Please note there are errors in this article and they are marked with a red number. They are explained at the bottom of the article. Railway Air Services By A. G. Matheison During the late 1920s Britain's four mainline railway companies, the London. Midland & Scottish Railway. the London North Eastern Railway, the Great Western Railway and the Southern Railway, began to face stiffer opposition from the road and omnibus companies. To counter this they considered there was a need to enter the aviation field and in 1929 they were granted the right to operate aviation in a bill passed through Parliament. The first railway company to operate a was the Great Western Railway which inaugurated a service between Cardiff and via Halcion (between Teignmouth and Torquay) on April 11. 1933. The service was operated on the railway's behalf by Imperial Airways Ltd. who used a Westland Wessex aircraft G-AAGW painted in the CWR Colours of brown and cream. Official dignitaries were carried on the first flight with fare paying passengers being carried the following day, the 12th. A limited number of souvenir covers were carried on the inaugural passenger carrying stages in both directions on the 12th and 13th of April, The service was initially twice a day, weekdays but the frequency was reduced to once daily when the route was extended to Birmingham on the 22nd May, these experimental services ceased before the onset of Winter on September 30th. Aero-philatelists have a particular interest in this service as the Postmaster General authorised the carriage of letters at a surcharge of 3d and sanction was given for the use of 3d GWR Air Mail semi-official stamps in a manner similar to that applying to 'railway letter • postal material. First Day covers of the 3d GWR Air •Stamps' were flown on the 15th May (Cardiff- Plymouth route) and 22nd May (Birmingham-Plymouth). It was evident that there was a need for a better integrated service throughout the country and on March 31st, 1934 a new company. RAILWAY AIR SERVICES LTD. was authorised With a nominal share capital of £50,000. The founding firms were the four railway concerns previously mentioned together with Imperial Airways Ltd. with each putting up one Director to the Board of the Company. Imperial Airways were also to provide the aircrew and the engineering back-up supporting RAS. Operations began the same year when the first aircraft bearing the RAS livery of red. green and silver opened a service between Plymouth and Liverpool via Haldon, Cardiff and Birmingham on May 7th. This was the DH84 Dragon six passenger aircraft G-ACPX one of ten such aircraft used by RAS in the 13 years of its existence. This service to Liverpool was in reality. a reopening of the GWR service of the previous year but with an extension from Birmingham to Liverpool. At this juncture it is also worth recalling that Spartan Airlines who had commenced a Summer service between Heston (London) and Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1933 had. on the1st May 1934. recommenced operations over the same route in association with the Southern Railway. Large scale operations by RAILWAY AIR SERVICES LTD. over four routes began in August of 1934 when the company inaugurated services between Glasgow-Belfast-Manchester- Birmingham London. Belfast-Isle of Man-Manchester, Liverpool-Plymouth and Official airmails were carried over all routes with the Glasgow-London service designated a ‘Royal Mail' route whilst that covering the Isle Of Man was on a 'a request' basis for both "mails and freight. The public was informed of those inland airmail well in advance and a GPO notice issued at Manchester is illustrated. All did not go well with the inaugural services which had been arranged for the 20th August. Two aircraft left Glasgow at 9-15 a.m. (the DH86s ‘Mercury' and 'Delphinus’) and successfully arrived at Belfast to complete the first stage. However, from then on the aircraft were buffeted by severe gales and were damaged en route and on arrival at Manchester withdrawn from service. The turbulence was so great that the pilot of ‘Mercury'. ‘Daddy' Measures, (1) put his head through a roof emergency hatch. Neither plane was to attempt a take-off from Manchester and the southbound mails wero dispatched by train. As the same time aircraft were due to be used for the Northbound flights later in the day a complete fiasco seemed unavoidable. However, a Wessex (G-AAGW) was flown from London to Birmingham and picked up the return mail. (2) Capt. Gordon Store in the Dragon G-ACXI successfully completed the Belfast -Isle of Man-Manchester (southbound run) .(3) the Liverpool-Plymouth route was completed both ways and mails carried the Birmingham-Bristol sector of the service to Cowes. All in all the company can be said to have had rather a torrid time during the inauguration of these inland airmail routes. Weather conditions improved the following day and all stages wore successfully flown and mails held back from the 20th carried to their destinations. The inaugural southbound service from Belfast to Manchester via the Isle of Man has been commemorated by the Isle of Man Postal Authority. On April 27th this year a set of five stamps illustrating aircraft were issued along with. the Island's first commemorative aerogramme. The latter depicted five aircraft and included the Dragon G•ACXI which inaugurated the first official airmail to and from the Isle of Man 50 years ago. These were still early days as regards flying and the tenet ‘mails must get through' had to be tempered with common sense. Weather conditions could be bad and occasionally services were cancelled. Covers from Belfast dated 24. 