Lighter Than Air

by Guy Warner

  And in his report, written in October, he had remarked:

  ‘This is obviously the most completely satisfactory proposal of all. The problem has been worked at, on various lines, for some three months. A successful result is confidently anticipated in the course of a few weeks more.’57

  He also believed that the idea could have offensive possibilities, increasing the range of bombing aircraft which could be detached from the mother airships over the target.

  The Airship Plane was flown without separation by Flight Commander W.C. Hicks in August 1915 and the first release, without a crew, was also successful. On 19 February 1916, permission was given for a manned slipping trial, with the pilots being given a completely free hand to choose their day and time, with an unknown staff officer adding in his advice to the Director of the Air Service, Rear Admiral Charles Vaughan-Lee:

  ‘I regard it as most inadvisable to allow the trial to take place in front of important visitors, as their presence necessarily exercises a certain compulsion on the pilots, and, in case of accident, the impression created is very undesirable. On this subject of experimental work I have some knowledge and never allowed any submarine trials to be undertaken other than in secret. It is difficult to carry out aircraft trials in secret, but as much secrecy as possible is most desirable.’58

  Therefore, on 21 February, Usborne and Squadron Commander Wyndor Plunkett de Courcy Ireland (the CO of the Great Yarmouth Air Station, who had been born in Co Tipperary in 188559) ascended from Kingsnorth on the manned trial of the AP-1. The craft climbed in a series of circles to about 4000 feet (1219m), watched by an anxious group of officers below. The AP-1 exceeded its equilibrium height, causing a drop in gas pressure, and the instability thereby created resulted in the premature detachment of the forward suspension cables. The nose of the aircraft plunged downwards, overstressing the remaining two wires, which failed. Apparently, Ireland had tried to climb along the fuselage to release the remaining cables, but to no avail. The controls of the BE (Serial No 989) were in all probability damaged as it parted company from the envelope, so making a safe descent impossible. The BE section was seen to sideslip and turn over, throwing out Ireland, who fell into the River Medway and was drowned. Usborne remained with the BE, which crashed in Strood Railway Station goods yard. It is poignant to think that their lives could possibly have been saved had the parachute demonstrated at Kingsnorth some eighteen months before been adopted, particularly for test crews and other high-risk ventures. The Admiralty immediately banned any further experiments of this nature until one of the new rigid airships should become available, and the planned AP-2 never flew. To the modern mind the Airship Plane seems something of an outlandish conception. But yet, was it any odder at that stage in its development than another idea which had, in its early days, been given considerable support by figures such as Winston Churchill and Murray Sueter? It was a large, ungainly steel box which lumbered across the ground on cumbersome treads at a speed far less than that of a walking man. Its crew were subject to deafening by the noise of the unenclosed engine with which they shared a cramped compartment, par-boiled by the intense heat which it gave off, and semi-asphyxiated by the pungent fumes of its exhaust, with guns firing from its barbettes like a turn-of-the-century armoured cruiser. It was, of course, the tank, which in the end would prove a most useful battlefield asset.

  The AP-1 at Kingsnorth. (J.M. Bruce; G.S. Leslie Collection)

  The AP-1 in flight at Kingsnorth in 1915.

  A Court of Inquiry was held, but the record of its deliberations and verdict does not appear to have survived, apart from some fragments of commentary upon it, made in March 1916.60 It is addressed ‘Admiral’ and is unsigned, but concludes:

  ‘I cannot speak too highly of Commander Usborne’s and Lt Commander Ireland’s sacrifices. They were trying to evolve a machine that could compete with Zeppelins and they gave their lives in this endeavour. Regarding paragraph 8 of the finding, it is submitted that these two gallant officers be given some post-mortem honour.’

  Air Commodore Masterman wrote in 1934:

  ‘Thus fell two gallant men, giving their lives for an experiment which since, under different conditions, had proved to be practicable, mourned by all who had the privilege of knowing them. As far as Usborne is concerned no one can talk of early British airship days without mention of his name and work, and no one can say what the subsequent history of this service would have been, had he been spared to assist in its development. A personality was lost on that February day which was irreplaceable.’61

  Masterman, who knew Usborne so well, and would later be instrumental in founding the Royal Observer Corps, lived to the age of seventy-seven, passing away in 1957.

