Great Western Airways - Last Flights

GWR (Great Western Airways). Last Flights 30th September 1933

On the 30th September, GWR flew its last flights for the season. The G.W.R Westland- Wessex monoplane G-AAW left Birmingham on Saturday morning 30th Spetember 1933 for Cardiff where the plane landed . It took off from Cardiff for Haldon Aerodrome (For Teignmouth and Torquay) but owing to fog did not land there. The plane flew on to Robourough Aerodrome (fro Plymouth) but owing to fog could not land again, so flew back to Cardiff where the mail for Plymouth was sent by rail. The plane then flew to Croydon Aerodrome and did not return to Birmingham as scheduled. In consequence of these delays, owing to fog, the mail arrived too late at Plymouth to recieve the 30 September postmark wand was not cleared from The Railway station post box until Sunday evening. The mail then recieved the Plymouth postmark of 1st October, 6.30 p.m.pThe service was only ever meant to be seasonal and conspiracy theories about it being shut down by the G.P.O. are just that. It started up again on the 5th May 1933 and on the 20th August became part of the Railway Air Services Redgrove does not list last flights, but Baldwin does. Baldwin lists ten flights as the complete set. Philips mentions a full set of flights but does not give a list. I have used Redgroves methof of naming the routes and called them D1 etc. The Baldwin ten flights are listed as D1 - D10 below. It is not known what the actual number of routes that make up a set. It is more than ten as listed by Field and maybe twelve or fourteen. At least eleven are currently known.

All the examples shown further down the page come from Plymouth, Birmingham and Cardiff. I only have pictures of ten of these whilst there are probably twelve in a full set, although there possibly could be fourteen. Any help would be appreciated. Phillips talks of a full set but does not name the stages. Once again Philips covers dominated the output and once again figures normally quoted as flown are for Phillips covers not the total number flown Philips states in 1935 ‘On September 30th, 1933, the service ended and the last G.W.R airmail was flown. Only 15 sets exist. 35 covers were flown from Plymouth-Newport and 15 each on the other stages’. Of the four main GWR mail dates, the last flights are the scarcest. I would estimate Phillips had about three quarters of the mail that day, which would mean there were about 15-20 on all stages apart from Plymouth-Newport which would be 35-40. D1. Birmingham to Plymouth D2. Birmingham to Cardiff D3. Birmingham to Torquay D4 Birmingham to Teignmouth D5 Cardiff to Birmingham D6 Cardiff to Plymouth D7 Cardiff to Torquay D8 Cardiff to Teignmouth D9 Plymouth to Cardiff D10 Plymouth to Birmingham D11 Plymouth to Newport * Not listed by Field but a Philips cover. D11 Plymouth to Newport (D13 Plymouth to Torquay) ???? (D14 Plymouth to Teignmouth) ?????

D3. Last flight Birmingham to Cardiff actuallly flown.