Post-blogging the 1909 scareships

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PHANTOM AIRSHIP. PROBABLE SOLUTION OF THE MYSTERY / Standard, 21 May 1909, 21

After yesterday's excitement, today is something of an anticlimax as far as scareships are concerned. In fact, it's more like a backlash.

There are some new sighting reports, from Wales again and from Birmingham. The Manchester Guardian reports (p. 7) that Oliver L. Jones, a Monmouth auctioneer (of Messrs. Nelmes, Poole, Jackson and Jones), his wife and two passengers were driving from Tregarog late on Sunday night when they saw an airship.

"I can believe my own eyes and ears. It was about eight miles from Monmouth when I first saw it. It came from the direction of Raglan, and seemed to go towards Chepstow. It then turned right round and came back towards Raglan and over the mountain. I continued to drive slowly on, and watched it for about half an hour. I was driving eight or ten miles an hour, but the airship seemed to go faster than that. I could see the cigar shape quite distinctly, and noticed the perfect control the occupants had over the airship."

The other report is sketchy: it seems that 'for several nights people living in Small Heath, a suburb of Birmingham, have seen what is stated to be an airship passing over the district'. Interestingly, it is described as cigar-shaped although no lights were seen. Local opinion is that it belongs to 'a local inventor [...] making trial trips'.
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AIRSHIP MYSTERY. FLIGHT BY NIGHT OVER CARDIFF / Manchester Guardian, 20 May 1909, 7

The Globe has a slew of new reports from last night (p. 7), from Norwich, Wroxham, Sprowston, Catton and Tesburgh in East Anglia, Pontypool in Wales (by workers at a forge, an architect and two postal workers), and Kingstown (now Dún Laoghaire) in Ireland. Some saw searchlights, some heard a 'whizzing' sound, some saw a cigar shape. But yesterday's story of the airship seen at Cardiff, is today the main scareship story in both the Standard and the Manchester Guardian, as well as (again) the Globe. It's clear that the mystery airships have moved from a minor curiosity to, if not big news, exactly, then at least middling news. The Globe has nearly a whole column on them, the Standard has another column, and the Manchester Guardian -- which has mostly ignored the story up until now -- has two full columns (see headlines above), a comment from its London correspondent and a leading article on 'The mysterious airship'. The only holdout in my sample is the stuffy old Times.

The Cardiff docks story is the lead. The statement of the signalman Charles Westlake is repeated, and further supporting statements from the other dock workers given. The Manchester Guardian's correspondent reports a rumour (p. 7) that residents of the Cathays district of Cardiff saw an airship on Tuesday night (i.e. the evening before the dock incident) but has not been able to verify this. It is also pointed out that locals are familiar with the appearance of airships, because one was built and flown nearby several years ago. This would be Willows No. 1; but it seems that Willows is not responsible for the mystery airship. At least, 'a Cardiff man, who has made a study of aerial navigation for many years past, and whose son is at present in London exhibiting a dirigible airship' is interviewed as well, without any connection being made between the two. But this must be Joseph Thompson Willows and his son Ernest Thompson Willows, who worked together on airships, though it is the son who is mostly remembered for this nowadays. In the opinion of Willows père, the airship at Cardiff was most likely launched from a ship in the Bristol Channel or off the south coast. He doesn't say anything about who would be doing this, or why, but other locals seem to have their suspicions:

Naturally enough, tremendous interest has been manifested throughout the district, and in some quarters a feeling of unrest has been created, because it is generally recognised that in the event of invasion the Welsh coal ports would represent a vital spot of enormous strategical importance.

