Its was the first battle in history waged almost exclusively in the air

Hitler’s plan to invade the British mainland hinged on Germany first annihilating the Royal Air Force and winning air superiority over England. With this in mind, the fight for Britain transformed into an all-air contest between the Luftwaffe’s bombers and Messerschmitt Bf109s and British Fighter Commander’s Hawker Hurricanes and Supermarine Spitfires. Luftwaffe commander Hermann Goering initially believed he would easily sweep the RAF aside in just a few days, but the dogfights dragged on for three and a half long months. By the time the battle ended in late-October, Germany had lost more than 1,700 planes-nearly twice as many as the British.

A British pilot famously rammed a German bomber to prevent the destruction of Buckingham palace

During one of the battle’s most frantic periods of fighting over London, RAF Sergeant Ray Holmes spotted a German Dornier bomber headed in the direction of Buckingham palace. Holmes had already used up all his ammunition in an earlier dogfight, but rather than retiring, he steered his hawker hurricane straight at the enemy aircraft and rammed it with his wing. The blow sliced the dornier’s tail clean off and sent it plummeting into a nearby Victoria Station. Holmes’ Hurricane was also wrecked, but he managed to bail out and land dangling from the roof of an apartment complex. The astonishing incident was partially captured on film, and Holmes was hailed as a national hero for having saved the royal residence from potential disaster.

Spitfire was not Britain’s main aircraft

The battle included one of the earliest uses of radar in combat