Charles Kingsford Smith and Those Magnificent Men

by P Fitzsimons

  Yes, Harry was damn sure, and now and again, didn’t really like Kingsford Smith’s attitude. He respected his ability, and his focus, just wasn’t used to this kind of intensity, and in fact recorded his impressions of the pilot: ‘He is a hellish stickler for perfection. He delegates but is right on top of it. I wouldn’t want to fly too often with him. Tough boss. Short tempered. Real individualist.’57

  The work went on. Courtesy of Captain Hancock’s money, Kingsford Smith was able to arrange for a new fabric to be put over the entire fuselage in the Douglas Aircraft facility in Santa Monica in which he frequently slept the night, as well as entirely rebuilding the wings to make them strong enough to hopefully survive the worst Pacific storms.

  Safety provisions?

  Yes, well…

  They were minimal at best. The key installation was a dump valve on the main petrol tank, which, if activated, would drain the petrol in fifty seconds and then re-seal, hopefully allowing the Southern Cross to stay afloat for a lot longer than she otherwise would have if they had to ditch her in the ocean. They also had steel and wood saws on board so that if they were afloat, they would theoretically be able to sever a wing from the plane, and they would stay floating even after the plane itself had sunk. (At least they hoped so.) The Southern Cross also carried a small transmitter, encased in a watertight container, with four balloons to carry the aerial aloft if they needed to call for help. Completing their preparations in this field, they also had emergency rations and a small distilling plant to get fresh water from sea water. Still, to save weight they decided not to carry a life raft, life jackets or parachutes. And they also decided as the Southern Cross could do without brakes on the ground that they just weren’t worth the weight. As Harry Lyon later noted of Kingsford Smith, ‘I think he even begrudged the weight of my sextant.’58

  When asked about the lack of safety provisions, Kingsford Smith was to the point. ‘No use cluttering up the machine with that junk,’59 he laughed lightly.

  Supervising closely all the mechanical work on the plane was the legendary Cecil C. ‘Doc’ Maidment, the most experienced and skilled aviation engineer in America, who specialised in Wright Whirlwind engines. His nickname of ‘Doc’ was borne of the fact that it was said he could diagnose an engine’s ills simply by listening to it for a few moments, before he set about curing those ills in record time. He had worked on Lindbergh’s engine, and now he was working on the installation of theirs, and not for nothing would Smithy say of him that he was ‘the man who put the whirl in our Whirlwind engines’.60 When it was done, all the crew required was a happy conjunction of good weather and a full moon and they would be away!

  This business of building a path across the waters was an extraordinary one. Every day now, from the veranda of his Sydney home, William Kingsford Smith gazed out upon the construction of the massive Sydney Harbour Bridge, as two approaching spans were bit by bit connected to massive pylons that had been built on both sides of the harbour. Soon, according to the diagrams that he pored over in the paper, two massive arches would begin to reach out towards each other across the water.

  Retired now, the 76-year-old spent a good many of his days pottering around the garden, solving crossword puzzles and doing the odd handyman thing around the house. His had not been an easy life, and he had never really recovered from his financial misfortune of three decades earlier, the one bad decision that had cost him so dearly.

  Against that, he took great comfort from his wider family and a special joy in the achievements of his youngest son, Charles. It was an interesting thing that just as his father had been a distinguished captain of the sea, his son had become a distinguished captain of the air. Yes, perhaps he would have liked to have been a distinguished captain of some kind himself, instead of what he sometimes felt like—a failed bank manager—but still, it was no little thing to be the son and father of such men.

  Certainly, William worried about Chilla, but equally had no doubts about his boy’s capabilities. From Chilla’s teenaged years on he had put himself in danger, and yet had always managed to survive, and also generally to prosper.