But there's an even more sensational airship story from Cardiff. In fact, it is 'of so strange a character as to be difficult of credence', according to the Standard (p. 10). On the same night as the dockyard sighting, a travelling Punch-and-Judy salesman by the name of Lethbridge was walking back home from Senghenydd to Cardiff over Caerphilly Mountain. At about 11pm he saw an airship which had landed on the mountain, and its crew. At least, that seems to be the implication of the interview he gave to the Cardiff Evening Express yesterday.
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MYSTERY OF THE SKY. AIRSHIP SEEN AT CARDIFF TO-DAY / Globe, 19 May 1909, 4

Only the Globe carries (p. 4) phantom airship stories today (out of my sample, at least), but it has two, and they head the column rather being buried down the page. The first is from Cardiff in Wales, where a number of dock workers saw an airship in the early hours of this morning, and were willing to have their names included in this 'official' statement by signalman Robert Westlake:

At 1.15 this morning (19 May), while attending to my duty signalling trains at the King's Junction, Queen Alexandra Dock, I was startled by a weird object flying in the air. In appearance it represented a boat of cigar shape, making a whizzing noise. It was lit up by two lights, which could be plainly seen. It was travelling at a great rate, and was elevated at a distance of half a mile, making for the eastward. There were many men working at the time loading the s.s. Arndale, and the airship was seen by most of them. Messrs. W. Morrison (pointsman), C. Harwood (traffic foreman), W. John, C. Hayman, J. Rogers, and C. Bray (coal tippers), and the third mate of the Arndale all testified to the facts recorded above.

The airship came from the direction of Newport, took a curve over the docks, and passed over the Channel towards Weston, being clearly in view for a minute or two. It could, it is stated, have been seen longer, but that the lights on board were suddenly extinguished.

Other workmen confirmed Westlake's account. One said that 'The night was clear, though there was no moon, and the airship could be distinctly seen, and the whizzing of its motor was heard by us all'.

The second story is not from Britain at all, but from Norway. The Norwegian Shipping Gazette has published an account by Captain Egenes of the steamer St. Olaf. On the night of 14 May, in the eastern part of the North Sea (i.e. not close to Britain), 'an airship, sailing at low altitude, approached his vessel and directed a searchlight upon the decks'. It then moved off and did the same to another, unnamed steamer. The Shipping Gazette suggests that the airship is carried by day on board one of the German warships conducting maneuvers in the North Sea.

So yesterday's trend of sightings outside the original focus in East Anglia has continued. Both of these new incidents seem very well attested; both are widely separated geographically (although, of course, widely separated in time, too). A searchlight shone onto a ship's deck seems fairly unambiguous; the number of witnesses at Cardiff is impressive. Do Norwegian sea captains worry about the Zeppelin menace? Do Welsh dock workers often have collective delusions?
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The phantom airship stories are starting to spread politically and geographically. So far only conservative newspapers have taken much interest in the 'fly-by-night', and so far it has only been seen in Norfolk and nearby areas. Both of these limitations make some sense: national defence is a particular concern of conservatives, and a single airship might conceivably have been the cause of all the sightings in the course of a few weeks' worth of test flights from a nearby secret base. But now the Liberal Manchester Guardian has its first report (p. 7) on the mystery airship, and it's from Belfast! The full text of the telegram from Belfast is as follows:

Wonderment but feebly expressed the feelings of over a score of Belfast people residing in different districts, who just after dusk last night witnessed the manœuvring of a strange aerial visitor as it passed over the southern suburbs of the Irish commercial capital, and which, high in the heavens, sped swiftly in a north-easterly direction towards the Irish Sea. The accounts of those whose attention was attracted to the strange visitant substantially agree as regards the main incidents of the mysterious occurrence.

Probably between two and three thousand feet high, a brilliant moving light was first observed about ten o'clock in the direction of Collin Mountain. It moved speedily onwards, occasionally dipping towards the ground, but always keeping at a high altitude. As the remarkable visitor came more directly over Belfast it was just possible in the gloom to distinguish a cigar-shaped object leaving no doubt in the minds of the observer that the strange spectre was an airship. That someone was on board the occasional flashing of a red light conclusively proved. All the spectators are agreed as to the brilliant headlight of the visitor.

When fairly off the residential parks off Malone Road, it slackened speed, sailing slowly but steadily. Then, rising majestically, it disappeared in the darkened eastern sky.

