(continued from Part 1)

The experience of the Americans no doubt impressed the Australian officials as paralleling their own, and on that note the proposals for regular air mail despatches by the Australian Post Office seem to have remained in abeyance until after the end of the war. However, there were other flights in the interim worthy of note —— those of Basil Watson, H. C. Carey and the Smith Brothers.

Apparently Watson and Roy Sissons (formerly Guillaux’s agent and now acting for Watson) planned a fairly extensive series of flights; Mr. Sissons’ letter of application to the Department for permission to carry air mail indicated that they planned to fly the following routes: Mildura - Melbourne, Adelaide - Melbourne, Hamilton - Melbourne, Echuca - Melbourne, Swan Hill - Melbourne, Bairnsdale - Melbourne and Albury - Melbourne. The letter went on: "The mails will consist of specially designed cards (which will) bear the disclaimer ‘The Commonwealth Postal Department does not take any responsibility for the safe delivery of this card’... I provide the necessary cancellation stamp, to be retained by your Department".

The Department approved the request to carry mail, subject to the same conditions as the Guillaux mail, i.e. those already proposed by Mr. Sissons, that the Department be under no expense, and that the cards conform to regulation sizes: not more than 5½ inches long by 3½ inches wide, nor less than 4 inches by 2¾ inches, and of approximately post card thickness.

Mr. Watson’s movements in the Western District resulted in the proposed Hamilton - Melbourne flight being extended to begin at Mount Gambier, and the trip was successfully completed.

As related earlier, he was killed after this first flight, and the extensive programme planned fell into abeyance.

The year 1917 was notable for another air mail "first" - the first such flight wholly within South Australia, made by R. Graham Carey between Adelaide and Gawler. Post office files still extant contain only very brief details, and the following information has been taken from non-Departmental sources.

Carey was born on 27th August, 1874, at Warrnambool, Vic., the son of a Cobb and Co. driver, and himself entered the transport industry. By 1912 he was operating a fleet of Ford taxis in Ballarat, Vie., and in 1914 he acquired the Bleriot XI which Maurice Guillaux had flown from Melbourne to Sydney shortly before. It was badly damaged from Guillaux’s crash at Ascot Racecourse, Sydney, and apparently some time elapsed in restoring it, because Carey did not get his flying licence until 1916, whereupon he established the Ballarat Flying School.

Over the next few months, he followed the usual activities of private pilots of the time training pupils, carrying passengers, barnstorming and displays at shows and fairs throughout western Victoria. In 1917 he was engaged to give a series of displays in Adelaide in connection with Red Cross and Army Nurses Fund appeals, and the Bleriot was railed there from Victoria.

On 23rd November, 1917, Carey took off from Enfield, S.A., with the first official airmail flown in South Australia - a mail bag containing about 100 postcards and ten letters, postmarked that day at Adelaide. The short flight was uneventful, although the weather was bad, and after half an hour in the air he arrived over Gawler about 3.30 p.m. and landed at the racecourse. He handed the mail bag to a telegraph messenger, Walter Nelsen, who delivered it to the Gawler Post Office.

Carey continued his aviation activities for many years afterwards. He died in 1959, at the age of 85 years. Two years before his death, on the 40th anniversary of his flight, he took part in a re-enactment flight and handed the philatelic mail to Mr. Walter Nelsen at Gawler.

While Watson’s and Carey’s flights attracted considerable public notice, and were notable feats in view of the primitive landing fields and practically non-existent navigational aids of the time, they were of course in the nature of exhibition flights only. Still looking towards the objective of regular, scheduled air mail despatches, the Postmaster General ’s Department appointed a special Committee - the Chief Electrical Engineer, Mr. P. Gelding, the Chief Inspector, Mr. G. Woodrow, and the Acting Chief Accountant, Mr. J. C. Westhoven - in March 1919 to "collect data, watch developments, and report ... in respect to both an Inland and Oversea Aerial Mail Service."

Presenting its first report on 28th July, 1919, the Committee said:

"The main question ... has been the possibility of an Aerial Inland Service ... between Capital Cities. There have been several press articles stating that a Company was in process of formation for this object and we anticipate that the promoters would ask for permission to carry nails. A practical business man setting out on such a project would require information as under:

(1) What class of Mail Matter would an Aero Service attract?

