Tangmere

The complete history of the Royal Air Force fighter station that played a vital role in D-Day, the Battle of Britain and throughout WWII. In its day, RAF Tangmere was one of the most famous and strategically important fighter stations in the British Isles. At the outbreak of World War II, it sent the first RAF squadron to France. During the Battle of Britain, Tangmere was one of the main fighter stations constantly engaging with the deadly Luftwaffe. Tangmere's Hurricane and Spitfire pilots heroically defended southern England for the next three years and turned increasingly to an offensive role. Squadrons at Tangmere were involved in Operation Jubilee and the combined raid on Dieppe. They harassed the enemy across the Channel with ever-increasing accuracy—a practice that led to their pivotal role in Operation Overlord, the Normandy landings. As the cold war set in, Tangmere was no longer well positioned as an interceptor station and by the end of 1958 Fighter Command had withdrawn its last squadron. It was eventually decommissioned in 1970, but lives on as the Tangmere Military Aviation Museum. Expertly told with use of official diaries and operations records, this is the definitive history of RAF Tangmere.