So what are we to make of this? Belfast is a long way from East Anglia; it's stretching credulity that the same airship could have flown from one place to the other without being seen. (Nobody has even flown the English Channel yet, let alone the Irish Sea.) So are two separate inventors making test flights? Two separate German warships launching airships on reconnaissance flights? One of each? Something else entirely?

The Manchester Guardian's London correspondent also discusses (p. 6) the mystery (though was evidently unaware of the Belfast sighting at the time of writing). They think that, although there has been some hoaxing going on ('One or two messages have been crude impostures' -- I'm not sure what this refers to, unless it is the strange object found at Clacton), the whole affair is 'too stupid to be only a hoax when it is done so woodenly'. And 'so many quite uncomical people like doctors and lawyers and so forth' have seen or heard something strange that there is a feeling that 'flight must be going on'. But the correspondent doubts the popular theory that some inventor is testing their airship at night to avoid detection. Not that secretive inventors are improbable -- the Wright brothers, who visited London recently, prove otherwise -- but that it is 'incredible that any man can be successfully using an airship by night'. (Again, no aviator has successfully carried out a night flight.) 'No, it really will not do as an explanation' -- but no alternative is offered.

There was also some parliamentary scareship activity yesterday. After the War Minister, Richard Haldane, was questioned by a Conservative MP on German funding for airships and whether Britain intends to follow suit, a Liberal backbencher, Horatio Myer (Lambeth North), asked Haldane the following:

Will the right hon. Gentleman, in any Report he may circulate, tell us about a certain dirigible supposed to be hovering about our coast?

That's from the online Hansard. According to the report in The Times today (p. 7), Myer's question was followed by laughter. Haldane gave no answer, which means that even though Haldane and Myer are from the same party, this is not a Dorothy Dixer (to use an Australian anachronism). Perhaps it was intended to make the preceding questions on airship funding look ridiculous by association?

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AERIAL MYSTERY. FLIGHTS OF MIDNIGHT AIRSHIP / Standard, 17 May 1909, 9.

For the first time, the Standard heads a column with the 'midnight airship' story today (p. 9). The story contains a brief summary of the sightings to date, along with a map of their locations. The first sighting was back on 23 March, made by a Peterborough police constable named Kettle. He saw a 'strange, cigar-shaped craft passing over the city' at about 5am. His friends were sceptical, but two nights later Mr Banyard and Mrs Day both independently saw something similar over the nearby town of March. Since then 'scores' of people in East Anglia have seen the 'mysterious visitant'. Here's the map:
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The Standard again has an article (p. 8) on the 'mysterious airship', though this time the information is taken from today's Daily Express. The Berlin correspondent of that paper has been making inquiries there, and reports that

German expert opinion is unanimous in believing that the airship ascends from some German warship in the North Sea, upon which it lands again after each of its flights.

The German navy is, as it happens, conducting exercises in the North Sea, and relatively small airships of the Gross or Parseval types could possibly be inflated and launched from a warship. But although the German navy is known to have ordered these smaller airships, it's unclear whether it actually has any yet.

The Norfolk News has a report on the activity of the phantom airship, or as the headline on page 15 has it, the 'phanton airship'. Disappointingly, although the Norfolk News is bang in the middle of scareship territory, it seems to be relying on the reports of London newspapers (again, the Daily Express). Accounts from three eyewitnesses are given. The first is the brother-in-law of Herbert Neaverson, a 'prominent Peterborough tradesman', who has made a statement to the War Office in London. He heard 'a swishing sound overhead and the throbbing of a motor' early in the morning at his home in Peakirk. He looked up and saw a 'peculiar light' coming from the direction of the sea. At Kingscliff, Great Clacton, one Mr Egerton Free saw 'an oblong machine hovering quite near my home' at dusk, ten days ago. It was 'stationary' for a few minutes and then disappeared in the direction of Frinton. Finally, Miss H. M. Bonville of Southend-on-Sea saw the 'fly by night' last Sunday, at about 11.20pm. Her description is similar to that of Free: it was 'a large, black object, oblong in shape'. Initially stationary, it suddenly rose in the air and headed in the direction of London, briefly showing 'a couple of very brilliant lights'.

