NYASALAND AT THE AVIATION CROSS ROADS:
ALAN COBHAM'S FLYING-BOAT VISIT, 1928
by Dr Colin Baker
A recurring dream of late nineteenth and early twentieth century British imperial visionaries was the Cape to Cairo highway, the creation of a south to north transport artery running the length of Africa.1There were hopes, initially, that this artery would run entirely through British territory, but the Anglo-German treaty of July 1890, which gave a common boundary to German East African and the Congo State, severed the continuity of British territory and, for a while, damaged those particular hopes although they did not extinguish entirely the Cape to Cairo dream.
The south-north line of British territory through which it was originally envisaged the highway would run was crossed by the line of what the Portuguese had hoped would be an east-west belt of colonial territory joining Mozambique and Angola. Near the area in which these two belts crossed lay the territory which later became Malawi, and indeed it could be argued that Nyasaland - Malawi's name in colonial times - was declared a protectorate in 1891 precisely because the territory was situated in that crossing zone where British and Portuguese aspirations were bound to conflict. The Protectorate's creation settled the matter and prevented the building o fan unbroken trans-African belt ofPortuguese territory just as the 1890 agreement prevented the creation of an unbroken north-south belt of British territory.
In exploring the Cape to Cairo possibilities, Ewart Grogan and Arthur Sharp in 1898 and Mary Hall in 1905 2 had travelled the length of Nyasaland in the course of their Africa-long journeys. But already the vision of a south-north artery was dimming because, whilst the railway pushed up northwards from South Africa through the Rodesias to Katanga, the routes of the Nyasaland, Tanganyika and Kenya railways penetrated laterally from the Indian Ocean in an east-west direction separate from the south-north line. Yet the imperialist visionary flame was not entirely dowsed and was fanned afresh in the 1920's by the development of long distance aviation and international rivalry to establish major inter-continental air services including the Europe- South Africa route, and by the granting of the mandate over Tanganyika which gave Britain the unbroken north-south belt through Africa which she failed to gain in 1890.
Even during the First World War the British Government had set up a committee to "deliberate on questions affecting the commercial use of aircraft in the period immediately following the war" and had concluded that there would be a demand for air carriage of mail, perishable foods and especially passengers. The anticipated developments were, however, delayed by the post-war slump in the world economies, but at the Imperial Conference in October 1926 Sir Samuel Hoare, Britain's Minister for Air, rekindled enthusiasm by arguing very strongly for an imperial airways scheme and by setting up a sub-committee on imperial air communications.
At the 1926 Imperial Conference and the 1927 Colonial Office Conference, the Dominions and Colonies agreed that there were great benefits to be derived, both politically and commercially, from the development of "a complete system of Imperial Air Routes". As a consequence, Britain changed its air policy by reorienting its efforts from European routes to imperial routes. With improved world economic prospects, the remainder of the 1920's saw a race against each other and against time by the western powers, each of whom was determined to gain a lead in inter-continental air travel. By late 1927 Germany was building its LZ 127 airship for a projected cross-Atlantic service to start early in May 1928; France had advanced plans by Bleriot to establish a cross-Atlantic service and had already pioneered a route from France, across Central Africa, to Madagascar which included a sea-plane landing on Lake Nyasa at Fort Johnston in November 1926 ; an American millionaire, Van Lier Black, prepared to fly from Amsterdam to Capetown with a Dutch pilot; the Americans, Brock and Schlee, had crossed the Atlantic and were setting out for Japan on a roundworld flight; and an American airship had landed on a U.S. aircraft carrier demonstrating the possibility of extending flight range by refuelling at sea 6.
In Britain, imperialists like Lord Wakefield believed that the development of air transport was one of the most effective means of bringing the peoples of the world in close touch and that it would do more to effect world peace than would any other development 7. Britain wanted to be ahead in the field, feeling that it was:
essential to the development of Imperial air communications that we should be first in establishing practicable air routes in directions where our interests are manifold 8
It is vital to the security and prosperity of the British community in Africa that we should be first, and thus eliminate competition by drawing all trade through British tenitory 9.