1934 are known with the written endorsement 'Delayed at Belfast because of bad weather'. A look at a map of Great Britain will show you that all of the services mentioned encompassed areas in which all of the railways operated apart from that of the London and North Eastern Railway. The latter, despite being part of RAILWAY AIR SERVICES LTD actively discouraged the development of airways in the Eastern part of England and no service was set up there. 1935 saw several developments, not least of which was the loss of the prestigious 'Royal Mail' contract between London and Glasgow. to Hillman's Airways with effect from the 1st December. Prior to this, the RAS services to the West and South of England had been re-organised and on re- commencement for the 1935 season the routes were; Nottingham-Birmingham-Cardiff-Denbury- Plymouth and Liverpool-Birmingham-Bristol- Southampton-Portsmouth-Shoreham flown by the newly delivered DH89s G-ACPP 'City of Bristol' and G-ACPR 'City of Birmingham'. RAS also operated a 'Manx Airway• service Manchester-Liverpool-Blackpool -Isle of Man. The latter commenced on May 31st whilst the first flights for the former took place the 27th May, These services were generally only operated during the late spring to late autumn and collectors will have noted that first flight and last flight covers exist for each year. An innovation introduced by RAS during the Summer of 1935 was the idea of a Sunday excursion service to France between Brighton and LO Touquet. The first flight was on Sunday 28th July, but the experiment was abandoned after one more trip with only eleven passengers being carried. I wonder if a souvenir cover exists for either one or other of these flights. Mention was previously made of the Spartan Airways service to the Isle of Wight during the Summer of 1934. made in association with the Southern Railway. This service was also resumed in 1935 with the airline using the larger Spartan Cruiser Ill but with RAS markings. A major change was made in the Glasgow-London route on the 14th September when Birmingham was made a request stop only and Stoke-on-Trent was put into the schedule for the first time, with a request stop at Moir. I have not seen any covers for that day postmarked to and from Stoke-on-Tran but no doubt they exist. The resumption of services in 1936 saw further changes to the routes in the South and West of England. Services were now to: Liverpool-Birmingham- Bristol-Southampton-Ryde-Shoreham with request stops at Meir (for Stoke-on-Trent) and Staverton (for Cheltenham and Gloucester), and Plymouth – Haldon - Cardiff - Weston -super-Mare-Bristol. The service to Ireland saw a minor change with Newtonards being substituted for Aldergrove airport for the Belfast Stop. On the ‘Manx Airways’ route Yeadon (for Leeds & Bradford) was introduced as a stop and the route Yeadon, Manchester-Liverpool-Isle of Man. All of these changes were effective from May 25th. Two further alterations were made from the 5th July. Daily Summer services were introduced between the Isle of Man, Belfast and Isle of Man-Carlisle (Kingstown) along with a Sundays only service on the route Cardiff-Weston-Super-Mare-Bristol- Southampton-Ryde-Shoreham to link with a Jersey Airways' service to the Channel Islands. From the 21st August an hourly service was instituted by RAS between Weston-super-Marc and Cardiff — this operated up to the 12th September. On December 2nd. 1935 the 'Royal Mail' contracts for the London- Glasgow route was re-awarded to RAILWAY AIR SERVICES LTD. From then on. the routes were basically unchanged up to the start of World War Il but that is another story and does not concern us in this account of the early years of RAILWAY AIR SERVICES LTD, References John Stroud 'ANNALS OF BRITISH & COMMONWEALTH AIR TRANSPORT (Putnam. 1962) N. C. Baldwin 'FIFTY YEARS OF BRITISH AIR MAILS' (Francis J. Field Ltd.1969). Robert Finch 'THE WORLD'S AIRWAYS' (OUP, 1938). Clarence Winchester 'WONDERS OF WORLD AVIATION' (The Fleetway House, 1939). NOTES ON ERRORS IN THIS ARTICLE 1) ‘Daddy Measures’ was in charge of RAS and a passenger on the flight, he was not the pilot. 2) Mail was sent up from London to Birmingham, but none was returned. The plane flew back empty. Mail that was due for Birmingham had been offloaded at Manchester and sent onwards by rail. Birmingham mail was also sent by surface. 3) This is part correct. Gordon Store did fly successfully from Belfast to the Isle of Man, but the mail did not. It overflew and went onto Manchester where it was returned the next day to the Isle of Man.

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