Charles Kingsford Smith and Those Magnificent Men (94 page)

This Kingsford Smith fellow would have to be stopped.

Behold, the ancient mariner…Why, it was none other than Captain Phillips, who thirty years earlier had put the fear of God into young Chilla when the youngster had been running amok on the
Aorangi
, when the family had been on its way to Vancouver for the first time. Smithy ran into him on a street in downtown Sydney, and was delighted to do so. The old man had followed the aviator’s career since he had first come to fame and was thrilled to meet him again now. Still, he couldn’t resist offering some advice.

‘You’ve done enough flying,’ he said with a smile. ‘I’d like to put those irons on you now and keep you here.’
⁵³

18 July 1935 was a very big day in young John Ulm’s life. It was the day when the
Southern Cross
—once again scrubbed clean and repaired enough to safely fly a little way—would be handed over to the Australian government. At Smithy’s invitation the fourteen-year-old was going to be sitting in his late father’s co-pilot seat, beside Australia’s most famous man, as he flew the tri-motor Fokker from Mascot to Richmond. The ‘Old Bus’ was to be temporarily housed there until permanent accommodation in a museum-like environment could be found for her.

‘This is a great man’s seat, John,’ Smithy told the young’un, as the cameras rolled. ‘A man who took chances with a smile in this dear old bus of mine. A man whose name any boy would be proud to bear…‘
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‘Gee I wish Dad would [be with me] on this last flight, ‘John Ulm near whispered in reply.

‘Perhaps he is, John…’

For the occasion, a crowd of several thousand people had gathered at the Mascot hangar where the
Southern Cross
had been prepared for her last flight. Smithy was in the formal dress-uniform of air commodore for the occasion, and looked resplendent in blue, with gold braids. A swagger stick completed the imposing picture.

The
Southern Cross
, with young John in the cockpit—and Lady Mary Kingsford Smith, Bill Taylor, Beau Sheil and John Stannage in the cabin, together with one of Smithy’s friends from New Zealand, Reverend Colin Scrimgeour—took off and was escorted towards Richmond by no fewer than six Hawker Demon biplanes from the Royal Australian Air Force.
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In the course of the journey, Smithy made three brief detours. First he dipped down in sad salute over Keith Anderson’s grave at Mosman, before heading over to Longueville where—in the manner of Bert Hinkler several years before—he was able to buzz low over his mother standing in the front yard of her home, waving. Most exciting for young John Ulm, though, was when Smithy also swooped down joyously low over his primary school at Chatswood, with all the kids running into the yard and waving up to them, as John ecstatically waved back. Such fun!

Smithy was kind to the lad, but at the same time the great pilot also seemed a little sad at having to part company with the plane with which his name had become synonymous, a plane that had taken him around the world, across the seven seas, through wind, storm, hail and snow, and had never let him down.

When they landed at Richmond RAAF base, Smithy seemed reluctant to get out of his seat, almost like he was glued to it, or it was a part of him. Finally, though, he stood up and slowly walked down the narrow passage which allowed him to exit via the rear stairs. There, a small crowd had gathered for the occasion, including a glitteringly turned-out Minister for Defence, Archdale Parkhill, who was often known as ‘Archduke’ for his propensity to overdress.

‘I am proud,’ the Defence Minister told Smithy in his brief formal speech, ‘to take over for the people this most famous aeroplane, from a man whose magnificent airmanship has made history for Australia.’
⁵⁶

Everyone applauded, and Smithy then addressed them in a low, sorrowful voice about the plane that he loved: ‘She has been a living thing to me. I’ve spent one hundred and fifty days and twenty whole nights on board. During all her long flights she had never let me down. Even on that last flight across the Tasman, it was not the
Southern Cross
that failed me.

‘When the propeller was smashed, I seemed to hear her call out: “It isn’t me, boss! It’s that new bit of cowling.” One day, I want to put a brass plate on the old plane. It will bear an inscription something like this: “To my faithful Old Bus, in grateful memory and regard—from her boss.”’
⁵⁷

With quavering voice, Smithy then read a poem he had composed.

ODE TO THE OLD BUS

Old faithful friend—a fond adieu,

These are poor words with which to tell

Of all my pride, my joy in you,

True to the end you’ve served me well.

I pity those who cannot see

That heart and soul are housed within

This thing of steel and wood—to me

You live in every bolt and pin.

And so my staunch and steadfast steed

Your deep and mighty voice must cease

Faithful to death, if God will heed

My prayer, dear pal. You’ll rest in peace!
⁵⁸

Then, with a tear in his eye, he took a single step back, looked at the cockpit and snapped off a formal salute.
⁵⁹

And then to business…Smithy and Beau Sheil were scheduled to leave for New Zealand that very afternoon on the
Aorangi
, with Smithy being farewelled on the docks by the once again pregnant Mary, two-and-a-half-year-old Charles Jnr, and the woman who had been the rock of his existence since his birth, Catherine.

With a persistence that the
Southern Cross
itself would have been proud of, the famed aviator’s intention was to address the New Zealand Cabinet once more before heading across the Pacific to reclaim the
Lady Southern Cross
, which was still sitting in the hangar in Burbank where he had left it.

And from there? Well, he wasn’t quite sure. A few years ago there had been neither enough hours in the day, nor days in the week for him to get through all the things he wanted to do, as opportunities abounded, red carpets ribboned before him, and every door he passed opened automatically, even as it rained pound notes. But it was no longer like that.

