Less than six weeks after the inauguration of the complete airmail route between New Zealand and the UK on 30 April 1940, the route was broken. After Italy entered World War II on 10 June 1940, mail could no longer be flown between Egypt and the UK via the Mediterranean.

All Empire air services were suspended on 11 June [1]. According to [2]: '... the air mails which were already en route will have been "dumped", as necessary, at certain points for onward conveyance by surface route.' However, that statement only applied to airmail which had yet to cross the Mediterranean.

Through airmails from New Zealand, May 1940

Flown to UK on second last through flight from Auckland on 22 May

This censored cover is postmarked in Wellington at 11 am on Saturday 18 May and is addressed to the UK. The trans-Tasman mail closed in Wellington at 12 noon on a Saturday. Hence the cover was in time to to be flown by TEAL on flight AS 4 which was due to leave from Auckland on Monday 20 May and connect with the Qantas flight SW 243 that left Sydney on 22 May and arrived in Poole on Sunday 2 June [4].

The weekly trans-Tasman service normally ran to time, but on this occasion it was two days late as the flight had been postponed due to bad weather over the Tasman Sea and was not flown until Wednesday 22 May [15].

The service to the UK from Sydney was twice a week and so instead of connecting with SW 243 the cover would be flown from Sydney on SW 244 on 25 May and arrive in Poole on 5 June.

Flown to Palestine on two last flights

This cover is postmarked in Napier on 21 May and is addressed to the 1st Australian General Hospital, Palestine which was situated in Gaza. It was opened by the censor (No 59) in Wellington [6].

It would have been flown from Auckland to Sydney on flight AS 5 on 27 May to connect with the QEA / BOAC flight SW 245 that left Sydney on 29 May. That was the last flight that was flown through to the UK before Italy entered the war. It has a Calcutta Not Opened By Censor A 16 mark and a Calcutta transit mark on 4 June which fits with the arrival there of SW 245 on 3 June [4] and means that the cover was unloaded there although the reason is unclear.

It may then have been flown on the last BOAC landplane service CW 224 that left Calcutta on 5 June and connected with the CW 244 flying boat service in Karachi on 6 June and unloaded in Alexandria on 7 June [4].

The cover has a major crease that occurred after the application of the Wellington censor mark, but before the Calcutta Not Opened By Censor mark. The crease seems to have resulted from poor application of the New Zealand censor tape.

Flown to UK on last through flight from Auckland on 27 May

The last through airmail from New Zealand was flown from Auckland to Sydney on Monday 27 May to connect with the QEA / BOAC flight SW 245 that left Sydney on 29 May and arrived in Poole on 9 June [4].

This cover to Cardiff has a New Zealand postmark on 23 May and so would have been on that flight. It was censored in Wellington [6].

As is typical of war-time airmails, the cover has no transit or arrival marks although I have seen the scan of another cover flown on that flight that was re-directed in London on 10 June.

Through airmails to New Zealand, May - June 1940

From UK, 6 May

This is a registered postcard postmarked in Locksbrook, Bath and again in Bristol on 6 May, the first day of issue of the GB Stamp Centenary set. It is franked with 11½d made up of 1d postal stationary together with the complete Centenary set of 6. That covered the postage rate for a postcard from UK of 7d together with a registration fee of 4d.

It would have been flown from Poole to Sydney on SE 245 from 9 - 20 May and then trans Tasman on SA 4 on 23 May. That date fits with the backstamp in Mangatainoka (near Wellington) on 24 May.

From UK, 1 June

This cover to New Zealand is postmarked on 31 May and again in London on 1 June 1940. As the service to Australia from the UK was twice weekly on Sundays and Thursdays [3], it may have been on flight SE 252 that left Poole on Sunday 2 June and arrived in Sydney on 15 June.

Alternatively, it may therefore have been flown on flight 253 which left on Thursday 6 June and arrived in Sydney on 17 June [4]. In both cases, it would then have been flown trans - Tasman on SA8 on 20 June.

The last through flight (SE254) left the UK on 9 June. It was flown from Ajaccio to Corfu on 10 June and to Alexandria on 11 June and so was out of the danger area when the service was suspended. That flight had been diverted round Italy on its way to Alexandria. Its route was Poole - Marseilles - Ajaccio (Corsica) - Bizerta (Tunisia) - Malta - Corfu - Athens - Suda Bay (Crete) - Alexandria. It arrived in Sydney on 20 June [4].

A cover, postmarked on 10 June in Hungary, addressed to New Zealand and flown on that flight is described in [5]. It has a Sydney backstamp on 20 June and would have been flown from Sydney to Auckland on SA9 on 27 June. It has a Piripaua (Gisborne) receiving mark on 28 June.

From Southern Rhodesia

Although the following registered cover from Southern Rhodesia to Wellington has no airmail etiquette and is insufficiently franked, the dates on the postmark and transit marks clearly show that it was flown from Southern Rhodesia to New Zealand. The only way to get from Southern Rhodesia to Australia in 14 days was by air and even then that required very good connections.

