|||B - 11 ■HB ■■■■ ii VOLUME 25 /aviati NUMBER 1 HEKiTAGE THE JOURNAL OF THE AVIATION HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF AUSTRALIA Ill Registered by Australia Rost Publication No. VBQ 154 On this page we invite readers to ask questions for vital answers you may have been seeking for years to complete research on a particular subject. The INFORMATION answers may have eluded you but another reader may have it at home collecting dust. If you don’t ask, he doesn’t know you require it. ECHO Each issue we intend publishing the replies so that all readers benefit along with the one who first asked the question. Keith Mess’s Meteor A77-730 In your Meteor serials list, in Bruce Thompson was later shot down hearty and living up in the Newcastle Newsletter Vol. 3 No. 1 page 14, the and spent a long time as a POW in area. demise at A77-730 is listed as being the North Korea, and then, while The ditching of A77-735 was the result result of a heavy landing. As I had a instructing on Wirraways back in of a take-off straight into low cloud on personal interest in that aircraft until Australia, was killed with a student, just an early training flight from Iwakuni by the day preceding its accident, Fd like off the beach at Point Cook. Sgt. Dick Bessell. With no way of to enlarge on the information which A77-128 and A77-354 collided within finding his way back down again at that you have. Unlike our earlier use of four or five miles of Kimpo while stage of his knowledge and lack of aids, Mustangs, Meteors were allotted to changing into echelon starboard he broke out into a clear patch south individuals in 77 Squadron, to be flown formation to join final for the standard of Iwakuni and ditched the aircraft as often as possible by the one pilot, fighter approach prior to landing after close to the shoreline. and looked after by him. I spent many a mission. Killed were Sgt. Ron hours under A77-730 with a bucket of The T7’s used in Malta were not used Mitchell, of No. 2 Course FTS, and avtur, washing off soft tar thrown up by by 75 Squadron, but by 78 Wing, which Sgt. Reg Lamb RAF, one of four pilots the wheels in the heat of summer, in consisted of 75 and 76 Squadrons. sent out to train us on Meteors, and the hope of keeping the knots up to who all managed to build up a lot of peak level. I flew it from allotment at operational experience on Mustangs Iwakuni on 6th July until 3rd October, Keith Meggs and Meteors. The accident is described with the use of others such as A77-368, Melbourne in the book “Across the Parallel.” A77- A77-15 and A77-959 during 721 was being flown by Warrant maintenance periods. At that time Officer Ron Guthrie when it was shot there was no approval to name or down, and he spent the rest of the war decorate our aircraft and they were as a POW, and was later joined by therefore unadorned. Bruce Thompson. Ron is still hale and To follow 62 missions in Mustangs, I flew 42 in Meteors, of which the last one was in A77-730 on 3rd October, after which I ferried A77-510 back to Iwakuni for maintenance and spent three days testing and ferrying, ending up with A77-726 at Kimpo on 6th October. I was then told that I was going to the USA, and packed to return to Iwakuni in Dakota A65-121 the next day, via Taegu and Pusan. On that day A77-730 was used by a new pilot to the squadron, Bruce Thompson, for his first mission. On return he hit the lip at the end of the runway at Kimpo, severly damaging the undercarriage. Rather than a heavy landing, it was a short one, and the resultant damage resulted in the aircraft careering down the runway, through 44 gallon drums of tar and into the GCA hut, although it is not shown in the photographs and I was only told that it hit it. A77-730 could have been towed away as a mobile unit before the photograph was taken. Damage was sustained and A77- 730 was subsequently broken up for spares. 