Here’s an interesting story from the New Zealand Herald dated 1 October 1938.
CRASH IN STOLEN MACHINE
Youths Planned Daring Flight .
In Search of High Adventure
HOW the high adventure plans of two young Royal Air Force apprentices ended when they crashed a £2200 monoplane a short distance from its hangar at dawn, was related to Mr. A. W. Cockburn, the acting chairman, at London Sessions.
The youths, tired of life in the Royal Air Force, determined to desert and go abroad, and Mr. Cockburn learned how they broke into a private aerodrome and stole the monoplane which they wrecked as they were attempting to take off.
Standing before him, the pair, Gerald Ernest Nicholson, aged 18, and Peter Leonard Hauser, aged 16, both stationed at Halton, Buckinghamshire, heard their plans discussed in the prosaic atmosphere of the Court.
“Having a certain amount of money, they made their way to London and then to Croydon Airport Hotel,” declared Mr. Vernon Gattie, who prosecuted them on charges of breaking and entering a hangar at Surrey, and stealing a Percival Vega Gull aeroplane, and of possessing a sawn-off shotgun. The aeroplane, which was wrecked, was the property of Mr. Richard Exton Gardner.
Mr. Gattie went on to tell how the youths, in the early morning, having obtained a shotgun, the barrel of which had been sawn off with a hacksaw, and ammunition, went to the privately owned aerodrome.
Forced Landing Story
They entered the hangar through a window, and after inspecting the aeroplanes there, selected the monoplane. They could not find sufficient petrol, and rang up a garage proprietor, asking for 60 gallons —sufficient to fly them for 800 or 900 miles. The explanation Nicholson gave to the garage proprietor was that they had been compelled to make a forced landing and were short of petrol. Having got the monoplane out they filled up with petrol and tried to get it to go. That was about. 3 a.m. Mr. Gattie, .then explained that Nicholson and Hauser were, “not very experienced:
“Eventually,” he said, “they succeeded* but had a very short flight;. They crashed in a hedge just on the outskirts of the aerodrome.
“The ground engineer noticed the monoplane and went over after it had crashed. In the cockpit he found the gun and ammunition. The gun was loaded with a live cartridge.”
Mr. Gattie declared the explanation given by Nicholson was that he and Hauser arranged to meet a man at the aerodrome who was to take them up for a flight. He did not arrive, and they took the machine themselves. Another statement by the youth showed this to be untrue.
Useless Maps
Mr. Gattie mentioned that it was right to say that, although the youths had the gun, it was not alleged that at any time they intended to commit any violence with it. According to their statements, they proposed to fly to France and then possibly further. Two cheap conversation books in French and Spanish found in their possession tended to confirm this story.
There were also some maps, but from an aeroplane point of view they were perfectly useless.
Acting Chairman: They thought the ammunition might be of some use if they landed in another country?
Mr. Gattie: Yes.
Detective-sergeant Wolff said that Nicholson was not amenable to discipline, and his discharge from the Royal Air Force was being recommended.
Hauser was also being recommended for discharge. The reason he had given for committing the offences was that he was discontented in the Royal Air Force, and his one desire was to go abroad. He was in hospital for practically a month as the result of injuries received in the crash. He had concussion and a slight fracture of the skull.
The officer added that he found the other half of the barrel of the gun in the rooms of the young men. Some of the ammunition had been cut open. Part of the cordite was used in the barrel of another gun they purchased and down which they rammed it. Cordite was found in their possession in cigarette cases.
Desire to “See World”
In reply to Mr. Guest, counsel for Nicholson, the officer stated that the youth was inclined to be “childish,” and it looked as though he “wanted to see the world.” He denied that Nicholson had said that the gun was to shoot rabbits when they were abroad, to keep themselves alive.
Replying to Mr. Derek Curtis-Bennett, for Hauser, the sergeant declared Hauser’s father was a lieutenant in the navy, stationed at Portsmouth. He agreed that the boy wanted to get up into the air and fly, which apprentices in the Royal Air Force were not allowed to do. The boy had an exemplary character.
Mr. Curtis-Bennett: His father was away on service abroad for five years?
Detective-sergeant Wolff: I understand so.
Mother’s Behaviour
Did Hauser run away because, in his opinion, his mother was not keeping faith with the absent father? —Yes.