The British R100 and R101 airships, each designed to carry a hundred passengers and ten tons of mail, were being built ready to conduct trials early in 1929 to link London with South Africa. British plans were well advanced to start services to India and Australia and across the Atlantic in mid 1928. Four Royal Air Force biplanes were preparing to leave London on a return flight to Cape Town, another four R.A.F. aircraft - Supermarine flying-boats - started a twelve month cruise to the Far East (10), and the London Times, pleading for a bolder air policy, published a leading article in which it said that:
The active encouragement of civil aviation in all its branches is a matter of increasingly vital importance to the security and prosperity of the nation and the empire.11
It was in such an atmosphere of aviation excitement and activity, and of international rivalry late in 1927 that Sir Alan Cobham -who had already flown 15,000 miles to India and back, 17,000 miles to South Africa and back, 28,000 miles to Australia and back and who had spent a year negotiating with the South African Government and other African Governments - started his 20,000 miles journey through and round Africa to survey the Britain-South Africa route. On the outward journey he followed the Cairo-Cape line.
The great idea was to establish a line of air stations through all British territory from north to south of the continent.
By means of our scheme we hope to bring about the development of those areas that will justify the completion of the Cape to Cairo railway.13
Once again, Nyasaland's cross-roads position became important because the country lay on one of two possible routes which the proposed air service could take on the section between Tanganyika and Southern Rhodesia; the other was via Northern Rhodesia. Was the route through Nyasaland to be selected or was the Protectorate to be a Cinderella in aviation, as in so many other, matters?
It is the purpose of this article to probe that question more deeply by examining the visit which Cobham made to Nyasaland in February 1928
Before he left Britain, Cobham - or a senior colleague, Charles Ward, on his behalf - wrote several letters to the Nyasaland Government seeking advice, information and support. 14 The information requested included details of climatic conditions, means of transport, supplies of petrol and oil, present and future radio and telegraph facilities, letter mail traffic, particulars of tourist traffic, a list of aerodromes and landing grounds, and a map of the country showing railways, roads, telegraph lines, wireless stations and aerodromes. Information was also sought on the possibilities of constructing landing grounds, an outline of current commercial development including agriculture, mining and manufacturing, and possible areas of future settlement for farming and mining. Cobham also sent to the Government of Nyasaland details of the flying-boat he proposed to use, how it alighted, taxied, moored, manoeuvred and took off, what it required in the way of buoys, sinkers and anchors, and advice on how to approach and refuel it when moored. He wrote directly to the District Commissioner at Fort Johnston saying that he had arranged for petrol and oil to be sent there and asking him if he would be so kind as to look after them until the flying-boat arrived. Finally, he explained to the Governor the advantages to Nyasaland of the Cape to Cairo air service: security and military transportation in emergencies, and especially commercial development which would be:
advanced by the establishment of any form of regular transport, and the aeroplane will open up new territory, because it can bridge gaps which would remain unconnected for many years by any form of surface transport. Through carriage of mails by air, business transactions became more rapid and more frequent. Officials of the Government and business houses can travel from place to place in the shortest possible time, so that administration of public and private business is simplified and eventually made cheaper because of the great saving of time 16
Alan Cobham was accompanied by his wife who acted as his secretary and kept his diaries and records; Henry Vernon Worrall, the second pilot; F. Green, the engineer; C.E. Conway, the assistant engineer; and S.R. Bonnett, the cine-cameraman. Their aircraft was the Short Rolls-Royce "Singapore", twin engined, first all-metal, flying-boat, G-EBUP, with a cruising speed of 90 m.p.h. loaned by the Air Council. On 17th November, 1927, having started off in the "wrong" direction - by flying westwards up the Thames from Rochester in Kent so as to pass over as much water as possible without going all the way round south-east England to reach Southampton - they headed by gentle stages towards Africa, flying via Bordeaux, Marseilles, Corsica and Malta where repairs to badly damaged wing tip floats and hull caused a long delay. Once over the African continent they flew via Benghazi, Tobruk, Alexandria, Luxor, Wadi Halfa, Karima, Berber, Khartoum, Malakal, Mongalla, Butiaba, Entebbe, Port Bell, Kisumu, Mwanza and Kigoma to Mpulungu in Northern Rhodesia. 17
In Nyasaland itself, the Nyasaland Times reported the "aviation fever", gave details of Cobham's progress noting each stage of his flight towards Central Africa18 and on 27th January, published a long leading article entitled, "All British African Route" 19 in which the "particular and vital interest (of Nyasaland) in any scheme of aviation between Europe and the African continent" was pleaded. What the Editor most feared was that Nyasaland would be bypassed and that a route south of East Africa would be followed which would favour the industrial and mining interests of South Africa "who have in view only the speedy transportation of gold and diamonds". Acknowledging that Nyasaland's principal interest was in the quicker transport of mail and perhaps passengers - both of which lacked the economic appeal of gold and diamonds - the Editor seized upon the fact that Cobham was using a flying-boat for the current flight, and argued that:
there already exists an all-British natural route from end to end of Africa by way of the Great Lakes, with natural "landing" places for the new all-metal flying-boats that are said to be most suitable for the tropics, and not a penny would have to be expended in building aerodromes or landing fields on this route...we are on the cheapest line of route.