It is postmarked in Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia on 3 June, 1940. Its likely route was Salisbury to Beira by Southern Rhodesian Air Services where it would connect on 5 June with BOAC flight DN 276 which arrived in Alexandria on 8 June [4]. (That was the last through flight from Durban to the UK.)

It would then connect with the Eastern Route service SE 253 which left Alexandria on 9 June [4]. That service arrived in Darwin on 15 June and the cover has a very faint Darwin N.T. transit dated 15 June). SE 253 arrived in Sydney on 17 June and the cover has a Sydney registered post transit mark on 17 June and a Sydney AIR backstamp on 18 June.

The connection would then be with the TEAL service SA 8 on 20 June and so it would arrive in New Zealand on the same flight as the above cover from the UK.

It has Out 21/6/40 in manuscript on the front which presumably refers to when its contents had been dealt with by the firm.

Airmail in transit on June 11, completed journey by sea

Mail from New Zealand which had not yet reached the Mediterranean on 11 June was dumped and continued its journey by sea [2].

According to the Australian Posts and Telegraphs Department statement reported in the Sydney Morning Herald of 15 June 1940 [14], mail from Australia (and hence New Zealand) was held up as follows: SW 246 left Sydney on 1 June and was held up in Egypt; SW 247 left Sydney on 5 June and was held up in India (Karachi [4]); SW 248 left Sydney on 8 June and was held up in Singapore; SW 249 left Sydney on 12 June and the mail was unloaded in Darwin before being returned.

A cover is reported in [13] that was postmarked in Adelaide on 31 May and redirected in UK on 22 July which is considerably earlier than the covers below that were likely flown on SW 247 on 5 June. That suggests that it was flown on SW 246 on 1 June and then sent by sea from Egypt and arrived in the UK just before the first Horseshoe Route mail which was in London by 24 July.

Several other covers which have been re-directed on arrival are shown below.

This cover is postmarked in Te Awamutu (near Auckland) at 5.25pm on Saturday 1 June and opened and passed by the censor in Auckland. It was redirected in Glasgow on 10 August.

The trans-Tasman mail closed in Auckland at midnight on Saturdays [15] and so this cover would have been posted in time to have been flown from Auckland to Sydney on Monday 3 June and then on flight SW247 that left Sydney on 5 June. That flight had reached Karachi by 11 June, but did not progress any further [4] and the mail would have been sent from Karachi to the UK by sea.

The cover was 71 days in transit.

The next cover is postmarked in Auckland on 7 June and so had just started its journey when Italy entered the war. The Trans-Tasman service continued and so there was no problem in getting to Australia on the flight of 10 June.

It is then likely to have been flown on SW 249 on 12 June to Darwin, but unloaded there and returned south before being sent to the UK by sea. It had arrived in London by 8 August as it was redirected on that date.

The cover was 63 days in transit. It was redirected to Lieutenant Hilliard, a RNZNVR officer who was the commander of HMS Blackthorn which was a minesweeping trawler.

This cover from India is postmarked on 9 June and has an Indian censor mark stating Not Opened by Censor. Where in India cannot be made out as the postmark is not clear, but as flight SW 247 was flown from Bangkok to Calcutta on 10 June and then to Karachi on 11 June [4], it may well have connected with that flight.

After arrival in Guthrie, it was redirected to Forfar on 10 August. (Both are in Angus, where I was brought up.) As the cover was redirected on the same day as the earlier cover to Glasgow, that supports the theory that they both were sent from Karachi by surface mail.

Crewe describes a cover that was posted in Hong Kong on 8 June and which has a London transit mark on 9 August [7] and so it could be that several mailboats from different places arrived in the UK at much the same time. In [8] a cover is shown postmarked in Perth on 6 June which may have connected with SW 248 in Darwin and was also redirected in London on 9 August.

Airmail via USA, June 1940

As mail could not be flown through the Mediterranean, the Horseshoe Route was quickly set up. Mail was flown from Auckland to Sydney and from there by the normal Eastern Route via Singapore and India to Cairo. From Cairo, it was flown to Durban in South Africa and from there to the UK by sea.

The first dispatch from the UK for the Horseshoe Route left by sea on 19 June on the Arundel Castle. It connected at Durban with the fourth Horseshoe flight that left Durban on 10 July and arrived in Sydney on 24 July [3].

However, there were alternative routes for airmail, examples being [8]:

• On June 15 and again on June 18, air mail for Australia and New Zealand was flown to Lisbon and from there on 16 and 19 June to New York [4]. It was then flown to San Francisco from where it was to be sent by sea on 25 June on the S.S. Monterey which was due in Auckland on 12 July and Sydney on 15 July [2].
• On June 21, mail for Australia and New Zealand was sent by sea.

