After the
loss of the Samoan Clipper
in 1938,
Pan American did not set up a regular New Zealand - USA service
until 1940.
The route was known as FAM 19 and was fortnightly.
Due to Italy entering World War II in June 1940, this was the only
through airmail route between New Zealand and the UK.
To Auckland
The trans-Pacific flight from San Francisco and Los Angeles to Auckland on 12 - 18 July 1940 carried the first ever official airmail from America to New Zealand. (The first New Zealand to US airmail had of course been in 1938.) The plane was the Boeing 314 flying boat American Clipper.
The trans-Atlantic airmail for New York which left the UK on July 6 connected with this flight. The UK - New Zealand airmail postage was 4/6 while the US - NZ airmail postage was 50c. The mail from San Francisco to Auckland was 16,275.
The above cover is postmarked San Francisco at 11am on July 12 and
backstamped Auckland on July 18.
It was then carried on to the UK, presumeably by sea as 50c was the
airmail rate from the US to New Zealand.
The route
The route to Auckland from San Francisco was via Los Angeles, Honolulu, Canton Island and Noumea in New Caledonia.
Different cachets were applied at each departure point. The Los Angeles cachet showed a map of the route. The mail from Los Angeles to Auckland was 3,751.
New Caledonia and Canton Island had replaced American Samoa and Kingman Reef used in the 1938 flight. Both the 1938 and the 1940 routes are shown on the map.
Canton Island was an uninhabited atoll with no fresh water. Pan American Airways built a village together with a desalination plant so that it could act as a staging post.
This flight was the first airmail between New Zealand and
New Caledonia.
At this time, Pan Am had not been granted landing rights
in Australia, but it appears that their choice of New Caledonia
as a stopping point had more to do with their aim of an Australian
- US service rather than it being the obvious stop on the way to
New Zealand.
Fiji was added to the route in November 1941.
Return from Auckland
The return flight from Auckland to San Francisco was on 20 - 24 July although the elapsed time was one day more as the route crossed the International Date Line. Although the flight left Auckland on 20 July, all mail was postmarked on the previous day. A special cachet was applied.
The New Zealand Post Office advertised the postage rate to the USA at 4/- while the US stated that the cost was 3/6 [1].
As this cover was prepared by an American collector, it only carries stamps to the value of 3/6.
The flight arrived in San Francisco on July 24 where a backstamp was applied.
The above cover would then have been carried by internal US airmail
from San Francisco to Missouri.
It arrived in Lutesville, Missouri on 26 July where a further
backstamp was applied.
The next cover followed the NZ Post Office instructions and carries a 4/- stamp. It is addressed to Los Angeles and so would be off-loaded there.
It was backstamped in Los Angeles on July 24.
Mail was also accepted on this route
from Australia.
The next cover is franked with the New Zealand Centenary set and so is overfranked by 6½d.
None of these covers have been opened by the censor.
Indeed, I have not seen a cover whose only postmark was on 19 July
in Auckland and which was opened by the censor.
Perhaps the volume of mail that had to be handled was so high
that the normal rules were not applied.
Cachet in green
The New Zealand first flight cachets were not just applied in Auckland, but also in Christchurch, Dunedin and Wellington. In Christchurch, the colour of the cachets was green. This is an example postmarked in Christchurch on 17 July.
It is a postcard flown on the first leg of the flight to New Caledonia. The rate for postcards was half the letter rate and so it has the correct franking of 6d.
Many collectors sent their covers for the flight in envelopes to the Auckland Post Office to be handled there and so covers with the Christchurch cachet are not common.
The mail from Dunedin, Christchurch and Wellington was flown in sealed
bags by Lockheed Electra of Union Airways ready to be loaded on the
clipper in order to lessen the last minute rush.
Mail to the UK
The cost of airmail postage from New Zealand to the UK via San Francisco was 6/3 per ½oz. Only 863 items were carried on the first flight to UK and Europe.
Mail for the UK was not normally backstamped in San Fransisco, but as the shown cover is registered, it has a San Francisco backstamp on 24 July and a New York backstamp on 26 July. It does not, however, have the usual first flight cachet. It has postage of 6/7 to include the 4d registration fee.
From San Francisco, the mails were flown to New York and from there to Lisbon on the trans-Atlantic Pan Am route. A BOAC service between Bristol and Lisbon had been started on 4 June flown by a DH 91 Albatross landplane, but from 10 July that had been replaced by a twice weekly BOAC flying boat service and that would have been used for this flight. The mail arrived in the UK on 3 August.
In response to my article on Alternatives to the Horseshoe Route [4], Berry suggests that the San Francisco - New York leg was by surface and that the dates on this cover support that conjecture [5]. However, given the size of the mail, that the normal San Francisco backstamp was not until 4pm on 24 July and that the Canadian and Missouri backstamps shown on this page are also backstamped 26 July, it does not seem at all unlikely that mail flown from San Francisco to New York was not backstamped there until 26 July.