2 Aviation Heritage Vol. 25 No. I VOLUME 25 NUMBER 1 V/^IATION HERITAGE I J I-------------J THE JOURNAL OF THE AVIATION HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF AUSTRALIA CONTENTS EDITORIAL 2 INFORMATION ECHO Keith Meggs describes the fate of “his” In a previous editorial (Vol.24,No.3) the Journal Committee Meteor A77-730 which he flew in Korea. sought opinions on the subject matter and treatment of future 4 THE STEWART MIDDLEMISS Journals. In mind, particularly, was the imminent planning of the STORY A.N.A. Fleet List issue. Part I of Greg Banfield’s interview with this famous aviator. In the absence of any positive preference, and as the result of experience with the T.A.A. issue, the decision has been taken to 11 RAAF C-47’s IN PNGDF SERVICE adopt the same format; a single issue. Joe Vella describes and illustrates the colour scheme of seven ex-RAAE The main factors affecting the matter are the compact presen­ Dakotas tation of homogeneous historic material and the reception accorded the issue within the Company concerned, where that issue was most 18 THE DOUGLAS DOLPHIN IN RAAF popular as a collection and nostalgia item, being distributed as a gift SERVICE at functions attended by Company people. A comprehensive history of Australia’s four Dolphins by Geoff Goodall and In short it was one of our best-seUing journals. After aU this, the David Eyre. balancing of Journal content is, apparently, still up to the Committee. FRONT COVER Stewart Middlemiss on the left, However, although we stiU have articles on hand, the variety is and Lloyd Maundrell in the cockpit of Short somewhat hmited. Sunderland NZ4108, on its delivery to Ansett Flying Boat Services in December 1963. Further contributions, particularly on short topics, would provide AHSA AND EDITORIAL ADDRESS a welcome leavening of the reading matter. P.O. Box 287 Cheltenham, Vic. 3192 At this time several Austrahan magazines are regularly pubhsh- EDITORIAL COMMITTEE ing historical articles, which we welcome, believing as we do that David Anderson this is the only practical way to preserve and disseminate historic Bob Fripp facts. Doug Hart Bob Wills This results in more numerous avenues for articles by estabhshed FEDERAL TREASURER Aviation Historians, some of whom have gained experience in these Bert Cookson. pages. Membership is for one full calendar year and includes both Journal and AHSA News. Obviously now is a good time for those about to complete articles Annual Membership fee is $22.50 suitable for the Journal to present them, swelling the ranks of the (Australian Currency) contributors and broadening the subject matter available. Published by: Aviation Historical Society of Australia, P.O. Box 287, Cheltenham, Vic., 3192, A tremendous variety of topics has never been touched, such as Australia travelling “Air Pageant” teams of the 1930’s, parachutists, gliders ©1987 Aviation Historical Society of Australia and aerodromes, to say nothing of small airlines, component ISSN0815 — 4392 manufacturers, sub-contractors and Aero Clubs. Printed by: Maxwell Printing Services, Send us your efforts and we will do our best to ensure that 669 Spencer Street, West Melbourne, Telephone: 329 8448 or 329 8337 promising material is included in these pages in acceptable form. Aviation Heritage VoL 25 No. 1 3 THE STEWART MIDDLEMISS STORY The name of Stewart Middlemiss, OBE, is inextricably associated with flying boats, in war and peace. It is also bound up with the fortunes of Reginald Ansett, who introduced him to flying in the Victorian country town of Hamilton, before he founded Ansett Airways. Stewart Carlyle Middlemiss was born at South \brra, Victoria, on 26th April 1912, and, was educated at Brighton. As a member of the RAAF Reserve, he was called up for service at the start of World War Two and became a flying instructor when the Empire Air Training Scheme commenced His love for flying boats began when he was posted to Catalinas and his administrative ability won him a posting as Commanding Officer of No. 11 Squadron. A short time later he found himself in the United States, in charge of ferrying Catalinas to Australia After the war he joined with resort owner Chris Poulson to form Barrier Reef Airways, which operated Catalina services to the islands of the Great Barrier Reef. Later Reg Ansett took an interest in the company and it became Ansett Flying Boat Services, while Stewart Middlemiss became its manager and a director of the Ansett company. When Ansett took over Butler Air Transport (now Air New South Wales), he became its manager too. Sadly, Stewart Middlemiss died at Sydney on 8th March 1985, after a long illness. He recorded this interview with Greg Banfield in October 1984. “At 17 years of age I left school to join the Commercial Bank of Australia Ltd. In my various roles in the bank, I was eventually posted in 1932 to a town called Hamilton, Victoria, where I became very interested in a fellow who was driving a seven-passenger Studebaker car, delivering the newspapers at night and trying to run a passenger transport service. He was Reginald Myles Ansett and, in his various exploits around the country, he had learned to fly in Darwin. In September 1934 he bought himself a Gipsy Moth, VH-UNF.