  This time, though? This time, to attempt to cross the Pacific Ocean with only two tiny stop-off points in between which, if they failed to find, would result in their deaths? The venture seemed incredible. Despite the overwhelming risks his son was taking, however, and his frantic busyness to get everything ready, neither William Kingsford Smith nor his wife Catherine were surprised to receive a cable from him to mark their golden wedding anniversary.61 Through everything, Chilla had always remained a wonderfully devoted son. And that really was something…

  It was the culmination of two years of hard work, and a good day’s backbreaking hard yakka. After toiling like navvies with the local Eskimo community to clear a path a mile long and 14 feet wide through the snow on Point Barrow’s frozen lagoon, at last, on the afternoon of 15 April 1928, George Wilkins and Ben Eielson took off in their tiny orange Vega and headed for the roof of the world. At that point, their plane weighed in at 4500 pounds, the bulk of which was petrol.

  Not in it for the bragging rights so much as for scientific discovery, Wilkins did not head for the North Pole—which Amundsen had already flown over by zeppelin airship and Byrd had reached in another Fokker—but a point 200 miles south that was previously unexplored. When they saw no land there, as had been thought to exist, just endless polar sea, Wilkins had once again added hundreds of thousands of square miles to mankind’s knowledge of the planet’s geography.

  Just over twenty hours and 2200 miles after leaving Point Barrow, they were on their approach to Spitzbergen, Norway, when appalling weather began to force them down. Running low on fuel and at last spotting some land—any land would do under the circumstances—they came back to earth on a desolate island known as Dead Man’s Island. For five days and nights they slept in the plane as the blizzard raged all around, and on the sixth day, took off, and completed their journey to Spitzbergen. The world was agog at the feat, and Wilkins and Eielson proceeded on a triumphal tour throughout Europe, which included an audience with King George V, where George Hubert Wilkins was knighted and thereafter became known as Sir Hubert Wilkins.

  And finally, on the last day of May 1928, they were ready. The Southern Cross was ready, the moon was full, and the weather report good. There remained just one more thing to do, in Charles Ulm’s view. That was to have Harry Lyon and Jim Warner sign a formal contract which, among other things, prohibited them from making any commercial endorsements; telling or selling their story without the express permission of Kingsford Smith and Ulm; to waive all claims to indemnity in case of injury or death; and to leave the plane at Fiji, by which time the need for a navigator and radio man would be diminished, because Australia was such a big target to aim for. In return, they were promised $500 upon arrival in Fiji, a first-class return berth on a ship back to San Francisco, and another $500 within a month. Both Warner and Lyon were stunned at the terms—clearly, they were being locked out of the spoils of victory if Kingsford Smith and Ulm made it—but were left with little choice but to sign. To refuse would be to make it appear as if they had cold feet, which was unimaginable.62

  For his part, Charles Ulm was entirely unapologetic. His view was that it was he and Kingsford Smith who had nurtured this dream, taken the risks, got them to this point, and the contract did no more than ensure that Lyon and Warner remain what they were—well-paid hired guns, there to provide a service.

  Eleven

  ACROSS THE PACIFIC…

  We can’t fail, the stars are with us—the stars for which our ship is named—the Southern Cross.

  CHARLES KINGSFORD SMITH TO A JOURNALIST FROM THE NEWYORK TIMES, BEFORE THE ATTEMPT TO CROSS THE PACIFIC1

  Kingsford Smith looked like an airman. There was something bird-like about his dapper, short figure, his clean-cut features, his quick movements, his alert air. He spoke rapidly, shortly, tersely. His face was lined by the many anxious hours he had spe
nt in the air, but this rather fine-drawn, care-worn appearance was offset by a bright and sparkling manner.

