Pilot Officer Matthew Infield Drawwater (28)
- Aircraftman 2nd Class William James Ellis (19)
- Sergeant Thomas Henry English
- Flight Sergeant Alfred Kitto Fearnside (25)
- Flight Lieutenant Henry Parker Fitzgerald (21)
- Aircraftman 2nd Class Alan Gordon Foster
- Aircraftman 1st Class George Warne Geddes
- Leading Aircraftman Albert George Goodenough