Counsel then stated that Hauser was at present living with his grandmother at Portsmouth. Hauser’s father, in the witness-box, declared that what the officer had said was true.
When he got home from service abroad he had to divorce his wife. For Nicholson, Mr. Guest urged he should be treated leniently. His father was managing clerk to a well-known firm of Maidenhead solicitors. Postponing sentence on Nicholson until next sessions, Mr. Cockburn remarked that his case was “obviously difficult.”
Hauser was bound over for two years and put on probation, a condition being that he should live where directed. His father went surety for him.
It was stated that the youth would be handed back to a Royal Air Force escort until he had been properly discharged from the Service. The necessary formal proceedings would take several days.
By: Dave Homewood - 11th December 2024 at 11:37
And a follow up from the Manawatu Times on 15th of May 1945
£40,000 Plane Stolen and Destroyed
YOUTH OF 19 ARRESTED
(Per Press Association.) AUCKLAND, May 14.
Remarkable circumstances surround the total destruction by fire of a Lodestar aeroplane at Mangere last evening. The loss of the plane was this morning the subject of the following statement issued to the Press by Union Airways:
“At approximately 9.30 last evening a junior engineer of Union Airways without authority broke into the hangar at Mangere through the garage and over the top of the oil store. He opened the hangar doors from inside and took the Lodestar out, thereafter careering round the aerodrome with the lights switching on and off and eventually hitting a dummy plane on the aerodrome. The aircraft burst into flames and was totally destroyed.
‘‘The hangar was securely locked by the station engineer before he left the aerodrome about 5 p.m. With the aircraft available, Union Airways will carry out every possible service to the original timetable with only necessary alterations, of which due notice will be given.”
In the Police Court this morning Frederick Demehy, aged 19, described as an assistant air engineer, was charged with stealing a Lockheed Lodestar monoplane valued at about £40,000, the property of Union Airways. It was stated that accused was arrested at 11.30 last night by Detectives Cromwell and Fraser. The police asked for a remand until May 21. The Magistrate (Mr. J. H. Luxford) refused bail.
By: Dave Homewood - 11th December 2024 at 11:33
Here is an example from New Zealand, from the Evening Star, 14th of May 1945.
STOLEN AEROPLANE
UKION AIRWAYS” LODESTAR” DESTROYED
Hangar entered and machine flown round ‘drome
(P.A.) WELLINGTON, May 14.
Head office of Union Airways states that an unauthorised person broke into the company’s hangar at Mangere last evening (it is believed by way of the garage and over the oil store), and took out Lodestar, which is the company’s finest machine and biggest civil transport operated in New Zealand. After careering round the aerodrome, with the lights switching on and off, it crashed into a dummy aircraft, took fire, and was totally destroyed.
The occupant scrambled out before the flames enveloped the cockpit. The hangar had been securely locked since 5 p.m. on Saturday. The Airways service is being rearranged to enable the remaining Electra and the D.H.86 fleet to transport passengers who hold seat reservations, and to carry mail.
By: avion ancien - 10th December 2024 at 18:07
Less successful aircraft thieves were Arthur Chapman Gargett (age 22) and Joseph Alan Smith (age 27), who were employees of Airspeed at Portsmouth in August 1936. They decided to go to Spain to find excitement and fortune in the country’s civil war – and decided that their means of doing so would be to purloin Airspeed Courier G-ACVE (which had been purchased by the Republicans through the agency of Carlos Krauel) from its manufacturer and fly there. Despite their employment, sadly neither man had a pilot’s licence or even any flying experience – and the closest that they got to Spain was the rocky embankment on the northern side of Portsmouth Aerodrome, to the east of the railway line. G-ACVE, apparently with Smith at its controls, took off but was airborne only briefly before it returned to the ground and crashed into the rocky embankment. G-ACVE was destroyed in the crash. Smith did not suffer serious injuries but Gargett, who was thrown fifty feet from the Courier, suffered more serious injuries from which, subsequently, he died. As a result, Smith was charged not only with the theft of the aeroplane but also the involuntary manslaughter of Gargett. Found guilty, he was sentenced to a total of a year’s imprisonment. A great deal more about this incident will be found at https://sussexhistoryforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=14061.msg59491#msg59491.
By: Sabrejet - 10th December 2024 at 13:39
There was a Thorney Island-based Varsity that was stolen and made it too.