  CHARLES KINGSFORD SMITH’S GREAT FRIEND GEOFFREY RAWSON IN HIS PREFACE TO MY FLYING LIFE, BY SIR CHARLES KINGSFORD SMITH

  On the misty morning of 31 May 1928, at exactly 8.48 am, the Southern Cross made ready to move off down the runway at Oakland airport to take flight, bound for freedom, bound for glory…bound for Australia. There to watch them go was a pulsing crowd of around a thousand well-wishers, including Captain G. Allan Hancock, incognito, and Smithy’s oldest brother, Harold, still rather stunned at his youngest sibling’s courage, but glad he had given him a letter to take to the folks at home, which stood a good chance of being the first trans-Pacific bit of airmail ever delivered.2 Well-wishers had also given the crew good luck charms to go with Smithy’s much-loved photo of Nellie Stewart and a Felix the Cat badge on his helmet: a bouquet of flowers, a horseshoe and, most poignantly, the silver ring which had belonged to Alvin Eichwaldt who had perished in a search for survivors of the ill-fated Dole Air Race to Hawaii, given to them by the dead pilot’s mother, just before they boarded. They also had with them in the cockpit a silken Australian flag.

  In that cockpit, as Smithy ran up each of the engines in turn to a satisfyingly shattering crescendo, he knew there were two possible impediments to a successful take-off. The first was weight. He and Ulm had just managed to get off the ground with the petrol tanks at capacity, but never with the two extra people in the back, and it was always going to be touch and go, as everyone knew. (Not for nothing had the US Army Air Corps parked a fully manned emergency vehicle halfway down the runway.)

  And the second possible impediment was a deputy sheriff with an attachment order he wanted to serve on them over the non-payment of some debts.3 Though Captain Hancock’s money had enabled them to pay back nearly everything they owed, there were still a couple of bills outstanding, and the creditors, most particularly one by the name of Tom Catton,4 had turned nasty. Which made it all the more imperative they get moving now. Mercifully, the deputy sheriff was being held back by the same dedicated policemen who were holding the pressing crowd back, officers who were not aware that there was an issue…

  It was with extra satisfaction, then, that Smithy gunned it, only to have the centre motor cut out 300 yards down the runway, when they were still at a fat waddle. Bringing the plane to a halt, they found that the problem was an ‘altitude control’ knob affecting the fuel mixture, which was fixed within a matter of minutes.5 Harry Lyon, for one, was delighted, as he believed in the mariner’s tradition that ‘a poor start, is a good ending’.6 Now, the obvious thing for most people would have been to start again at the beginning of the runway, but the obvious wasn’t the best choice when you knew that the deputy sheriff was waiting there.

  Upon consideration, Smithy decided it would be better to just start from where they were and chance it. So, with all three engines on full throttle again, the Southern Cross began to move off once more…

  Another waddle…a jog now…a run…a sprint…the machine was hurtling down the runway and seeming to just lift a little, as the watching crowd held its breath. Inside the cockpit, his eyes focused, his lips set, Smithy held her true with the throttles wide open, even as an overflow valve from the central tank gushed petrol upon his shoulders. A mile down the runway the plane lifted a little off the ground…then came back down…then up a little again…and then down…and then up…7

  Up…up…UP, you beauty. Staying up! Just a few feet, but getting perceptibly higher with every passing second as the crowd had no sooner let out its breath and everyone was cheering!

  In the cockpit of the Southern Cross, whatever else, it was a spectacular beginning to the nigh on 7400-mile journey.

  At much the same time as the prisoners of Alcatraz heard the sound of screaming engines above them, Kingsford Smith and Ulm could see, out to the right from their cockpit, the bustling rail and car ferry terminus of Sausalito, and beyond that the picturesque fishing village of Tiburon. And now, as they headed straight for the Golden Gate, the channel that connected the bay to the Pacific Ocean, they could glory in the view of San Francisco proper to their left. With the base of it shrouded in fog, it was only the tops of the tall buildings that poked through, giving the metropolis the appearance of being a magical city in the clouds.

  Not all of the crew were exuberant, however. Noting the several planes accompanying them for the first few miles, most of which had newspaper photographers on board, Jim Warner couldn’t help himself. ‘If we do go down,’ he told Lyon, ‘those photos will make some nice mementos for our friends.’8

  As Charles Kingsford Smith at last turned away and focused solely on the flight ahead, strong emotions flooded through him. Finally, all the worries, all the problems, the fierce squabbling, the desperation and disappointments were behind them. They were on their way!