At the age of thirty-eight, everything was a struggle as he no longer had the energy or strength that once drove him at will; the red carpets had become endless reams of red tape that near strangled a man, and in terms of opportunities the most familiar sound was that of doors shutting in his face. To top it all off, he was just about broke. Despite the government’s repeated use of such flowery sentiments in various speeches that ‘Australia owes more than it can ever pay to Kingsford Smith’, when it came right down to it, the government seemed to do everything in its power to thwart him. None of the routes he and Ulm had pioneered had ever been granted to them to run, not one penny of government subsidy had ever come their way and, while it was obvious that the world of aviation was at the dawn of a new age in terms of commercial travel, his place in that new age was not readily apparent.

Twenty years earlier, when the youthful Smithy had been about to board a ship leaving Sydney Harbour on his way to the Great War, he had been a young man who laughed easily and was possessed by an overwhelming sense of adventure. Now, though, it was a sombre, quiet and exhausted man who held Mary close—with an extra gentle pat for their new baby that was on its way and due just before Christmas, five months hence—hugged Charles Jnr and told him to look after his mother, and kissed his own mother goodbye before marching up the gangplank. The
Aorangi
was the ship he had first gone to Vancouver on as a child and the ship he had met Mary on, when near the height of his fame. Now, who knew to what fate it was taking him?

Catherine, Mary and Charles Jnr watched silently until the ship disappeared from view. It was a cold, windy day. Getting chilly. Winter had set in. Time to head home—Mary and Charles Jnr to their suddenly empty Darling Point house; Catherine to Kuranda, where she was living totally alone since William had died. They hoped that Chilla would be all right.

Sitting around a table in the New Zealand parliament in Wellington, on the afternoon of 24 July 1935, was Acting Prime Minister Sir Ethelbert Ransom and the members of the Cabinet. Smithy had been invited to address them on his proposals, and he did so for the next three hours as they questioned him.

He spelled out the estimated cost of the service, the planes his company wanted to use, schedules, their proposed landing grounds—the lot. All that was needed was the New Zealand government’s commitment to back them.

At the end of the meeting, the Cabinet had made no commitments, but nor had they said no. Their primary concern, it seemed, was that British aeroplanes be used, not American ones, which was a little problematic as Smithy was of the firm view that the only planes capable of flying the Tasman on a regular basis were the American planes—the Douglas DC-2s, Sikorsky S-42s and Martin M-130 China Clipper flying boats. The amazing thing, as Smithy pointed out to Beau Sheil from atop the steps of the parliament building on their way out, was just how many American cars were in the parliamentary car park, given the lecture he had just received on the importance of buying British.

Still, it was something to go on with at a time when not a whole lot else beckoned, and after another meeting with the New Zealand leader of the Opposition, Michael Savage, which was very positive, Kingsford Smith headed for California. He had a good feeling after his meetings, and was hopeful that things were moving his way at last.

Behind him, things were certainly beginning to
move
, anyway…For the aviation industry had been watching Kingsford Smith carefully. ‘It is obvious,’ Hudson Fysh, Managing Director of Qantas, wrote crisply to George Woods Humphreys, his Imperial Airways counterpart, ‘that Taylor and Kingsford Smith are unbusinesslike and incapable when it comes to organising and operating a service like that between Sydney and New Zealand. But they have a certain following in Parliament and among the public which it is not wise to ignore…‘
⁶⁰

Woods Humphreys didn’t ignore it, and wrote to Fysh by return mail: ‘On the subject of Kingsford Smith’s activities, I have arranged with the Air Ministry and the Dominion’s office for them to telegraph the New Zealand Government, asking them not to commit themselves to anything before consulting with the Government here. In the meantime, we are preparing a scheme…to put to the United Kingdom government.’
⁶¹

Soon afterwards, Australia’s Controller of Civil Aviation, Edgar Johnston, received a letter from his deputy: ‘The New Zealand Government is not taking kindly to Kingsford Smith’s proposal.’
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Enormously powerful forces were being brought to bear on the Kingsford Smith problem, even as he sailed for San Francisco. For its part, the London
Daily Express
took a dim view rather representative of the Establishment, saying that ‘Sir Charles Kingsford Smith is today planning a pirate air route with American aircraft over the 1,200 miles between Australia and New Zealand. It will compete with the general Empire airmail speed-up and extension scheduled to begin in 1937.’

The
Express
even quoted Sir Ethelbert Ransom panning the idea on behalf of his government: ‘It would scarcely be keeping faith with Britain and would certainly be an embarrassment were New Zealand at this stage to become prematurely committed to a separate proposal. The Tasman service must be considered part of a comprehensive Empire scheme.’
⁶³

The Australian government took the same view, with the Defence Minister Archdale Parkhill announcing that Kingsford Smith’s scheme ‘was both very expensive and unnecessary’.
⁶⁴

Shortly after docking in San Francisco, Smithy was apprised of both decisions. Two more doors—big ones—had just been firmly slammed in his face.

Well, bugger the lot of them. He and Sheil would just have to raise the money elsewhere, and launch their airline independently of any government assistance. To get that money, they would go to the financial capital of the world, London. And, once again setting eyes on the
Lady Southern Cross
, where she had been waiting for him in the Burbank hangar, Smithy felt he had unfinished business with her, too—and not just having to pay more precious money to free the plane from the usual attachment imposed by a San Pedro court because of unpaid debts.
⁶⁵
Perhaps one more, just one more record-breaking flight, to show everyone that he was as good as he had ever been, and could still grab the world’s attention, even if the Australian and New Zealand governments had turned their backs on him.

All of this was clearly on his mind when, shortly after arriving in America, he was interviewed by the famous American aviation journalist Edwin C. Parsons, for
Liberty
magazine. ‘Despite strict adherence to my creed, “Never take an unnecessary chance”,’ the Australian told Parsons, ‘there has arrived a time on nearly every hop when I’ve been thoroughly frightened. I’ve been in so many tough spots when it’s been touch and go whether I lived or died that I’m convinced that I shan’t wash out for good till my number is up.’
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