support two Blenheim squadrons, Nos. 110 and 107, were placed on temporary detachment to RAF Lossiemouth in Moray, from where they could attack shipping and the German held airfield at Stavanger in southern Norway. The Group carried out intensive operations against the advancing Germans in the Battle of France following their breakthrough of 10 May 1940, suffering heavy losses. On 17 May, twelve crews of No. 82 Squadron left Watton to attack enemy columns near Gembloux. A severe flak barrage split the formation up, allowing Messerschmitt Bf 109s to attack. Only one Blenheim, managed to return to Watton, the rest shot down. No.82 Squadron was again operational just three days later. During June, Blenheims began a new phase by bombing Luftwaffe airfields in France. In July the twelve Blenheim squadrons of 2 Group lost 31 aircraft, along with three Wing Commanders. During the summer the light bomber force also supported defensive operations during the Battle of Britain, bombing German invasion barges concentrated in the Channel ports. As Bomber Command commenced on its nighttime bomber offensive against Germany 2 Group was set aside to engage in daylight raids on shipping, coastal ports and other heavily defended targets across the channel in Occupied Europe. At that stage of the war the Group’s Blenheims were near obsolete and sustaining heavy operational casualties. Nevertheless, operations continued unabated under Air Vice-Marshal D F Stevenson, a man who was infamous throughout the RAF at the time for his ruthless aggressiveness, his ambition and his lack of concern for the high loss rates suffered by his crews. Even Churchill was greatly disturbed by the loss rates on the attacks Stevenson was ordering his crews to fly. Upon his removal as Air Officer Commanding (AOC) in December 1941 his crews were greatly relieved. No. 2 Group carried out a low-level attack on Bremen on 2 July 1941 in which the leader, Wing Commander Hughie Edwards of No. 105 Squadron, won the Victoria Cross. 2 Group supported the ill-fated Dieppe Raid in August 1942. Mosquito Mk IV's also made the first daylight attack on Berlin. On 6 December 1942 James Pelly-Fry led 2 Group's Operation Oyster daylight raid on the Philips electrical works at Eindhoven in the Netherlands. Eight of 2 Group's squadrons were committed to the raid, which was complicated by the need to use three different types of bomber aircraft to get an adequate bomb load to