He feared not only South African vested interests but those also in Northern Rhodesia and he pointed out that the Alan Cobham Aviation Company was currently seeking to buy land in the Fort Jameson area upon which to build an aerodrome. Although Cobham personally was already inclined to the opinion that the route from the Mediterranean to East Africa should be by flying-boats and south from there by aeroplanes 20, the Editor knew that only if the route south ofTanganyika used flying-boats did Nyasaland - with its large inland lake, which Northern Rhodesia lacked - stand a chance of being placed on that route.
Daily, as Cobham travelled southwards, Nyasaland waited, and waited. On 8th February he cabled the Editor of the Nyasaland Times, from Mwanza on the Tanganyika shore of Lake Victoria, saying that he had to return to Khartoum but hoped to arrive in Nyasaland in about a fortnight's time21. On 20th February the Editor sent a cable to Karonga for Cobham asking to be informed of the date and time of his expected arrival at Fort Johnston so that the public could be told,and although Cobham, in return, cabled the Chief Secretary from Nairobi saying that he would be at Mwanza again on Thursday, 23rd February, Kigoma on the eastern shore of Lake Tanganyika on Saturday and Mpulungu at the southern tip of that Lake, near Abercorn - the last stop before Nyasaland - on Sunday, the telegraphic service was interrupted between Abercorn and Karonga so that Cobham's expected, and actual, dates of arrival in Nyasaland could not be announced in advance:
no advice has been received from Sir Alan Cobham as to when he will arrive at Fort Johnston 24.
In fact, Cobham left Mpulungu on Sunday, 26 February at least a day earlier than those in Nyasaland expected.
Our next hop was a short one, a matter of some 200 miles...to the northern end of the Nyasa Lake...and finally we flew above the Songwe Valley down towards the lake until we sighted the small settlement of Karonga, on the north west shore 25.
As the flying-boat flew over, someone - presumably the District Commissioner - sent a message to Zomba and Blantyre to let those there know that Cobham was on his way.26
Cobham had originally intended to land at Karonga but he was worried about the depth of the water there and the difficulty of finding a safe anchorage27. Instead, therefore, he decided to land at Vua some 20 miles further south where a safer anchorage could be found. Vua was marked on his maps and he very carefully studied them but despite his vigilance from the open cockpit he saw nothing but "apparently uninhabited jungle" and it was not until he had flown obviously too far south that he realised that he had missed Vua. He turned round, headed north again and fortunately saw a smoke fire opposite "two houses buried in the trees". He had previously asked that at all places he visited a smoke fire should be started as soon as his flying-boat was sighted so that he would know in which direction to alight,28 and it was such a smoke fire which enabled him to find Vua.
He alighted on the lake and was greeted by Edmund Lushington Rhoades - formerly Commander of the British Central Africa Naval Department - who came out to meet him 29. Rhoades - who had accompanied Grogan in a mule cart on part of his journey through Nyasaland on his way from the Cape to Cairo thirty years earlier- had been expecting Cobham for some time and had prepared the moorings for him. Cobham immediately took to him and found him an excellent and amusing host who "combined the wit of Sam Weller with the resolution of Horatio Hornblower"(31) and was Rabelaisian in wit. 32
The flying-boat party slept the night in mosquito net covered camp beds on the verandah of Rhoades' house, and were up before dawn so that the Cobhams and Worm11 could "take part in a little hunt". After lunch they continued their journey southwards and readily persuaded Dr. Child and his nephew who were on a game hunting vacation to accompany them in the flying-boat although this meant curtailing their vacation by ten days.