The Norfolk News also adds that

A search for the airship's home is being undertaken by motorists and others in all parts of East Anglia.

If the warship theory is correct, then they won't find anything, of course. But this amateur sleuthing connects the phantom airship scare with the spy mania also prevalent at this time. Indeed, The Times carries several letters relating to the Legion of Frontiersmen, an unofficial patriotic organisation which at times indulges in the sport of spyhunting. More intriguingly, immediately following its 'mysterious airship' article, the Standard has a report of 'several suspicious movements of strangers' near an Admiralty telegraph station at Humberstone, near Grimsby (and so also on the east coast), leading to 'elaborate precautions'.

One of the staff of the station, it is stated [by a correspondent], was recently attacked and rendered unconscious by two men who sprang on him from behind and afterwards escaped [...] locally there appears to be the impression that the outrage was the work of foreign spies bent on obtaining an entrance to the room where the code-book is kept.

The current success of Major Guy du Maurier's play An Englishman's Home, about an invasion of England by 'Nearland', probably doesn't do much to sooth fears. Today's Southampton Times and Hampshire Express has a puff piece (p. 9) about its upcoming Southampton run ('It should be seen by all -- men and women -- not only for the great and valuable lesson it teaches, but also because it is a powerful, real, and interesting play'): on the first night's performance recruiting officers will be present for the Territorial Army. The Norfolk News also mentions (p. 8) the play: a speaker at a Norwich meeting of the Peace Society objecting to the military's use of 'every means to entrap the young fellows of our country' notes that:

Even whilst we are at this meeting a play is being introduced at our local theatre, the object of which is to show by a very much overdrawn production how needful it is to be prepared against an enemy that does not exist.

On the other hand, the Globe relates (p. 2) an amusing anecdote given by Major Baden Baden-Powell (brother of B-P, and an expert in military ballooning, as it happens) at the annual dinner of the Iron and Steel Institute. Baden-Powell referred to the 'stories of certain nations being ready to invade these shores, how they had plans laid down, and spies swarming in this country watching details'. He himself asked an officer from a 'certain army' [i.e. Germany's] whether this was true:

The officer told him that that was so, and that they had details of the Eastern counties, every village was marked, the principal landowners and officials were known, and even the postmasters of the villages were recorded. "How did you get it?" he asked, and the officer replied, "We spent 10s. 6d. and bought a Kelly's County Directory" (loud laughter). So much for spies (hear, hear, and laughter).

This shows that not everyone bought into the spy scare. But that the anecdote was worthy of telling and got such a big reaction also suggests that there were plenty who did.

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On page 9 of the London Standard today is a short article entitled 'ELUSIVE AIRSHIP'. Evidently the story is not quite new, for it begins:

The mystery of the elusive airship still continues to attract attention, and the belief is gaining ground that there is some foundation to the various reports. Obviously something has been seen and heard at night in the sky, usually at places in East Anglia, Clacton, Southend, Peterborough, Lincoln, Ipswich, to quote only a few instances.

But this is the first time that the Standard has made mention of this mystery (at least in May), so the writer appears to assume that the reader will be aware of the story from other newspapers. There is a new sighting (or rather hearing) to report, however, at Windsor made by Patrick Alexander, 'the well-known expert on aeronautics, who is not likely to make a mistake'. One night recently -- the date is not given -- he 'heard at night sounds apparently of an airship in motion'. Alexander thought it was the Army airship but this is not thought capable of such a 'bold exploit'. Which is probably true: Baby, the only airship possessed by the government at this time, was not a very robust craft and was not flown much until rebuilt as Beta in 1910. The Standard has another idea:

One "explanation" is that some one owns an airship, and is trying it at night. It is known that there are one or two under secret construction in the country, but the difficulty is, given the relatively short period of darkness, to see how it avoids being detected in the early dawn.

