Quotations about or by Lord Dowding
“…A difficult man, a self-opinionated man, a most determined man, and a man who knew more than anybody about all aspects of aerial warfare.”
Sir Frederick Pile GCB DSO MC (General Officer Commanding Anti-Aircraft Command)
“We admired him more than we loved him, for none of us really knew him intimately. He was too busy “rowing with the Ministries” on our behalf to get us the equipment we so desperately needed, so we saw him all too seldom to get to know him well.”
Air Commodore Teddy Donaldson (Commander of 151 Squadron) in Dowding’s Obituary in Daily Telegraph 1970
“ I firmly believe that painful experiments on animals are morally wrong, and that it is basically immoral to do evil in order that good may come- even if it were proved that mankind benefits from the suffering inflicted on animals. I further believe that, in the vast majority of cases, mankind does not benefit, and the results of vivisection are, in fact, misleading and harmful.”
Lord Dowding in the House of Lords July 1957
“Dowding is one of those people who seldom make a pleasant remark to one’s face, but who never make an unpleasant remark behind one’s back.”
Sir Arnold Lunn
“He was among the first to appreciate the vital importance of RDF (radar) and an effective command and control system for his squadrons. They were ready when war came. In the preliminary stages of that war, he thoroughly trained his minimal forces and conserved them against strong political pressure to disperse and misuse them. His wise and prudent judgement and leadership helped to ensure victory against overwhelming odds and thus prevented the loss of the Battle of Britain and probably the whole war. To him, the people of Britain and of the Free World owe largely the way of life and the liberties they enjoy today.”
Inscription on the base of the statue of Dowding outside St. Clement Dane’s Church in London (the RAF Church)
“…the papa who was all affection, the chap who wrote me entrancing letters about war and flying and polo and shooting from Iraq and Palestine.”
Dowding’s son Derek
“Seldom in our history has a man deserved so much of his fellow countrymen and wanted and received so little…Dowding surely earned his place alongside Nelson and Wellington and other great military names in our history.”
Douglas Bader
“…one of those great men whom this country miraculously produces in times of peril.”
Dennis Healey at Dowding’s Memorial Service 12th March 1970
“I believe that our chief was the only C-in-C of any major successful campaign in the 1939-1945 war who did not receive his fifth star. Yet his victory was critical, complete, unreserved and against near overwhelming odds. I can think of five-star commanders who could not lay such a claim. “
Wing Commander Jock Thomson
“My job was to prevent the war from being lost, not to win it, and when my job is done, I shall go out like a cork from a bottle.”
Dowding speaking to his friend Sir Arnold Lunn
“To the love of my life. Isn’t it fun- she’s also my wife!”
Dowding wrote this to his second wife, Muriel, on their 15th wedding anniversary in 1966 – given to her with an amethyst and diamond ring.
“That when men have been suddenly killed in the heat of action, they have no idea that they are dead and wander about for a time in a state of great bewilderment. These were the people whom we were enabled to help by quietly explaining their condition to them and by putting them in touch with those who would be able to give them further assistance in this new stage of their life.”
Dowding
“We are not too proud to organise National Days of Prayer and we should not be too proud to acknowledge the results. Some people are inclined to say “Good Lord deliver us from this grievous affliction” and afterwards to attribute their deliverance to their own efforts. I have a deep personal conviction of divine intervention in this war, which I believe we should otherwise have lost some time ago.”
Dowding on Battle of Britain Day in 1942
“Far from being the old Stuffy Dowding of World War One, he set out to learn from his men about any faults which could be put right both in the aircraft and their operation. He would gather round him groups of pilots, encouraging them to speak out frankly.”
Lord Balfour writing (in 1988) about how he found Dowding in 1940
“When argument failed, Dowding laid down his pencil on the Cabinet table. This gentle gesture was a warning of immeasurable significance. The War Cabinet cringed, and Dowding’s pencil won the Battle of Britain.”
A.J.P Taylor (Historian) – A quotation that Dowding himself is said to have found “rather absurd.”
“ If an adequate fighter force is kept in this country, if the fleet remains in being, and if home forces are suitably organised to resist invasion, we should be able to carry on the war single-handed for some time, if not indefinitely. But if the home defence force is drained away in desperate attempts to remedy the situation in France, defeat in France will involve the final, complete and irremediable defeat of this country.”
Dowding in 1940
“Since I was a child, I have never accepted ideas because they were orthodox, and consequently I have frequently found myself in opposition to generally accepted views…. perhaps, in retrospect, this has not been altogether a bad thing.”
Dowding (from his notes) written in 1956, to assist with a biography of him
“The strains of the great problems and lack of sleep began to show. There were times when I saw him almost blind with fatigue; he obviously needed a long rest, he was becoming burnt out. When Dowding was eventually replaced, he came along to see office and said, “I think you know that I am going, thank you very much”. On the morning of his departure, Sholto Douglas came to take over and walked into the office while Dowding was writing at his desk; he finished what he was doing, looked up at Sholto Douglas and simply said “Good morning”, and was away.”
Peter Flint
Dowding and Headquarters Fighter Command:
“My dear Fighter Boys, in sending you this my last message, I wish I could say all that is in my heart. I cannot hope to surpass the simple eloquence of the Prime Minister’s words “Never before has so much been owed by so many to so few” The debt remains and will increase. In saying good-bye to you I want you to know how continually you have been in my thoughts, and that, though our direct connection may be severed, I may yet be able to help you in your gallant flight. Good-bye to you and God bless you all.”
Letter written by Dowding November 24th, 1940
“Without his vision, his planning, his singleness of purpose, and his complete disregard for personal aggrandizement, Fighter Command might have been unable to win the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940.”
Douglas Bader
Dowding on Fairies:
“ …they are essential to the growth of plants and the welfare of the vegetable kingdom and I have a good deal of evidence to support me in this belief.”
“ Out of office hours he could be an extremely entertaining companion, having a fund of good stories and a quick wit with which to tell them. This sense of humour does not, as a rule, extend into his work, and he could be extremely exacting and tiresome to his subordinates. He had, however, a great sense of justice which earned him the respect of all who worked with him.”
Air Chief Marshall Sir Philip Joubert de la Ferte
“ The mental laziness which makes it always easier to say No than to say Yes” annoyed Dowding “…because if you say Yes you will have to think, and you may make a mistake “……but I think that Brooklands saw it in its finest flower.”
Dowding of his time at Brooklands
“….seldom allowed his dry style of humour to emerge from behind a barrier of terseness.”
Herbert Ward member of 16 Squadron, writing of Dowding
“People talk very lightly about casualties. They’ll say “We only lost four pilots today.” I feel as if I had lost four sons.”
Dowding (recalled by Albert Lunn)
Lord Balfour spoke of Dowding as a good officer whom everyone respected but a man who disliked team sports, funny stories and the “gaieties of mess life”…..“..a silent, forbidding figure…difficult to approach unasked.”
“ If mother had lived, I believe he would have enjoyed the social side of life associated with his job, because she was always so full of fun and wanted to be involved.”
Brenda (Dowding’s stepdaughter)
“I said that I wanted bullet-proof glass for the windscreens. I remember that a gust of laughter swept round the table. I said “..if Chicago gangsters can have bullet-proof windows for their cars, why can’t my pilots have bullet-proof windscreens?”
Dowding
On the award of his knighthood Dowding said
“ If I could, I should like to cut the decoration up into a thousand pieces and distribute it to the fighter boys, who are the ones who have really earned it.”