UK to New Zealand via USA

This cover was posted on 14 June 1940 and according to Walker [1] was carried on the first dispatch from the UK to be flown from Durban on the Horseshoe Route. It is addressed to the same person as the cover shown by Walker.

However, it is backstamped at Carterton in New Zealand on 16 July and so arrived in New Zealand too soon to have been flown by the Horseshoe Route [3].

Therefore the cover was flown to Lisbon on 15 or 18 June [2, 8] in a DH 91 and then flown trans-Atlantic to New York and from there to San Francisco. It completed its journey across the Pacific by the steamer S.S. Monterey due to arrive in Auckland on 12 July. That gives it plenty of time to be in Carterton by 16 July.

I have seen a scan of a cover posted in London on 11 June 1940 and sent by surface mail which was forwarded from Perth, Western Australia on 22 July. As the airmail sent via the USA arrived in Sydney on 15 July and the first Horseshoe service did not arrive in Darwin until 22 July [4] this demonstrates that sending mail by air at this time gave little or no advantage over surface mail.

Cancelled To Pay

The Empire Air Service to the UK was suspended in New Zealand on 14 June. Although the Horseshoe Route was set up very quickly, the first official dispatch from New Zealand was not until 23 July and arrived in the UK on 5 September [1].

In the meantime, alternative routes between the UK and New Zealand were available [10]. The advised route was now by sea to Honolulu from where mail would be flown to New York followed by sea to the UK. The cost of this service was 1s 9d while, if it was also to be flown from New York, the rate was 4s 0d [9].

Although the Empire Air Service at the 1s 6d rate was suspended on 14 June, it is likely that letters would still be posted by the public for that service. The answer of what happened to them is partially answered by this cover.

It is postmarked in Cromwell on 18 June 1940 and passed by the censor in Dunedin. It has franking of 1s 3d and the intended service is not clear. There was a 1s 3d rate to USA via Panama which was meant to have the routing instructions Canal Zone - USA. The route was by sea to the Panama Canal followed by air to Miami and New York [11,12]. It is possible that the intention was to go on this route to New York and then go from New York to UK by sea.

However it was deemed to be deficient in postage and has a To Pay handstamp of 120 centimes which means that there was 12d to pay, i.e. that it was underfranked by 6d. That indicates that the expected rate was 1s 9d, i.e. the rate via Honolulu.

However, the To Pay handstamp has been very effectively cancelled (obliterated?) by a circular handstamp with wavy lines. The most likely conclusion is that a decision was subsequently made for it to be sent to the UK by sea for which it had more than sufficient postage.

It would be interesting to see what happened to a cover posted around this time and which was franked with 1s 6d - would it go by sea or would it have 60 centimes to pay and be sent via Honoulu?

The trans-Pacific Pan American service between Auckland and San Francisco was actually started before the first Horseshoe dispatch from New Zealand. The PanAm service gave a fast, if expensive, through airmail service to the UK.

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All scans were made by the author. Information on this page is taken from:
[1] Airmails of New Zealand, volume 2, D.A Walker, 1986, Air Mail Society of New Zealand
[2] Confidential Overseas Mails Branch Report No. 40, 15 June, 1940, POST 56/76, Royal Mail Archive.
[3] Aspects of the Horseshoe Route, W.H. Legg, Air Mail News, vol 45, no 177, pp 44 - 53, May 2002.
[4] Bridging the Continents in Wartime: Important Airmail Routes 1939-45, H. E. Aitink and E. Hovenkamp, SLTW, Enschede, 2005.
[5] R Lee and J Kennet, Airmail Hungary to New Zealand June 1940, New Zealand Air Mail News, no 672, pp 4-5, August 2007.
[6] The Postal History of World War II Mail between New Zealand and Switzerland, R.M. Startup and C.J. LaBlonde, 2005.
[7] Hong Kong Airmails 1924-1941, D. Crewe, Hong Kong Study Circle, 2000.
[8] Confidential Overseas Mails Branch Report No. 41, 22 June, 1940.
[9] A Problem Airmail Cover, A.P. Berry, The Kiwi, vol 46, pp 95-96, September 1997.
[10] Alternatives to the Horseshoe Route in June and July 1940, R. Clark, The Kiwi, vol 58, pp 42-47, March 2009.
[11] The 1935 Pictorial Issues and Associated Postal Rates with Dates of Printing of Varieties: Part2 Overseas Postage Rates 1932-1939, R.P. Odenweller, The Kiwi, vol 53, pp 108-111, September 2004.
[12] Airmails of New Zealand, volume 3, R.M. Startup, 1997, Air Mail Society of New Zealand
[13] Answer 251 to: When did the first "true" Horseshoe Route Covers leave Sydney?, Air Mail News, vol 44, no 176, pp 245 - 251, February 2002.
[14] Australian Newspapers 1803-1954, Trove, National Library of Australia
[15] Evening Post Wellington 1916-1945, Papers Past, available at: paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast

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