They flew low over the lake and were intrigued - as Grogan had been in 1898- by the great smoke-like pillars of Kungu fly, which Bonnett was able to photograph as they passed. They crossed the lake and flew over "what is known as the loneliest cathedral in the world" at Likoma which "looked a heavenly little spot" and then flew southwards to Fort Johnston bar.
News of Cobham's arrival in Nyasaland had reached the readers of the Nyasaland Times early Tuesday, 28th February 34 whilst the flying-boat crew were preparing it for its flight down the lake. Despite the very short notice and the distances involved
scores of folk...journeyed down to the bar...from Fort Johnston proper, some miles away, and there were many more who had journeyed all the way from Zomba, the capital...a journey of eighty miles 35
The "excellent arrangements" for looking after the flying-boat and for the "wonderful reception" were made by Commander Reginald George, who had first come to Nyasaland in January 1915 when he was seconded from the Royal Naval Reserve for service on Lake Nyasa 36. The Governor himself had intended to travel to Fort Johnston to welcome Cobham but the flying-boat's delay clashed with other arrangements which Bowring had to make in the meantime. He was nonetheless anxious that at least some members ofthe Government's Air Committee should be at Fort Johnston when Cobham arrived, and Major Henry Edward Green, Staff Officer of the Nyasaland Volunteer Reserve and Chairman of the Air Committee, together with Major Francis Trant Stephens, the Chief Commissioner of Police, were there to meet him(37).
Cobham stayed in Fort Johnston for only one night - with the District Commissioner, Arthur Cecil Kirby (38)- because it was essential that he should meet the Governor to discuss "the possibilities of the African air route passing through Nyasaland". He and Lady Cobham left the crew at Fort Johnston and journeyed by car with Bonnett to Zomba. If a convenient body of water - a lake or river - had existed at Zomba they would have landed there and saved time, but they nonetheless enjoyed the trip which was "through delightful scenery". The possibility of the flying-boat alighting on Lake Chilwa some twenty miles east of Zomba was explored but to no avail. The District Commissioner of Zomba, Robert Keppel-Compton was told to visit Chilwa as a matter of urgency and to ascertain the depth ofthe water between Chilwa
Island and the end of the road from Zomba:
I dropped everything and spent the rest of the day in a dug-out canoe with a long bamboo pole marked in feet, finding out the depth of water ...the greatest depth was only eight feet close to the Island; elsewhere it was much shallower... Consequently the idea that Alan Cobham could use Lake Chilwa to come down so conveniently near to Zomba was dropped and he came from Fort Johnston by car. I met him next day at dinner at Government house"
Keppel-Compton's report to the Chief Secretary made it clear that not only was the shallowness of the Lake a problem but the condition of the Zomba-Chilwa road in the middle of the rainy season made its use "impractical"40.
Arriving in Zomba, the administrative capital, very late in the afternoon of Wednesday 29th February, the Cobhams stayed with the Chief Secretary and admired, as had so many other visitors, the views across Lake Chilwa to Mlanje Mountain: "some of the most wonderful panoramic views I have ever seen". Thirty years earlier, on his south- north journey through Africa, Grogan had commented that "The view across Lake Shirwa...ranks amongst the finest I have seen in Africa" 41. The Chief Secretary at this time was Wilfred Bennett Davison-Houston, an Irish military officer who had formerly served in the British South African Police, West Africa, France, Canada, the Windward Islands and as Administrator of Saint Lucia; he had been appointed as head of the Nyasaland Civil Service only shortly before, on 22nd September, 1927, and two years later was suddenly taken ill - just after the arrival of a new Governor - and left Nyasaland. He retired from the Colonial Service on grounds of ill health in September 1930 42.
The following morning Sir Alan, with his wife, drove over to Blantyre, the commercial capital, to address a hastily called meeting of the Chamber of Commerce. He had earlier explained to the Governor that he wished to assess the probable support of commercial organisations for his proposals both in respect of initial capital, and in respect of the use of the service when established43. At the Blantyre meeting he explained that the primary purpose of his visit was:
to sound public opinion as to the most suitable route for the proposed air service from Cairo to the Cape and to ascertain by actual flying experience whether flying-boats or aeroplanes were the better type of machine for the purpose44.
