Dive-bombing potential of the Hawker Henley?

[Sid Guttridge]

Was the Hawker Henley in its original light bomber form in any way a potential competitor to the Ju87, or was it more like the Fairey Battle?

Many thanks,

Sid.

[Stig Jarlevik]

Hi Sid

I am not so certain that RAF considered the Henley as a Ju 87 equivalant. The Henley was conceived as a light bomber to REPLACE the Battle.

I don't think the RAF Brass ever considered dive bombing as an option within the Force.

As you know the development during the 1930's particularly on the fighter side went extremely fast and by the time the Henley flew it was thought its performance, although much better than the Battle, was STILL not good enough for it to survive in a battle environment, so it was decided to use it for other purposes.

Playing with "what ifs", I personally believe the Henley would have been far better than the Battle during the Battle of France. It looks neat and a bit Hurricane like, so, while I have no figures relating to its stress capacity, I believe its turning performance for instance would have been far greater. Roughly 30 mph faster it would have had that much better chance to escape as well. Enough? We will never know...

Cheers
Stig

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Stig,

A book entitled "Dive Bombers in Action" apparently includes an account of the Henley. I haven't seen it, but an internet review of the book says the Henley's combat career was killed off by RAF prejudice. I presume that as the RAF had no obvious prejudice against light bombers, it was its dive-bombing that offended.

Cheers,

Sid.

[Stig Jarlevik]

Hallo again Sid

Confess I haven't seen the title you refer to, but I am very certain the type in question was NOT developed as a dive bomber as such. All light bombers are designed to be capable of "diving", the Henley as well, but that is a far cry from the "true" dive bombing we have come to associate with the JU 87 (mode initially developed by the USN). The specification for the Henley was that it should be capable of diving, but I have seen no specific details as to what angels etc this specification refered to.

What I am very positive about is that it was not the diving capacity that killed off the Henley as a bomber (diving or not), it was the changed climate in Europe. I am in agreement that the Allied Expeditionary Force in France would have been better off with the Henley than the Battle, but that was hard for the "thinkers" in the 1937-39 period to anticipate. I doubt Britain and RAF in particular had a scenario even coming close to what actually happened in the 1940-45 period and although Britain came out of the the Battle of France as "second best", the rest of the war proved those planners slowly fought their back to to the top

Cheers
Stig

[Graham Boak]

The Henley would have been better than the Battle in France, but we are not talking about true equivalents. The Typhoon would have been better, too. The Henley was a later aircraft than the Battle, and would not have been in widespread squadron service in time. Placing it into production would have reduced the production of the Hurricane, and that is the real reason why it was not adopted in numbers. It is difficult to see how any number of Henleys would have compensated for the loss of fighter production at that time.

[JohnMacG6]

There's also the point that even if the Henley had replaced the Battle in time for the Battle of France, if the Henley had been used in the same way as the Battle, IE in very low level and without fighter escort, they would probably have suffered as many losses to German flak and fighters as the Battles did.

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi Guys,

I have just looked at the Putnam book on Hawker aircraft. It seems that the Henley was fully stressed for dive bombing.

Cheers,

Sid.