This cover was not opened by the censor in New Zealand, but was opened by the censor on arrival in the UK. The censor tape is over the New York backstamp.
As the Cairo - London section of the through airmail route from New Zealand to the UK had been suspended on 11 June, the new US route was the only through airmail route to the UK as the alternative was the Horseshoe Route which involved a sea journey from Durban to the UK.
The following cover was overweight and so has franking of 12/6. It is postmarked in Wellington on 18 July and was opened by the censor in New Zealand. The cachet would have been applied in Wellington.
Australia - NZ - USA - Canada
Mail was accepted for the flight in Australia and was initially flown trans-Tasman to New Zealand by TEAL. This cover was first postmarked in Melbourne and then again on 19 July in Auckland where the first flight cachet was applied.
It was then flown to San Francisco where it was backstamped on 24 July. It was then flown to Canada and arrived in St Anne de Bellevue in Quebec where it was backstamped on 26 July.
The rate from Australia to Canada was 3/11 [3], but there was
the same confusion over rates for the first flight [1]
and this cover has a franking of 3/6 which was the rate advertised by the US Post Office.
Later Flights
Reduced rate
Initially mail from New Zealand to the UK had to be re-sorted in San Francisco. As this was now the only through airmail route between New Zealand and Great Britain (the Horseshoe Route took much longer) the volume of mail increased sufficiently for closed bags to be made up in New Zealand for the UK mail so that no sorting had to be done in San Francisco.
This reduced the cost and the New Zealand Post Office announced that from 9 September 1940 the airmail postage rate from New Zealand to the UK via the USA was to be reduced from 6/3 to 5/9. (According to Griffiths [2], this reduction only applied to the UK and not to the rest of Europe.)
The first flight at the new rate left Auckland on 18 September and arrived in San Francisco on 23 September. This flight was also the first time that fare paying passengers were flown from New Zealand to USA [6].
This censored cover is postmarked on 9 September, the first day at the new rate. It was flown across both the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans by PanAm and then from Lisbon to the UK by BOAC.
Also, at that time, the route from New York to Lisbon was
changed to include a stop in Bermuda.
The UK - Lisbon airmail service was temporarily suspended from 9 October to 17 December 1940.
From UK
The next cover is from the UK and is addressed to New Zealand. It is a commercial cover postmarked in September 1941. It was not opened by the censor in either the UK or New Zealand.
The postal rate from the UK to New Zealand remained at 4/6 throughout the duration of the service and was significantly less than the rate from New Zealand.
The route was UK to Lisbon by BOAC and then by Pan Am to
New York via Bermuda.
It was then flown to San Francisco before being flown on FAM 19
from San Francisco to Auckland.
to Canada
This cover is postmarked on 19 June, 1941 in Auckland and is addressed to Canada. According to Startup [7], the rate from New Zealand to Canada of 4/- did not cover airmail within USA. For that the rate was 5/- which is the franking on this cover. It would be flown to San Francisco and then to by US and Canadian air mail services to Montreal.
From 9 September 1941, the postage rate for the complete air journey to Canada was reduced to 4/- [7].
The cover was opened by the censor in New Zealand.
Surface mail
The charge of 3/6 (or 4/-) for airmail from NZ to the USA was a significant surcharge on the ordinary surface rate of 3d. Most mail therefore continued to be sent by sea.
The shown censored New Zealand surface letter to San Francisco is postmarked 20 November 1941 and so was sent just before the last airmail flight of 25 November. All flights were stopped after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December.
The USA entered World War II while this cover was in transit.
The censor mark was applied in San Francisco and the censor re-sealing tape
is plain brown with no inscription.
I assume that this is because
it is a very early US WWII censored cover and official tape had
not yet been produced.
back next
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
Air Mail Society of New Zealand
[1] M Shand, 'New Zealand - USA Air Mail Service - What was the Postage Rate?',
The Kiwi, vol 49, p 135, November 2000.
[2] Q 271, K A Griffiths, Air Mail News, vol 45,
pp 97-98, August 2002.
[3] Legg, W.H., Wartime Interruptions to Airmail Routes,
Air Mail News, vol 47, pp 46-53, May 2004.
[4] Clark, R., Alternatives to the Horseshoe Route in June and July 1940,
The Kiwi, vol 58, pp 42-47, March 2009.
[5] Berry, A., Notes on the Report on the Perforations Workshop and the
Horseshoe Route in the last issue of the Kiwi,
The Kiwi, vol 58, p 61, May 2009.
[6] Krupnick, J.E., Pan American Pacific Pioneers, 1997.
[7] Startup, R.M., Airmails of New Zealand, volume 3, 1997.