Today’s post was written by David Langbart, archivist in Research Services at the National Archives at College Park, MD.
This is the eighth in a series of occasional blog posts.
So far this series of posts has made stops in Tokyo, Shanghai, Amoy, Calcutta, and Baghdad. The Army Around the World Flight, flew out of Baghdad on July 9 and flew west to Aleppo. Over the next four days the flight passed through the following cities overnighting in those that were not refueling stops: Aleppo, Constantinople (now Istanbul), Bucharest, Budapest (refueling), and arriving in Vienna, Austria, on July 13.
As the flight passed through the Balkans, there was a bit of confusion and perhaps, intrigue. On July 14, the U.S. legation in Austria reported that the three airplanes had arrived in Vienna at 3:30 PM the day before, having left Bucharest, Rumania, in the morning and making a one-and-a-half hour stop in Budapest, Hungary. The legation reported that, “A considerable and very friendly crowd came to the field to witness their arrival, and their passage later through the streets to the Imperial Hotel attracted much evidently favorable attention.”
The report also included the following paragraph marked “STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL”:
The legation also noted that the flight team “had a friendly press in Vienna; the first pages of the leading papers featuring the event in their editions of today in a complimentary way. It is evident that the successful World Flight is excellent propaganda for the United States.” The report closed with this comment: “As illustrating the considerable prestige of the American Fliers, it is significant that the Hotel Imperial here, where they were put up, made a charge of only $1.40 per person for the five best rooms in the hotel.”
During the earlier stop in Budapest, however, things did not go as smoothly. The legation in that city sent the following report on the flight’s brief stop there, pointing out that Balkan politics might have played a role in the confused situation.
The legation in Bucharest provided different information on the stolen tools and the Vienna telegram issues. In response to a request by the Department, the legation sent a report by the U.S. Military attaché that denied any tools had been stolen and explained the telegram issue as follows:
With reference to the receipt of the garbled telegram at Vienna by the Franco-Roumanian Co., and with reference to the delay in receipt at Vienna of the telegram sent from this Legation, until after the arrival there of the expedition, it is generally admitted that telegraphic communication in this part of the world is thoroughly unreliable, and no one who has lived here places much dependence on telegraphic communications. The Roumanian telegraph system is particularly poor, and not infrequently letters reach their destination ahead of telegrams sent at the same time. In addition to the delay in transmission, telegrams are frequently garbled. I seriously doubt if the telegram referred to was intentionally garbled.
From Vienna, the flight headed for Strasbourg (refueling), Paris (on Bastille Day!), London, Brough, Kirkwall, Hornafjordur, Reykjavik, Fredriksdal, Ivigtut, and on August 31 returned to North America at Icy Tickle in Labrador. Along this stretch, they lost one plane to accident and faced weather and other obstacles. By the time the remaining two planes reached Labrador, they had flown 19,215 miles in 266 hours of flight.
Sources: All the documents mentioned above come from file “811.2300” in the 1910-29 Central Decimal File, RG 59: General Records of the Department of State. A listing of those documents will be found in the Purport List for that file, which is available online, beginning at frame 510.