Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

George D. Warren, 18 November 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Monday, 18 November 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 416 is a report from Lieutenant Commander George D. Warren RANR, commanding officer, HMAS Coogee, a civilian coastal steamship requistioned by the Navy for use as a minesweeper. Warren is reporting on the results of his investigation of an aeroplane seen from a naval lookout on the northern end of King […]

P. J. Connolly, 3 June 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Monday, 3 June 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 836 is a report by Senior Constable P. J. Connolly regarding ‘an aeroplane flying in a Westerly direction’ seen at 9pm the previous evening at Charlton, in the Mallee region of Victoria, by William Bannon and no less than ‘eight other farmers’, who all saw the machine together: One bright white

T. J. Wilson, 31 May 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Friday, 31 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 529 is a statement by Captain T. J. Wilson, master of the SS Koolonga, a merchant vessel plying the Newcastle–Port Pirie route. At 8.15pm on 26 May 1918, Koolonga was off Cape Willoughby, Kangaroo Island, South Australia; Wilson was on the bridge when, ‘Casually looking aloft, he saw a dark square

C. Joyes, 22 May 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Wednesday, 22 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 134 is a report by Constable C. Joyes, Victoria Police, about an ‘Aeroplane seen in the vicinity of Dromana‘, a seaside resort town about 70km from Melbourne. Doctor J. G. Weld of Dromana reported to me today that he saw an Aeroplane about 530 am yesterday morning (21st [May 1918]) flying

Adelaide Twist, 18 May 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Saturday, 18 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 138 is a statement made by Adelaide Twist, a bookkeeper from Macarthur in the Western District of Victoria, to Mounted Constable J. C. Pickett. She states that on 11 May 1918 she and her sister were walking home at about midnight, and Just as we were about to go in our

J. M. Jenkin, 16 May 1918
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Thursday, 16 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 842 is a copy of a statement by Joseph Jenkin, a farmer from (or near) Woomelang, witnessed by Mounted Constable J. C. Thornton, Victoria Police. It reads: that at about 8 a.m. on 11th May 1918 I was inside my house gettinh [sic] ready to go to Woomelang when I heard

K. O. Mackenzie, 13 May 1918
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Sunday, 13 May 1917

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, pages 325 through 327, is a report from Lieutenant K. O. Mackenzie RANB (Royal Australian Naval Brigade), though in fact the bulk of it is his rendering of a statement made by James Aitken, a ‘mail contractor’ from Waratah Bay, regarding an aeroplane he had seen at Cape Liptrap on the Gippsland

Frank Shann, 12 May 1918
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Sunday, 12 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 202 is a letter from Frank Shann, headmaster of Trinity Grammar School, Kew (a suburb of Melbourne), to Commander F. G. Cresswell (the Navy’s Director of Radio Service — no connection to Rear Admiral W. R. Creswell, the Navy’s senior officer). Shann is reporting ‘an extraordinary and possibly suspicious occurrence’: One

HB64, 11 May 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Saturday, 11 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, pages 668 through 671 is a copy of Directorate of Military Intelligence report HB64, ‘Aircraft, lights and objects reported seen in the air — summary and appreciation no. 4’. It is a continuation of the last such ‘summary and appreciation’ HB56 of a week ago. But whereas HB56 was 17 pages long,

C. Kingsford Smith, 10 May 1918
1910s, Archives, Australia, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures, Post-blogging the 1918 mystery aeroplanes

Friday, 10 May 1918

NAA: MP1049/1, 1918/066, page 997 is a copy of a report from 2nd Lieutenant C. Kingsford Smith RFC on ‘investigations made at Gosford and Terrigal, re aircraft seen there at night’. Kingsford Smith has been sent up from Sydney on the basis of his experience as a pilot on the Western Front. His account can

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