When Australian National Airways Ltd planned a special Christmas flight to the UK in 1931, they also planned a return flight to Australia. Mail for New Zealand was accepted for this flight and was to be sent on by sea from Sydney.
Due to the problems of the Australia - UK flight, the Avro 10 Southern Star did not arrive in the UK until 16 December. The original plan had been to leave the UK on 9 December, but that date was now put back to 18 December.
The cover is postmarked 17 December, ready for that departure date and was specially produced for the flight.
As it was clear that they could not get the mail to Australia in time for Christmas, Kingsford Smith and Scotty Allan decided to postpone the departure until 21 December so that the Avro 10 could be thoroughly checked by A.V. Roe, its manufacturer.
On the afternoon of 21 December, the plane was ready and Allan was to fly it from Hamble, near Southampton, to Croydon. Unfortunately there was dense fog and he crashed on the way. The plane was badly damaged, although Allan was unhurt.
The plane was repaired by A.V. Roe at Hamble and amazingly was ready
for the return journey which began on 7 January, 1932.
It eventually arrived in Sydney on 21 January with the New
Zealand mail arriving in Wellington on 27 January.
Mail from Singapore
It was planned that mail would be picked up at Singapore on the return journey. However, after the crash on 21 December, the authorities in Singapore decided that they would send the mail by sea.
This cover is postmarked 24 December in Singapore and was one of the covers sent to Australia by sea.
It was backstamped at Broome in Western Australia on 8 January and so was presumably landed there and flown by West Australian Airways, first to Perth and then to Adelaide.
Later Singapore mail was postmarked 14 January and was flown by
Kingsford Smith.
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All scans were made by the author.
Information on this page is taken from:
Airmails of New Zealand, volume 2 (1986) compiled by Douglas A Walker,
and the New Zealand Airmail Catalogue, (2nd Edition, 1994)
by James Stapleton.
Both are published by the
Airmail Society of New Zealand