He went on to say that he had already mapped out a suitable route as far as Tanganyika, which would follow the Nile, and although he was clear in his own mind as to the problem south of Tanganyika, he seems not to have left the problem unambiguous in the minds of his audience. In his own mind:
The great difficulty was to decide whether the air line should come down through Nyasaland and so on to Salisbury and thence to Bulawayo, or whether it should go southwestward after leaving Tanganyika, through Northern Rhodesia to the railway line at Ndola or Broken Hill, and then via Livingstone to Bulawayo45
In essence, the question was: at the crossroads should the west or the east fork be taken? In the minds of his audience, however, the stark choice may not have been made anywhere near so clear because the Nyasaland Times' account of Cobham's Blantyre address refers to the stop after Tanganyika being "the north west end of Lake Nyasa".
From there, he gathered, in order to serve as large a population as possible, the best route seemed to be via Fort Jameson or Dedza and Blantyre, thence to Salisbury and Bulawayo etc. etc. That route would take in both Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland46.
The expression "the north west end of Lake Nyasa" could have been taken, broadly interpreted, to mean Mpulungu (Abercorn) in Northern Rhodesia or, narrowly interpreted, the Karonga-Vua area in Nyasaland; and he furthered the ambiguity by referring to a route which would take in both Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland and by appearing to leave open the question of whether flying-boats or aeroplanes were the better aircraft on this section.
The Editor of the Nyasaland Times had already warned his readers three days earlier that the strategic question was vital to Nyasaland's interests and that "apathy in this...scheme, destined to further the country's progress, is likely to have retarding effects on our development"(47). Yet there is no evidence that the Blantyre audience focussed on the strategic issue - placing Nyasaland on the main route south of Tanganyika, preferably by using flying-boats - since the only questions which the Nyasaland Times' account of the meeting reported being asked were what the fares might be for intermediate journeys in Africa and whether there were - as they in fact agreed - suitable aircraft landing sites near Blantyre. They overlooked the fact that there were no suitable landing sites for flying-boats anywhere near Blantyre. After this, even the Editor lost his enthusiasm and perspicacity and ended his report of the meeting by telling his readers that the power developed by the flying-boat's engines was sufficient to lift the largest ocean liner in the world one and a half times the height of Mount Snowdon!(48).
Why did Cobham - so clear in this own mind as to the really important question about the route to be followed, a person who normally expressed himself with great clarity, and a man in the habit of not spending longer than was necessary in any one place on his long flight - go to the bother of spending seven days in Nyasaland, of driving all the way from Fort Johnston to Blantyre and addressing a meeting there, and yet not put the all-important question clearly and unambiguously focussed in the minds of his audience? The most probable reason is that he was about to ask the Governor for financial support for the air service and knew that he was more likely to agree if it could be shown that there was public support behind the scheme. Such support would not be forthcoming if the route did not go via Nyasaland. The Editor of the Nyasaland Times had already pointed out how strong were the pressures from South Africa and Northern Rhodesia for the route to go via Northern Rhodesia, and Cobham could not afford to let his audience believe that the issue had already, and adversely, virtually been decided or even that it was likely that the route would by-pass Nyasaland. It would have been in Cobham's interest to let his audience stray from the major issue and to continue to hold out hope of a route via Nyasaland.
The Cobhams returned to Zomba and spent the next two and a half days staying at Government house with Governor Bowring. Cobham had courted the Governors and leading officials at each stopping point on his way south, usually staying at Government House; he addressed a Governors' Conference in Nairobi attended by the Governors of Kenya and Uganda, Sir George Schuster from the Sudan and a senior representative from Tanganyika 49 and he entertained Sir William Gowers, Governor of Uganda on a trip in the flying-boat round Victoria Nyanza, marking the equatorial passage with a cross ing the line ceremony and having lunch in the air complete with champagne, liqueurs and cigarso. In Zomba he was equally charming and later wrote to Bowring in warm terms to thank him.
for all your wonderful kindness and generous assistance on the occasion of our visit...My wife and I will always have affectionate memories of our stay in Nyasaland 51.
Central to the thinking behind Cobham's itinerary lay his financial strategy. The air service which he proposed, would cost about £50,000 in inauguration capital expenditure and £120,000 a year thereafter in running costs which would require a subsidy of £35,000 a year Ministry, the British Government was unlikely to provide the required funds by itself.
