as sport airfield with wide grass strip slopping slightly eastward. Its infrastructure consisted of few corrugated metal sheet hangars, solid main building, elegant officers mess and wooden and solid quarters. During the war, the aerodrome was one of the main bases of the 11 Group. There was enough room to disperse planes of four squadrons, but not for all the pilots, and some of them were billeted in local villas but in rather Spartan conditions. On the very next day upon arrival, the Poles commenced their training on Miles Master, and on the 6th on Hurricane Mk Is. As previewed, in August the unit received initial complement of 18 fighters. Some had problems to adjust themselves to new equipment, which for some made a huge difference of whatits first success and joined the raging aerial battle. Its finest hour had arrived. Read about the No. 303 Polish Squadron Battle of Britain exploits here On October 11th, after nearly six weeks of being in the thick of fighting, the exhausted 303 was moved to Leconfield. It then became a intensive fighter training unit, and begun receiving replacements for those who had been killed, wounded, or sent to OTUs as instructors.



Rested from the strain of heavy fighting (from left): sgt Kustrzynski, Sgt Popek, Sgt Szlagowski, F/O Feric, P/O Daszewsski and F/O Zumbach. The Battle of Britain (BoB) was in its last stages, and although the favorable weather for invasion could still come, its threat was vanquished. The Luftwaffe was still a handful, but the Fighter Command could