Ireland 1939 First Flight Covers

I am new to collecting First Flight Covers.
These covers say Ireland to Monoton, NB, Canada and Ireland to Newfoundland
but have United States Addresses.
Please explain the process?
If they are First Flights to Canada and Newfoundland why the United States addresses?

The trans-atlantic crossing was Shannon to New Foundland. The route was Southampton to Baltimore.

In 1939, PAN AM started two weekly routes to Europe. One was a passenger flight on the southern route via the Azores on 30 March, with a passenger service added 28 June. The article does not say when it returned. However, your route is the northern one and cannot be this.

The second route was the route shown on your cover. This left for the British Isles on 24 June 1939. It was a mail-only service. The passenger service started 8 July. Your covers must have been a return flight on the northern route before the passenger service was added.

The westbound flight left on Saturday morning (24 June, 8 July), arriving Sunday. They returned from Southampton on Wednesday (28 June, 12 July).

Your first cover may have been carried on the first westbound mail flight.

The sender, probably, intended the second cover to be flown on that flight and returned to him (hence the c/o Pan Am that was struck), but did not post it in time and then used it as a 'normal' cover. Another explanation was that it was intended to be carried on the first passenger service on 12 July 1939. However, that seems questionable. It would have made the 5 July mail flight.

See enclosed links. For Wikipedia, search 'Yankee Clipper.'
https://www.panam.org/explorations/...enger-flight
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am

Does this help?

Another strange thing with the cachet is that it shows the route Shannon - Botwood - Shediac. The terminal for transatlantic flights was at Foynes om the bank of the Shannon Estuary, not very far from Shannon, but on another side of the estuary and still some distance from the town. Shannon was not built until 1942. Foynes also coincides with the route mentioned in the Wikipedia article. It is rather strange that the cachet uses the waterway for the Irish port and not the place name.

The first envelope also does not fit the dates. The first envelope states the two crossings via the Azores and via Ireland. It also mentions Bermuda before the Azores. None of the stories about that first flight of the Dixie Clipper mention Bermuda. All suggest the first passenger flight on the southern route flew the leg from New York directly to Horta on the Azores.
That would suggest the envelope is from a later date, when Bermuda was included in the route and was used for either new routes added to the transatlantic services, or a new (type of) aeroplane flew the route. Another oddity is that it says via Moncton, when the route was via Shediac (both according to the article eastbound, and the cachet westbound). Moncton is about 30 minutes by bus inland from Shediac.

Going back to the northern route, another question is why these letters should have been offloaded in Canada when addressed to the USA, where the flight terminated. There is no sign of any receiving stamp when these letters crossed the border into the USA. As you remarked, both have the odd "Ireland to ..." on the envelope.

https://metroairportnews.com/pan-am...e-to-europe/
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la...4-story.html

The envelopes both raise serious questions. A lot about these envelopes suggest they are phantasy items.

Edit: Bermuda was an intended stop on the route.
https://longreads.com/2015/02/10/gl...n-the-1930s/

Here is the second type cover on a very questionable route during WWII.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Gambia-F...362901385059

A similar one as yours from Ireland to Shediac. With the same cachet. Also appears to be 30 June / 1 July item.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ireland-SG...372683946420

Another one cancelled 30 June 1939 in London that has the red typing at top left and the c/o Pan Am in Botwood, but addressed to USA in common.

https://www.ebay.ie/itm/154925852029?https://www.ebay.ie/sch/i.html?_id=...20USA&_sis=1

Same stamp combination (why not 1/- and 3d?), same London F.S. cancellation. Same combination of "via" and then a US address.

12:15 P.M London, had to be carried to Southampton, then flown to Foynes, all on the same day.

For being the first two First Flight Covers I've ever purchased I sure got puzzelers.

I cannot find any information on when the return flight departed. It was planned for the Wednesday. That would have been 28 June. All the examples I can find were posted in London or Dublin on June 30, but also show many coincidences.

NSK: Thank you for the replies it is very helpful

Found it.

The flight left New York on 24 June and was delayed at Shediac due to fog. It continued its journey on 27 June and did not arrive in Southampton until 28 June. The return flight left Southampton on 30 June, arriving in New York on 1 July. So, the covers fit the timing for the first westbound mail flight from Foynes to Botwood.

http://www.nzstamps.org.uk/air/empi...tlantic.html

I have collected postage stamps for 65 years but in that time I have not accumulated many covers; perhaps 100 or so.. Being from a small city I've never personally met anyone who collected First Flight covers. I had assumed they were made to commemorate the first time mail was carried between point A and point B by air post. Apparently there is a lot more to it than I realized. NSK was kind enough to show me there is a lot more to this than I could have ever imagined.

I saw these two covers on eBay at a very low price so I bid on them and somehow won the covers. They are between Ireland and Canada, both of which I collect their stamps. They make a fine addition to my collection. I am happy to have them although I may never fully understand what is involved in collecting them.

Pan American Airways began transatlantic air service from the US to Europe in 1939 using their luxurious flying boats. They had a contract with the US Post Office to fly the mail in both directions with the designation U.S. Foreign Contract Air Mail Route number 18 or more commonly known as FAM 18. (lower number FAM routes were established earlier to places in the Caribbean, Central America, South America, Canada, and countries across the Pacific Ocean). The first FAM 18 service began on May 20, 1939 and was known as the Southern Route. This service flew from New York CIty to Marseilles, France with intermediate stops at Horta in the Azores; Lisbon, Portugal; and then returned by the same route in reverse. Collectors prepared thousands of first flight covers that were flown along this route with starting and ending points among these cities. The result is there are 12 different legs that can be collected - for example Horta to Lisbon or Marseilles to New York, etc. There are also some subvarieties of cachets and cancellations that are collectable on this route. Shortly after this Southern route was inaugurated, Pan Am inaugurated their Northern route departing New York City on June 24, 1939 and flying to Southhampton, UK with intermediate stops at Shediac, Canada; Botwood, Canada; and Foynes, Ireland. It then returned to New York with stops at these same cities in reverse order Collectors prepared first flight covers to be flown between all of these cites on both the eastward and westward flights. This means that there are 18 different legs on this inaugural flight that can be collected, plus a couple of additional variations. There are three different legs of outbound covers from Foynes. They would be postmarked on the day of departure from Foynes which was June 30, 1939 or possibly a day or two earlier which would have been held by the Foynes post office to put into the first flight mail bags for the June 30 departure. You have two of the three legs of the Foynes westbound inaugural mail - to Shediac and Botwood - both arriving on July 1, 1939. The third which you do not yet have is the leg from Foynes to New York City, also arriving on July 1, 1939. All of these flirst flights are listed along with substantial background information in the American Air Mail Catalog, Sixth Edition, Volume 3 in the FAM 18 listings.

First Flight Cover collecting has been a large area of postal history specialization for over 100 years. Often collectors prepare covers to be flown with their home addresses but also with additional notations as to which legs of an inaugural service they wish to have their cover carried on. Some people who do not collect first flight covers have a misimpression that they are simple philatelic souvenirs, but they are not. Rather they are actually carried in the official mails and represent the first time this particular mode of official mail carriage - by air - is being used for a given postal route. While many are colorful and have attractive cachets and sometimes attractive special postage stamps as well, they are real mail.