Every day during the Blitz, the Daily Mail published a selection of letters from readers on various topics, out of the hundreds received every day. Clearly it can't be assumed that these are representative of British public opinion generally, or of Mail readers, or even of those readers motivated to write letters to the editor (though on that last point, at least there is the newspaper's own daily summary of its mailbag to compare with). Still, they're fascinating to read. Consider this letter from Molly Roche, of Welwyn, Hertfordshire:

For God's sake put women in charge of the R.A.F. policy before it is too late.¹

This is somewhat cryptic as it stands: what did she think women would do differently, if they were in charge of the RAF? It's clear enough from the context that the policy she had in mind was the bombing of German cities in reprisal for the Blitz. At this point, 80% of the letters received by the Mail advocated 'unlimited reprisals on German cities' -- though another 12.5% were opposed.² Was she right in implying that women generally favoured reprisals? It's impossible to say, because of the caveats mentioned above, but there were certainly other women who were thinking along the same lines. For example, Ida Turnbull, Bury St. Edmunds:

English men and women are getting as tired of hearing "bombed at random" as we were of "appeasement." And what good did that do? The only thing that Hitler and Co. can understand is the iron fist: so why not bomb their principal streets and shops of Berlin? We have the finest airmen and craft, so why not let them "Go to It?"³

Mrs. A. Penington, Blackpool:

"Bomb Berlin. Raze it to the ground." is on everybody's lips.⁴

Mrs. Rosa Keoghoe, Wood Green, N.22:

Why all this tender feeling for German children? When bombing military objectives it is their own families' fault if they are within bombing distance. They have the same chance to break up their homes and go to safer places as many English families have had to take. This is war, and we are all in it.⁵

Mrs. E. M. McMillan, Ormskirk, Lancashire (it's not clear what she is proposing specifically, but it's the first letter in a section headed 'Reprisals'):

As a cancer or a poisonous weed should be ruthlessly cut out, so must the German race be utterly and definitely purged of all its evil powers.⁶

Not all published letters from women on the matter of reprisals were in favour, of course. And there were plenty in favour from men -- or so I assume, since in most cases first names or honorifics are not given, only initials; where either or both appear, it's nearly always for a woman. The letter I found most chilling in fact gives no clue as to the gender of the author, and is from E. James, Colchester:

I understood we were going to be meeting force with force. What is murdering women and children but force?⁷

At least it's not hypocritical.

1. Daily Mail, 26 September 1940, p. 3. []
2. Ibid. The other 7.5% were presumably on unrelated topics. []
3. Ibid., 23 September 1940, p. 3. []
4. Ibid., 24 September 1940, p. 3. []
5. Ibid., 2 October 1940, p. 3. []
6. Ibid., 4 October 1940, p. 3. []
7. Ibid., 30 September 1940, p. 3. []

During the Battle of Britain and the Blitz, British newspapers regularly published official German statements about the progress of the air war. Those relating to the war over Britain could be checked against both British communiques and, to an extent, personal experience. There were large discrepancies: for example, for 7 September 1940, the Luftwaffe claimed to have lost 26 aircraft compared to 94 lost by the RAF. The British claims were almost precisely inverse: 22 British losses to 99 German.¹ Partly the differences were inherent in the nature of air combat: the same kills were often claimed by different pilots, aircraft which may have looked like goners somehow made it back to base. But in the era of Dr. Goebbels and Lord Haw-Haw, there must also have been great suspicion of anything said by any German official. According to a leading article in the Manchester Guardian, what 'the German High Command [says] on the eve of or in the course of an attack, is not evidence'.²

But there was also the air war over Germany. Here, German official statements were one of the few sources of information about the effectiveness of Bomber Command's assaults on Germany available to the British press. The very same leading article noted a discrepancy here as well, a different kind. The first really big raids on London, on 7 September 1940, killed around 400 civilians and injured 1300, according to first reports. But strangely, these casualties were far greater than those being sustained in Berlin:

Our own aircraft were over Berlin for nearly three hours on the previous night [6 September 1940] and attacked an aeroplane engine works at Spandau as well as a Berlin power station. According to the official statement made in Berlin on Saturday the anti-aircraft protective was forced by the third wave of bombers and in a working-class district fires were started and "appreciable damage done to buildings." Yet the casualties are given as three people killed and several injured. It is to be concluded either that the casualty list has been incompletely compiled or else that our bombers showed even more ability at confining themselves to their legitimate objectives than they did in forcing the city's defences.³

'[I]ncompletely compiled' seems an unnecessarily polite way of calling the Germans liars, but I'll let that pass. The first thing to note is that there are several alternative explanations for the difference in reported casualties between Berlin and London that the Manchester Guardian neglected: for example, maybe Berlin's ARP was better than London (lots of deep shelters, perhaps); or maybe Bomber Command wasn't hitting Berlin as hard as the Luftwaffe was hitting London. Neither of those possibilities would have been very palatable.

The editorial conclusion is, I think, very revealing:

The apparent contrast in casualties inflicted would argue a much closer and more effective concern with legitimate targets on the part of the R.A.F.⁴

So, rather than discount the German claims of light casualties as more of the usual lies, designed to show the world that Germany was winning the air war, the Manchester Guardian evidently preferred to regard them as true, because that confirmed the belief that Bomber Command was only attacking legitimate (that is to say, military) objectives, unlike the Germans. In this way, German propaganda seems to have fostered the delusions of both countries.

1. Actual losses were more like 28 British to 41 German. []
2. Manchester Guardian, 9 September 1940, p. 4. []
3. Ibid. []
4. Ibid. []