  Charles Ulm felt much the same and was truly exultant that they were actually setting out on fulfilling a dream they had been separately and jointly nurturing for years. Ulm, though, would acknowledge at a later point that he felt a rather strange presentiment a couple of hours after leaving ‘Frisco. From the cheery farewell, and the first lot of sunny skies above and sparkling blue below, they had to climb up over a mountain of slightly forbidding cloud. Looking down upon that formation, into its amazing valleys and ridges from 2000 feet on high, Ulm was suddenly struck by a haunting sense of their complete isolation.

  And isolated they truly were. Every second was taking them further away from land and they were still about a dozen hours from the halfway mark, when they would at last be heading towards land and their first stop-off point. Strangely, beneath them on the ocean there had so far been no sign of any vessels even though they were flying above what were meant to be fairly busy shipping lanes. Were they indeed on the right course? In the cabin, Harry Lyon checked and rechecked his calculations. Allowing 3 degrees for the southerly drift of wind, he had them on a course of 242 degrees, at the beginning of their Great Circle route to Honolulu. (A curiosity of Harry’s style was that he did not keep those calculations in a leather-bound book, like other navigators, but, once done, would scrunch them up and throw them out the window!)9

  Might this trip be easier than they thought, after all their hard work to get in the air? Might it simply be a matter of pointing the plane in the right direction and letting her rip, giving lie to the local Californian betting agency that had offered odds of 11 to 1 against their even reaching Hawaii?10 After all, they had passed soon enough through the slightly threatening cloud, and if anything, things were now almost too perfect. In a very odd kind of way, the monotony of the blue sea below them, the blue vault above, and the ear-splitting bark of the engines, almost began to oppress them.11

  Now back down to some 1000 feet above the Pacific Ocean, their mighty aeroplane flew on. Both Kingsford Smith and Charles Ulm were generally delighted with how she was performing. (And a ‘she’ the Southern Cross definitely was. A beautiful, protective creation that was going to see them through on this life’s journey, and look after them whatever hard times might be coming.)

  Meanwhile, Lyon was also giving them updates as to his estimation of how far they had travelled and at one o’clock San Francisco time, told them they had already covered 350 miles of their first hop. They had just over 2000 miles left to go to Hawaii…

  And thar she blew. Seemingly from out of nowhere, they flew into a storm that reduced visibility to nearly nothing and rocked the craft from side to side and up and down, almost as if they were zooming along a terrible aerial road filled with shocking potholes, sudden gullies and sharp corners. With all four of them perched atop wicker chairs that were not attached to the fuselage, with no seat belts, bad bumps could see them airborne in their own right and many curses ensued. Happily, they were soon through it and beneath them a sunny sea quickly appeared again, a shimmering, vivid turquoise so calm that ‘not a single fleck of foam marred the endless mirr
or’.12

  By now it was 4.30 pm San Francisco time and they had been flying for just over seven and a half hours. Still there was no sign of any shipping, which remained a cause of slight concern, but it wasn’t as if there was anything they could do about it. Lyon continued to assure them that they were on course, and they were still connected to the rest of the world by the gossamer thread that was the radio beam coming at them from ol’ ‘Frisco, some 620 miles behind. (Funny, was it really only that morning that they had left that magic city in California? Somehow, it seemed extremely difficult to comprehend that that world and this world of aerial wonder could be connected, just by them and eight hours’ flight.)

  At 6.40 pm Honolulu picked up a Morse message from the Southern Cross: ‘It’s getting dark now. One notices a steady flame pouring out of the exhaust. Engines doing their duty royally, making one feel safe as the pyramids of Egypt.’13 (This message clearly had not come from Smithy, as he had been inside those pyramids and had not felt safe at all.)