Short Empire Flying Boats :

G'day Cinderella Collectors.
Looking for a scan of a sheet of Short Empire Flying Boats,
(circa 1937 brit stamp exhibition)
I've kicked around but not located as yet.
Probably Blue or Green and quite scarce.
I thought I had an image in my collection

CASTOR : (one of the twin sons of Zeus and Leda)



Saturday 21st August 1937

Was called at 6.45 am. Got an awful shock had £13.2.6d. excess luggage to pay. Left by Hotel Bus for Docks. Left
Docks by Motor Boat, the Flying Boat "CASTOR" looked lovely out in Southampton water. Took off at 8.30 sm.
Glorious morning bright and sunny. Perfect take-off. Passengers - 5 men and myself. Coffee or Bovril served at
10.30 am. Arrived Marseilles 12.30 pm, and went ashore. Left.one passenger. Left Marseilles 2 pm. Had lunch on
board. Wonderful view of cloud effects. Also had wonderful view of Swiss Alps en route.
Arrived Rome 4.30 pm. An hour's drive by Imperial Airways Bus to Grand Hotel De Russie. Tea ready on arrival. I
had tea with two gentlemen, one travelling to Durban and the other to Alexandria. Very nice suite of rooms. Dinner
at 8 pm. In garden of Hotel, fairy lights and lanterns hanging from the trees and a lamp on each table, very pretty
effect. After dinner had walk through the gardens with one of the Officers. I asked him if was possible for us to
come down on land and his reply was "only once" (We landed on the sea, river, or lake each time, in case of a
forced landing on land, the flying boat would be damaged badly)

http://www.fad.co.za/Resources/avia.../FB/eye5.htm

Is this what you're looking for?

http://auctions.findtarget.com/deta...AILS_BY_AIR/

That's it! Thanks 22 crows,
already six bids, it would be nice to get mail from this locale,
"Chicken" Alaska ..now there's a postmark.

This is another one I have been outbid on a number of times.
And it usually sells for a lot more than at the auction link shown by 22crows ! A very good price.

I'm always on the lookout for stamps, sheets, covers, anything, depicting British military aircraft that saw service in WW2. If anyone has any spares, or anything to flog off to me, please contact me!

Yes that's what I thought, If in a local auction
I'd probably go $12-$15 but on ebay, you just get sniped all the
time so I forget it.
Plenty of other stamps around.

The Flying Boat featured in the cinderella is the "Centaurus"
which went to the Royal Australian Air Force in 1939

Can we get London Bus to suggest what flag the "Castor" is flying ?

Since were on the topic of AIRCRAFT, are there any good AIRBUS 320 stamps in existence?

I would love to get a few, and change my avatar to a nice one, when I Google I only get one ratty looking A320 stamp.

There are two flags there and neither [sadly] are very clear.
In 1937 the Flying boat may have been flying the Civil Air Ensign [Blue and white cross on light blue background with Union Flag top left], but the one in the pic looks like a White Ensign although, as I said, it is not clear.
In the foreground, the flag flying from the back of the small[mail {?}] boat looks like the England flag.

What say you all ?

here is the White Ensign



and the good old Cross of St.George [there is even St.George slaying that nasty Welsh Dragon ! [Oops sorry]



Londonbus1

Yep, agreed Lb.
be careful, the current Prime Minister of Australia is from Wales :)
and shall be for the next 3 years.

The Civil Air Ensign was chosen as the Flag of the Imperial Airways Flying Boat [in the UK] in 1931. Previously the Union Flag was used.
IA Flying Boats in other parts of Europe flew the Red Ensign.



Here is the Red Ensign on one of my Kensitas silks.



If anyone, by chance, comes across any Kensitas Silks Flag issue, I would be extremely interested. I do not have a complete set and those in the Album are yearning for the missing brethren to join them !

Londonbus1.....flying the Flag

Edwin - there's an Airbus 320 stamp from Finland, issued in a booklet, 2003 (SG1701)

http://www.filahome-stamps.com/stam...sfinland.htm

Here's one of my favourite crash covers from the Imperial Airways Short S.17 Kent Flying Boat, Scipio which crashed in Mirabelle Bay in Crete in 1936:



Note the royal insignia on the labels, "E R"!

I've posted this elsewhere but I hope you don't mind me doing this again:

Before WW2 Crete was a key staging point for Imperial Airways' new passenger and airmail services flying from Britain to and from India, Australia and Africa.

This cover was posted in Auckland in New Zealand on 7th August 1936, carried to Australia on the ocean liner SS Mariposa and then flown by Imperial Airways.

The cover left Alexandria on Imperial Airways G-ABFA on 22nd August 1936 and crashed when trying to land in Mirabella Bay in Crete (its next scheduled stop.)

G-ABFA, called Scipio, was one of three Short S.17 Kent (Scipio class) luxury flying boats commissioned by Imperial Services for these long-haul services. The crew of four and five passengers were rescued safely but sadly two other passengers were killed in the accident.

38 bags of mail were recovered and forwarded to Athens within 6 hours of the crash and apparently it was then forwarded to Brindisi in Italy and processed there. It must have been quite a task to dry so much saturated and flimsy mail. Many of the covers like this one lost their stamps in the process.

Many receiving post offices applied handstamps to explain the poor conditions of the items. This one has the simple British marking, "DAMAGED BY / SEA WATER".

This cover is also very unusual in that the seals that were applied in London to hold it together before delivery have the ER and crown insignia of King Edward VIII.

Here's a nice short audio film clip of Scipio in happier times:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmuNQXst6nI

To bring us back on topic here's a similar video clip of a Short Empire
flying boat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9CVbDaXWnY&NR=1

...and for good reason! Very cool.

Is it surprising that it doesn't have any receiving marks from London? Knowing that most of them got there in August, together with the Edward VIII seal, tidies it up pretty well, anyway.

Thanks for sharing it.

Collin