This is not implausible. 1909 was at the dawn of the air age, and many people were trying to build aeroplanes and airships. One of the most successful of the latter were the Willows airships, designed and built by E. T. Willows of Cardiff. He was between airships at this time, however: Willows No. 2 was not to fly until November, and besides Wales is a long way from East Anglia. But who knows, maybe some hardy inventor was testing their contraption over Windsor a few nights ago.

That's the only phantom airship story in today's papers, or rather in the sample of papers I've examined. Although it's only a small article, it is on page 9, in the middle of the paper, which more or less took the place the front page in today's newspapers. So it's not unimportant, either.

What else is going on today? Just below the 'elusive airship' story is another brief article reporting that the Wright brothers have sold 14 of their aeroplanes (first publicly demonstrated in 1908) in Europe: 10 in France, 2 to Austria, 1 to Germany and 1 to Britain. But the Standard is clearly more interested in the lengthy report of its special correspondent in Germany, who has toured shipyards in an effort to ascertain just how many dreadnoughts are under construction there (nine, it looks like). This, of course, is an echo of the great dreadnought panic which took place in March, when there was a violent political and press frenzy over claims that Germany was accelerating its naval construction and so might, conceivably, overtake the Royal Navy at some point. This then raised the prospect of a German invasion of Britain -- or at least it did for Conservative papers like the Standard.

Other newspapers -- again, at least the Conservative ones -- have a similar mix of reports on defence and aviation issues. The London Globe, for example, has articles on the global naval balance (Britain has 53 battleships to Germany's 32), a successful flight by the (singular) Army aeroplane (it flew as far as 1200 feet in one hop, reaching a height of 50 feet), the upcoming Frankfurt aeronautic exhibition (where various German cities will offer prizes to encourage progress), and a statement by Wilbur Wright on the future of aviation (of little use for military purposes at the moment). There's clearly already a discourse going on about the role aircraft will play in war. But so far, however, the 'elusive airship' is not being framed as any sort of threat to the nation; it's merely a curiosity.

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Starting tomorrow, I'm going to try some more post-blogging. It's 100 years since the phantom airship wave of 1909, when mysterious aerial visitors appeared in the night skies over Britain. Or at least, stories about mysterious aerial visitors filled the newspapers of Britain. It's hard to tell from this distance: the only evidence we have about the scareships are the press reports, which could be a problem if you are interested in a possible underlying reality. But then again, since the number of (alleged) phantom airship witnesses is relatively small, the press was the only way most people would have learned that their sky was being invaded by Zeppelins every night. So for them as for us, the stories are the event itself. (The phantom airship scare did not take place, perhaps?)

My sources are a variety of print periodicals: The Times, the Liberal Manchester Guardian (much more Radical than it was later), the Globe and Traveller and the Standard (both from London and both Conservative, or Unionist if you prefer), Saturday Review (Conservative, but not as reactionary as under Lady Houston), Fortnightly Review, Punch, the local weeklies Norfolk News, Eastern Counties Journal, and Norwich, Yarmouth, and Lynn Commercial Gazette (which I'll refer to as the Norfolk News!) and Southampton Times and Hampshire Express, and the specialist weekly Flight. At this time there was no radio and film was a novelty.

Compared with the Sudeten crisis twenty-nine years later, the 1909 airship scare was not as intense nor was it as protracted. It was not a major defence or political crisis. But it was about the first time that the possibility of an aerial threat to Britain was given an extended run in the press, even if that threat was not yet the knock-out blow ...

Further reading: Alfred Gollin, The Impact of Air Power on the British People and their Government, 1909-14 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1989); David Clarke, 'Scareships over Britain: the airship wave of 1909', Fortean Studies 6 (1999), 39-63; Nigel Watson, 'Airships and invaders. Background to a social panic', Magonia 3 (Spring 1980).