Hitler issued fresh orders, stating that from today invasion preparations would be designed to put pressure on the British. There would be no invasion in 1940, but one might be contemplated in 1941.

An Army officer’s wife wrote to Case’s mother, explaining this and continuing: “Everyone was terribly upset when the Spitfire was shot down. I have seldom seen my husband so affected but he assured me that the boy must have been killed in the air before he crashed.

Despite poor weather there was much Luftwaffe activity, with London hit by day and night. A high explosive bomb hit the National Gallery and destroyed a room where works by the Italian painter Raphael had hung before the war.

At about 9.20am a Spitfire of No 72 Squadron crashed in a field off Winehouse Lane, Capel-le-Ferne, not far from where the National Memorial to The Few now stands. Pilot Officer Herbert Case, a 24-year-old farmer’s son from Somerset, was found dead at the scene.

It was recorded that, during a patrol led by Squadron Leader Ted Graham, Case’s aircraft had fallen out of formation for no obvious reason. Witnesses, though, later reported that they had seen the Spitfire attacked by German fighters.