Looking back at issue 1, May 1944
2024 marks a historic moment for Air Mail. It will be exactly 80 years since the first Air Mail was printed and distributed to 10,000 RAF Association members.
The upcoming Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe was evidently on the mind of editor, Air Commodore E. L. Howard-Williams MC, during his first welcome:
“Everybody’s war remains to be won”, he began. “Impending events charge the times with a high potential. We are on the eve of momentous months. To win we shall have to work and fight as never before.”
The first editor’s welcome.
The 20-page magazine included snippets of world news, updates on air affairs, a feature on the aircraft trade and the Royal Air Force, a double-page of jokes and cartoons plus three pages of branch news.
As well as updating on activities from its own area, the submission from Surbiton Branch highlighted the mood at the time regarding the new magazine:
“We welcome this opportunity to be one of the first to record their appreciation to those at Headquarters who have worked so hard. The advent of a new journal… will meet a very urgent need…. It is only fair to give the new journal a just trial before offering any criticisms. We must be helpful and ensure that it reflects the requirements of the whole of our membership and not the individual. If it maintains that contact which is so vital to the readers, then it will earn an everlasting place in the life of our Association.”
Other branch news entries show that the country, and the Association, were still firmly on a war footing.
“The Secretary had to report with sincere regret the loss of two of our DFC members in operations over Germany – F/O’s Aspin and Preston,” ran the Bury and District Branch entry. “We hope they managed to bale out safely and will turn up.”
Some had good news to report, such as Gloucester and Cheltenham Branch welcoming back member Ted Buck, who had “recently been repatriated after three and a half years in enemy prison camps”. Others, such as this from Ipswich and District Branch, were less joyous: “Sympathy was expressed to Mrs Watson, whose son LAC Watson recently died in a Japanese Prisoner of War Camp.”
Numerous entries also show the support which branches were providing to the RAF community.
“The branch… has a big sprinkling of airmen of the USA, and other Allied Forces are among the honorary members,” reported Leicester Branch. “The camaraderie evident at all gatherings augers well for the future. Practically every night is a gala night, and one finds fliers of today comparing notes with men who thought their machines in the 1914-19 ‘do’ were the last word in aircraft… Another pleasing aspect of the branch activities is the practical sympathy shown to Leicester and Leicestershire men of the RAF who are in the hands of the enemy. The branch sends each prisoner parcels regularly.”
Scattered throughout are adverts from giants of British aviation, from Rolls-Royce and Hawker-Siddeley to Bristol and Vickers-Armstrongs. One in particular – a civil engineering company – had one eye firmly on the future:
“When the time comes for rebuilding this battered world… then Sir Lindsay Parkinson and Co. Ltd. will be found supremely ready to play a leading part once more.
Advert for Rolls Royce Merlin engines.
Advert for the Bristol Aeroplane Company.
Advert for Vickers Armstrongs.
A list of notable persons within the Association’s governing body was also published, which included many luminaries of the RAF and WAAF (Women’s Auxiliary Air Force). Its patron was King George VI, and its first president Hugh Trenchard, Marshal of the Royal Air Force and founder of the RAF.
In addition to news from the RAF and Association branches, more light-hearted sections can also be found. On one page the editor observed that “a language all its own for the air is being forged in the fierce heat of battle,” before going on to list a few examples. The list ended with a call for readers to submit more phrases so that Air Mail could “record them for the benefit of future generations.”
At a time when the decisive battles of Kohima and Imphal where raging in India, it is perhaps appropriate that the jokes page featured this topical anecdote:
An airman on the north-west frontier of India once found himself short of money. He conceived the brilliant idea of writing to the Almighty for some. His letter ran: ” Dear God. I’m broke. Please send me £10.”
In due season this letter reached the Air Ministry, some say appropriately. Touched by the man’s simple faith, a few officers are said to have subscribed the sum of £3 and sent it to him.
Thinking no more of it, what was their amazement, some six months or so later, to receive another letter, from the same airman, also addressed to the Amighty. This one ran:
“Dear God. Thank you for the £3. But next time, please don’t send it through the Air Ministry, as the so-and-so’s have pinched seven!”
Wartime RAF expressions.
Cartoon featuring a B-17 bomber.
In the editor’s welcome of Air Mail issue one, Air Commodore E. L. Howard-Williams MC challenged the readers to “Let us have your constructive views… It shall be our job to try and balance them out.”
Responses came in by the hundreds, with some published in issue two. “Bang on effort,” read one. “Hearty congratulations,” read another. Reactions to the branch news section were divided – as they have been over the intervening eight decades. “More branch news please,” wrote one reader. While another stated: “Too much branch news!”
Over the next few months we’ll be posting interesting snippets from previous Air Mails on our social media channels, so make sure to follow us on Facebook and Instagram.