However,
If the scheme was urged forward by the various British African Governments (by way of financial contributions) he felt sure the Imperial Government would not hesitate and do their part (53).
He had already persuaded the Governors of Kenya and Tanganyika to provide annual contributions for five years, and he "hoped that Nyasaland and the other territories would do the same(54)including, presumably, Uganda where Sir William Gowers at least owed him a decent lunch! By April 1928, the Sudan, Uganda, Southern Rhodesia and Northern Rhodesia Governors, but not Nyasaland's had joined Kenya and Tanganyika in guaranteeing a joint subsidy 55.
Nyasaland's Governor, Sir Charles Calvert Bowring, had been appointed in 1923 and remained Governor for six years. At the age of 23 he had been appointed Local. Auditor in British Central Africa - the name by which Nyasaland had at that time been known -in 1895 "to supervise the accounts of the Administration stations" and had looked after Grogan during his 1898 journey through Zomba 56.His period of gubernatorial office had opened with his having to ask the British Government for the first grant-in-aid to balance the budget for over a decade. He had made that request with reluctance and deep regret possibly because of his earlier training in accountancy, and at his first meeting of the Legislative Council he had set the tone for much of the remainder of his service in Nyasaland:
Strict economy and cautious anticipation must continue to be out main aim 58.
He viewed the burden of guarantee, which made up its public debt, as preventing the contemplation of development, and believed that
The services for which provision had been made barely allowed for the administration ofthe Protectorate without serious risk of breakdown and afforded no possibility...of promoting the welfare and development of...Nyasaland 59.
Although the country's financial position had much improved by 1927 and was considered to be better than at any previous timeoo, Bowring, still the accountant at heart and once bitten twice shy, insisted on preserving a balance of £100,000 - a figure almost half as large as the current annual expenditure - against bad years 61.Ever cautious, he incurred "a considerable expenditure" in 1928 in making preparation to meet a food shortage which did not in fact occur 62. A senior civil servant who knew the Governor well, much later said of him:
Sir Charles' reputation was that of a rather irascible, prickly man...(whose) talents were more in the line of keeping the pot boiling than in innovation
He seems to have been over-awed by difficulties of planning for development during periods of uncertainty:
The uncertainty of what the position will be from year to year adds greatly to the difficulties of making arrangements for local development
So, the Governor now being visited by Alan Cobham was one whose "main aim" was economy and caution, who was reluctant to risk innovation and who found planning in uncertain conditions difficult. He was already at the top of his profession, 56 years of age, a knight of two orders, within a year of retirement. His early service in Nyasaland had been before the railway or motor car had been introduced into the country and at a time when transcontinental travel meant walking on one's own feet by people like Grogan; maybe he found it difficult to grasp the significance of air transportation.
Bowring called a meeting of the Executive Council at which Cobham explained his air service scheme The members of Executive Council, in addition to the Governor and the Chief Secretary, were the Treasurer, the Attorney-General and the Senior Provincial Commissioner 66.
The Treasurer, Keith Ravenscroft Tucker, was born in 1890, had joined the Colonial Service in 1913, as Assistant Auditor in the Gold Coast, and had been transferred to Nyasaland in 1916, being promoted to Treasurer in 1921. On 4th August, 1927 he was "obliged to proceed to England on medical grounds" and arrived back on 6th January, 1928 shortly before Cobham's Visit67.In May 1928 he advised that "aviation expenditure ofany kind must be considered a luxury whichthe Protectorate cannot at present afford 68.
The Attorney-General, W. Harragin, about whom rather less is known, arrived in Nyasaland on 16th April, 1927 from Trinidad where he had been Crown Counsel 69.
The Senior Provincial Commissioner, Harold D'Auvergne Aplin, had been appointed Clerk in the Secretariat in Nyasaland in 1901 and had been promoted Provincial Commissioner in 1922 and Senior Provincial Commissioner on 9th January, 1928. From 9th July, 1927 to 3rd February, 1928 he had been away on leave and in April 1928 he was absent due to ill-health. He retired in 1932. He was 49 years of age when Cobham visited the country70.