  Betty Usborne had a dream three nights beforehand – a black car from the Admiralty had drawn up at the door of their house in South Kensington to tell her of Neville’s death. On waking she asked him to postpone the test. He wouldn’t. When the day came she determined to stop the dream coming true by leaving with him first thing and not returning till after midnight. But at midnight the black car was waiting. A fellow airshipman at Kingsnorth, Commander Harold Woodcock, wrote to Mrs Usborne:

  ‘He was a man of vast ability, energy, initiative and fearlessness, his death is a great blow to the service; we shall all miss his personality and genius more than I can say.’62

  Another contemporary described him as; ‘The brilliant experimental non-rigid pilot.’63

  The Official Historian wrote of him:

  ‘Commander N.F. Usborne, whose tenacious ability had done much to sweep aside the difficulties and prejudices that dogged the early development of the small airship, typifies the vision and courage which the personnel brought to their work. The science of aeronautics was young. Ideas which seemed to work out in theory had always to stand the ultimate practical test in the air. The risk in this, the supreme test of the inventor’s faith in his machine, had to be accepted, not in the excitement of battle, but in cold blood.’64

  Betty, who married Hugh Godley, later the second Lord Kilbracken, died in 1958, and Ann, who never married, passed away in 1985. Betty’s son, John Godley, later the third Lord Kilbracken, and a distinguished Fleet Air Arm pilot in the Second World War, wrote:

  ‘As her second marriage disintegrated, she increasingly idealised her first husband, Neville. Their years together (at least in recollection) had been so perfect, the gentle lover, the wise father, the brilliant man of invention. He was more than an outstanding naval officer, a visionary with an eager mind, as well as great charm and magnetism.’65

  Her father, the artist Vereker Hamilton, died in 1931 and his obituary in The Times noted that his painting, The Airship Flown by Captain Neville Usborne, RN, was held in the collection of the Imperial War Museum.66

  The Zeppelins were eventually defeated by interceptor aircraft armed with a machine gun firing a mixture of explosive ammunition to punch holes in the fabric covering the outer skin and the gas cells within, and incendiary bullets to ignite the escaping gas, anti-aircraft fire from the ground and their own inherent unsuitability for the role of strategic bombing. Almost 100 Zeppelins and Schütte-Lanz airships served with the German Army and Navy during the war. Nearly three-quarters of these were lost due to being shot down, bombed in their sheds, catching fire accidentally, being wrecked by heavy landings, or succumbing to adverse weather conditions. They made 4720 operational flights covering over 1,250,000 miles (2,000,000 kilometres), dropping just 202 tons (203 metric tonnes) of bombs, which resulted in the deaths of 556 and injuries to 1358 more.67 Of the navy’s seventy-three ships, no less than fifty-three were destroyed and forty per cent of the crews were killed – a loss rate comparable to those sustained by the German U-boat Service and the RAF’s Bomber Command in the Second World War.68 Murray Sueter calculated that the RNAS, RFC and RAF were directly responsible for the destruction of twenty-one enemy airships, with the BE2c taking part in nine of these.69 The German airships totally failed to live
up to either the expectations of their operators, or the fears of the countries against which they were directed. It is arguable that they could have been put to better use on long-range reconnaissance missions, scouting for convoys and passing information by wireless to shore bases or U-boats. Undoubtedly they were of considerable assistance when used by the High Seas Fleet for scouting, carrying out more than 200 such missions over the North Sea and may well have saved it from destruction at Jutland. Indeed, Admiral Jellicoe later wrote that:

  ‘Our position must have been known to the enemy, as at 2.50am, the fleet engaged a Zeppelin for quite five minutes, during which time she had ample opportunity to note, and subsequently report the position and course of the British Fleet.’70

  Taken as a whole, however, the Kaiser’s rigid airships were a costly flop in comparison to the much simpler and cheaper Royal Navy non-rigids, which carried out a valuable but unheralded service throughout the war.

  In 1921, the Royal Aeronautical Society founded the Usborne Memorial Prize for a lecture on an airship subject, in memory of Wing Commander Neville F. Usborne. Indeed, the Secretary of the RAeS, Lieutenant Colonel W. Lockwood Marsh, wrote to The Times suggesting that Usborne’s name be coupled with that of Air Commodore E.M. Maitland, who had recently lost his life in the R.38 airship disaster.71 The terms of the award were subsequently changed to:

  ‘Awarded annually – at the discretion of the council – for the best contribution to the society’s publications written by a graduate or student on some subject of a technical nature in connection with aeronautics.’