(2) What is the average daily load of such Mail Matter which would be available for transport by Aero Service?

We are of the opinion that only urgent letters would be sent by Aero Mail. Owing to the concentration of population in Sydney and Melbourne, an Aero Service between these two points seems at first glance to offer the best prospects, the volume of Mail Matter being much greater than between any two other points. The existing mail service by train, however, enables a letter to be despatched in the afternoon and delivered next day ... an aero service under conditions which do not provide for night flying could not give a much better service.

... a report is attached, based upon actual weighings of a week’s interchange of first class mail matter between Capital Cities ... only a small proportion of our mails consists of letters ... for instance, between the two great population centres, Sydney and Melbourne, the daily average was: Sydney to Melbourne, 320 lbs. per day; Melbourne to Sydney, 360 lbs. per day.

"In estimating what proportion of this would be available for Aero Service at special postal rates ... the United Kingdom’s Civil Aerial Transport Committee in its Report on an experimental Aerial Service between London and Glasgow ... first based its estimate as an eighth of the current letter traffic ... but later amended it to an eightieth ... in view of the British Report, we do not consider that the Acting Chief Accountant’s estimate of 5% (one twentieth) as being too pessimistic ... The daily weight of letters offering for Aero Service would, on this basis, be: Sydney to Melbourne, 16 lbs. per day; Melbourne to Sydney, 18 lbs. per day.

"To this daily average would of course be added letters from Brisbane and from Adelaide and Perth ... but these would not increase the load by more than 50% ... the volume of mail offering is so small that this Department could not, on a purely business basis, pay the promoters a sum sufficient to pay even a small percentage of the cost of operation ... 4/8d. per mile in Great Britain ... it is regrettable that the conditions do not permit us to put forward a more encouraging report."

The Committee presented a separate report, also dated 28th July, 1919, concerning an interview which had been sought by a Mr. Ken Finlay, an ex-officer of the Australian Flying Corps, who was considering the prospects of commercial aviation.

Mr. Finlay told the Committee that he felt that the Melbourne-Sydney rail service was sufficiently good to preclude air services between those two cities. He had in mind a Sydney-Adelaide air service; the greater distance and the existing circuitous rail connections would give a direct air service great advantage in this area, and he hoped that mail would constitute the main loading. He thought of using a large aircraft, perhaps an ex-bomber, with a capacity of up to 2,000 lbs.

The Committee members told him of their recent statistical survey, and that actual weighings showed an average of 60 lbs. daily from Sydney to Adelaide. If 5% of this was offered for air mail, it would amount to only 3 lbs. per day In the wry words of the report, "this seemed sufficient to convince Mr. Finlay that from the commercial viewpoint, the proposed mail service was not a business proposition ...

During the discussion, the question of overseas air mail services arose, and the Australian Government’s prize of £10,000 for the first London to Australia flight (at that tine still outstanding) was mentioned. Mr. Finlay expressed the view that £100,000 would not tempt him to undertake the trip, the report records. Nevertheless, the prize was to be won in that same year, 1919, by the team of Ross and Keith Smith, Bennett and Shiers, flying a Vickers Vimy.

In accordance with its brief, the Committee watched developments in Australia and overseas for some time afterwards, and compiled notes on European and American air services which were beginning at that period. In this country, several air transport companies were being formed, and legislation to govern air navigation was being drafted. In March 1920, in reply to overtures from representatives of one proposed air company, the Department said that if an aerial mail were established it would probably be at a special charge; that the mutter would be considered when companies were able to make definite proposals; and in the event of competition tenders would be called. In April 1920, in answer to a question in the Senate regarding aerial mail services for outback parts of Queensland and other States, the Minister representing the Postmaster General replied that the policy was to utilize aerial services for postal purposes as soon as such were commercially available.

Such a service became available in the next year; on 4th December, 1921, West Australian Airways’ inaugural flight on its Geraldton-Derby route took place, and the first regular, scheduled air mail despatches in Australia began.

Reprinted from Australian Post Office Philatelic Bulletin (1967/68)