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The news that Britain was at war was broken by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain at 11.15am on Sunday 3 September 1939. In a 5 minute broadcast on the Home Service, he announced that as Hitler had failed to respond to British demands to leave Poland, "This country is at war with Germany". Chamberlain went on to say that the failure to avert war was a bitter personal blow, and that he didn't think he could have done any more.
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