  The revised terms were similar to another of the Royal Aeronautical Society’s awards, the Pilcher Memorial Prize. The two were subsequently amalgamated to become the Pilcher-Usborne Award, which was awarded through to the late 1980s.

  In the papers which have survived are some unfinished report forms on the fifteen officers at RNAS Kingsnorth, which Usborne was probably working on before his final, fatal flight. His concise, no-nonsense summaries are a mark of the man and may serve as an epitaph:

  W.C. Hicks – ‘A good common-sense officer. Not much ingenuity or initiative.’

  J.N. Fletcher – ‘A very intelligent, keen officer. Has a somewhat unfortunately brusque manner.’

  A.D. Cunningham – ‘An excellent messmate.’

  J.W.O. Dalgleish – ‘This officer has a tendency to become depressed and grumpy.’

  E. Sparling – ‘An indefatigable and reliable officer. Has the gift of instantly establishing cordial relations with strangers.’

  A.C. Wilson – ‘Hard working but not clever. An excellent odd job officer, but will never be brilliant at anything.’

  G.C. Colmore – ‘An unusually fine officer with a very strong personality. Has been all over the world and had every sort of adventure. Specially recommended for promotion.’

  Unfinished: T.H.B. Hartford, Blundell, Hunter, Merchant, Brice, Hibbard and Park.72

  Chapter Five

  Usborne’s Achievements and his Legacy

  Neville Usborne made important contributions to the early development of four strands of naval aviation: the rigid airship, the SS Class nonrigid, the Coastal Class non-rigid and the airship-launched aeroplane. How did these progress in the years following his unfortunate demise?

  British Rigid Airships

  The Royal Navy’s rigid airship programme was suspended in 1911 after HMA No 1’s less than happy debut. HMA No 9r was originally ordered from Vickers in 1913, but, due to frequent changes of ministerial and naval policy, was not delivered from Barrow to the Rigid Trials Flight at Howden until April 1917, having become the first British rigid to fly on 16 November 1916, commanded by Wing Captain Masterman. Murray Sueter wrote; ‘When hostilities broke out No 9 Rigid was in her design stages. Then it was brought to the notice of the Admiralty that munitions were of greater importance than airships, so the work on No 9 was stopped, against the advice of the Director of the Admiralty Air Department (myself).’1 Her design was by then somewhat outmoded, being largely derived from a pre-war Zeppelin which had force-landed in France in 1913. She was slow and heavy, deliberately being strongly built to withstand ham-fisted handling by inexperienced crews. Her dimensions were: length 526 feet (160 metres), a diameter of 53 feet (16 metres) and a capacity of 846,000 cubic feet (23,942 cubic metres). The lack of a British rigid airship for reconnaissance at the Battle of Jutland in 1916 was regretted by the Director of the Naval Air Department:

  ‘I have always been convinced that if the naval airmen had been allowed to develop proper aerial reconnaissance of the North Sea, we could have done so much better on the naval side throughout the whole war period. The lack of British Zeppelins at Jutland was no fault of Lord Jellicoe.’2

  HMA No 9r in 1916.

  No 9r was used mostly for training and experimental work, but did carry out one operational patrol over the North Sea in July 1917. She was scrapped in June 1918 after a flying life of only 198 hours; 20 feet (6 metres) of her bow was salvaged by the commanding officer of Pulham Airship Station in Norfolk, for use as a bandstand and rose trellis.

  The next British rigids were the four airships of the 23 Class, 23r, 24r, 25r and R26, which were delivered in 1917–18. In essence they were more advanced versions of 9r. For self-defence purposes, 23r was fitted experimentally with a two-pounder gun mounted on top of the envelope. They were used mostly for training, patrols and convoy work, though on 25 October 1918, R26, which was the best ship of the four, flew over London as part of the Lord Mayor’s Show, a unique appearance by an airship at this event. They were all deleted in 1919.

  Airship R24 at East Fortune in 1917.

  R29 at East Fortune in 1919.