By: avion ancien - 10th December 2024 at 13:11
By: Dave Homewood – 10th December 2024 at 10:25
I wonder what they would have done if they’d made it to France.
For an example of an aircraft thief who did make it to France, take a look at the story of Malcolm Reece, a twenty year old apprentice, who, in 1951, stole a Tiger Moth from Portsmouth Aero Club and flew it from Portsmouth to Harfleur, where he abandoned it in a field before travelling to Le Havre and then hitch hiking to Rouen, where he was discovered aboard an American ship and was repatriated to the UK. He did it because he was fed up with his life in the UK and wanted to travel. He was acquitted of stealing the Tiger Moth but found guilty of fraudulently obtaining credit – for which he got three months in prison.
By: avion ancien - 10th December 2024 at 10:58
The story is covered in some detail at http://sussexhistoryforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=14463.msg89679#msg89679.
By: Sabrejet - 10th December 2024 at 10:43
G-AFBW?:
Portsmouth Evening News – Tuesday 28 June 1938
Police Interview Man After Winning King’s Cup Plane Crashes: Another in Hospital
Police inquiries followed the crashing at Warlingham, Surrey, early today of the Percival Vega Gull monoplane with which Mr. Charles Gardner won the King’s Cup air race. Two men were in the machine. One was injured but the other was unhurt. Police afterwards interviewed the uninjured man and the other was taken to Caterham Hospital.
The plane, which belongs to a brother of Mr. Gardner, had been left in Mr. Charles Gardner’s hangar, and was taking off from his aerodrome when it crashed into a hedge and was badly damaged.
Mr. Charles Gardner won the King’s Cup in 1936 and 1937.
An official at the aerodrome said to a Press Association reporter: “Entrance to the hangar had apparently been gained through a fanlight. Two young men were seated in the plane.”
An early morning request for a large quantity of petrol at a local garage was described by Mrs Quittenden, wife of fthe proprietor.
“Two young men woke my husband at about 3 a.m. to-day,” she told a reporter, “and ordered a large quantity of petrol. My husband took drums of petrol in his car to the air field, making several journeys. The men said that they were going for a flight, but did not mention their destination.”
Portsmouth Evening News – Tuesday 09 August 1938
TIRED OF LIFE IN R.A.F.
Boys Steal Plane
The story of the two R.A.F. apprentices who “tired of life in the Air Force,” attempted to take off in £2,000 monoplane stolen from a private aerodrome, but wrecked the machine when they crashed into a hedge, was told at London Sessions to-day.
The two boys, Gernald Ernest Nicholson (18), and a Portsmouth boy of 16, of the R.A.F. Camp at Aylesbury, pleaded guilty to charges of breaking and entering an aeroplane hangar at Warlingham, Surrey, and stealing the machine, a Percival Vega Gull, the property of Mr. Richard Exton Gardner, and possessing a sawn-off shotgun.
Anxious to go Abroad
Mr. A W. Cockburn, K.C., postponed sentence on Nicholson until next Sessions, and postponed his decision in the case of the Portsmouth boy until later in the day.
Mr. Vernon Gattie, prosecuting, described how the two boys determined to desert after becoming tired of R.A.F. life. They were anxious to go abroad, and on June 18 left the camp and stopped at the Croydon Airport Hotel.
Having provided themselves with a sawn-off shotgun and ammunition, they got out the monoplane at the private aerodrome at Warlingham, but it crashed into a hedge just after taking off.
They were, according to statements, proposing to fly to France. They thought the ammunition might be of some use if they landed in another country.
Detective Sergeant Wolff said that both boys were being recommended for discharge from the R.A.F.
Living at Portsmouth
Questioned by Mr. Derek Curtis Bennett, Det.-Sergt. Wolff said that he understood the Portsmouth boy’s father, who was a Lieutenant in the Navy, had been away on service abroad for five years.
Mr. Curtis Bennett: Did the boy run away because his mother was living with another man?
Sergt. Wolff: Yes.
Counsel said that the boy was at present living with his grandmother at Portsmouth. His father’s ship was stationed there, and the father was prepared to look after him.
By: Dave Homewood - 10th December 2024 at 10:25
I wonder what they would have done if they’d made it to France.
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December 10, 2024 at 10:22 am