  The 23X Class, R27 and R29, followed; R27 was soon destroyed in an accidental fire in the hangar at Howden. R29 was more successful and was the only wartime rigid to see action, bombing a suspicious oil patch on 29 September 1918 off the coast near Sunderland, while on convoy duty. Signals made by Aldis lamp called in the destroyer escorts and subsequently the sinking of UB-115 was confirmed.

  The next two airships, R31 and R32, were unusual in that their hull frameworks were based on the German Schütte-Lanz practice and were made of wood. During trials, R31 reached a speed of 70 mph (112 kph), but was scrapped after a career of only four hours and fifty-five minutes. R32 was seconded to the National Physical Laboratory for experimental work in manoeuvring and parachuting. One oddity of both ships was that their wooden frames flexed so much in flight that, ‘anyone standing in the control room doorway and watching a friend at the tail-end of the keel gangway would see him “disappear” and then “reappear” during turns.’3

  Airship Service personnel had become members of the Royal Air Force on 1 April 1918, but ownership of the airships was not passed from the Admiralty to the Air Ministry until October 1919, by which time the number of rigid and non-rigid airships on charge had been greatly reduced.

  Some idea of the comparative utility between the rigid and non-rigid RN airships during the war may be gained from the fact that – in total – the eight rigids flew 1500 hours of wartime patrols, whereas one non-rigid alone, the SSZ11, flew no less than 1610 hours. In one month in 1918 the SSZ11 was aloft for 259 hours – given the fact that the airships flew in daylight; this was more than half the actual hours available in the month. Another, SSZ20, flew 28,299 miles (45,278 kilometres) in 1918 in 1263 hours – a round-the-world journey at an average speed of 20 knots (23mph/37kph). One airship historian goes as far as to say:

  ‘Although they never received the same public acclaim that was so often bestowed upon the undeserving rigid airships, the SS Zero blimps were truly the unsung heroines of the war against the U-boats.’4

  R33 was registered as a civilian airship G-FAAG in 1920. Note the pair of Gloster Grebe fighters suspended below the envelope.

  Two of the most successful British airships were the R33 and her sister ship, R34, of 1919. Both were almost identical copies of the Zeppelin L33. Among the hi
ghlights of the R33’s career was the time that a brass band played on her top platform in flight and the early example ‘eye in the sky’ duty, when assistance was given to the police monitoring car traffic at the Epsom races in 1921. R33 continued to give valuable service until 1926. The R34 was built by the firm of William Beardmore, in Glasgow, and achieved considerable fame on 2–6 and 9–13 July 1919, when she made the first double crossing, including the first east-west crossing, of the Atlantic, from East Fortune in Scotland to Long Island, New York. The outward trip took 108 hours and 12 minutes, and the return trip to Pulham, assisted by the prevailing winds, took 75 hours and three minutes. This was only a few weeks after Alcock and Brown’s first west-east crossing from Newfoundland to Clifden, Co Galway, in their Vickers Vimy. The first east-to-west crossing by a heavier-than-air machine was not until 12–13 April 1928, in the Junkers W33 D1167, Bremen, flown from Baldonnel to Greenly Island, Labrador, by Captain Hermann Kohl, Baron von Hunefeld and Commandant James Fitzmaurice – the commanding officer of the Irish Air Corps. (In October 1910, Walter Wellman and his crew of five (plus dog) made an unsuccessful attempt to cross the North Atlantic from west-to-east in the small non-rigid airship America. Following engine problems and other difficulties, they were rescued by the SS Trent.)

  Sadly, a minor accident, which was followed by severe weather damage while the R34 was moored out of doors on the ground, brought a premature end to this fine airship in January 1921.

  R36 flew only 80 hours before being deleted and broken up for scrap in 1926.

  The R36 was registered as a civil aircraft, G-FAAF, and used for passenger transport experiments. She was 673 feet (205 metres) in length, with a diameter of 79 feet (24 metres) and a capacity of 2,101,000 cubic feet (59,458 cubic metres). Her passenger cabin was luxuriously appointed with accommodation for fifty. On 27 June 1921, forty-nine MPs were taken for an hour’s flight, returning to the mooring mast at Cardington in Bedfordshire, which had recently been fitted with a lift. Her navigating officer was Flight Lieutenant Tom Elmhirst, who was one of Lord Fisher’s original young midshipmen drafted from the Grand Fleet in 1916 to fly the SS Class.