The Executive Council, therefore, was comprised ofa cautious, economy- minded Governor who was on the brink of retirement; a 57 year old Chief Secretary also on the brink of retiring who had been in Nyasaland only five months, a Treasurer and a Senior Provincial Commissioner none of whom enjoyed the best of health; and an Attorney-General who had recently been promoted and had been in the country for less than a year. It seems that Cobham failed to make much impression on them. The Protectorate Annual Report for 1928 disposed of his visit in 17 words:
In February, Sir Alan Cobham passed through Nyasaland in his flying-boat on his African transcontinental journey 71.
Had the Governor been a Harry Johnston as in 1891-1897, or a Shenton Thomas as in 1929-1930, or a Geoffrey Colby as in 1948-1956 - all outstandingly dynamic, developmentally progressive heads of government - or even a Hubert Young, an aviation enthusist as in 1932 -1934, Cobham might not simply have "passed through Nyasaland". In the event, it was to be another 21 years before a flying-boat landed on Lake Nyasa again 72 and Colby was able to reach out and create an opportunity which Bowring had failed to grasp or possibly even to recognise.
The remainder of Cobham's time was taken up in being entertained by the King's African Rifles, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Hawkins, who put on a display of the troops at drill and at work - which so impressed him that he said he would never forget it - and by the Chief Commissioner of Police, Francis Trant Stephens, formerly of the KAR, who had welcomed him at Fort Johnston and who now showed him how "the wonderful body of (African) gendarmerie were trained from the raw material"("). He seems to have been much more at home with these extrovert military men, as he had been with Commander Rhoades and Commander George, than with the more cautious civil servants and the more narrow visioned commercial men.
On Saturday, 3rd March, the Cobhams motored back to Fort Johnston, looking for possible landing grounds and examining a number of them on the way. They were up betimes on Sunday morning and although two days earlier the Nyasaland Times had told its readers that the flying-boat would leave the bar at Fort Johnston between 10.00 am and 11.00 am and should be sighted over Blantyre between 12 noon and 1.00 pm, probably in a south westerly direction 74. Cobham in fact took off at 9.15 am. He circled over Zomba - possibly as a final gesture to the Governor - passed over Blantyre and headed south away from Nyasaland towards Beira 75.
In the study of administrative history one can identify "hinge-points", points at which the graph of progress had the opportunity, to a greater or lesser extent, to change direction. One such hinge-point occurred in Nyasaland in 1928. If the Protectorate could be placed directly on a major inter-continental and transcontinental air route, then it would be likely that her economic progress would be significantly enhanced: she would receive more visitors, both businessmen and tourists, and her communications and commercial contacts with other countries would be much enhanced. Nor was the matter solely or simply one with economic implications for there were also significant political and social ramifications. If Nyasaland were to be connected by a feeder aeroplane route to a main route which passed through the Rhodesia, then it was likely that her links with Southern Rhodesia would strengthen and develop. If, however, she were to be placed directly on the main route from East to Southern Africa, especially if the flying-boat route were extended south as far as Lake Nyasa, then there would be the possibility that her links also , or even particularly, with East Africa would strengthen and develop. Once again Nyasaland stood at the cross-roads: the direction - north or south - in which Nyasaland developed her links would influence the political and social, as well as the economic, future of the country. During the referendum period prior to Southern Rhodesia being granted internal self-government in 1923, arguments were very strongly advanced and widely held in favour ofthe incorporation of that country into the Union of South Africa, especially by mining and financial interests and by the Union Government76.In the opposite direction, both geographically and philosophically, also in 1923, the British Secretary of State for the Colonies enunciated the paramountry doctrine in Kenya: "the interest of the African native must be paramount" . It is clear that Sir Charles Bowring was aware that Nyasaland stood at the crossroads and could look either south or north, for in effect he so told his Legislative Council in May 1927.
The geographical position of Nyasaland towards neighbouring British territories is a matter which doubtless causes all ofus constant serious thought... The earlier history of Nyasaland points to a closer association with British South Africa and South Africa is still the most rapid means of communication with the united Kingdom. But as regards climatic conditions, forms of government, native administration, treaty obligations and other matters we have more in common with the territories to the north known as the East African Group 78.
The opportunity to be placed directly on the main route and to influence the direction in which the country's outside contacts would develop came Nyasaland's way with Sir Alan Cobham's flying-boat journey to South Africa in 1928.
Nyasaland's chances of success were not great but they did exist. The country had relatively little to offer Cobham since she lacked Northern Rhodesia's economic wealth and unbroken geographical continuity with Southern Rhodesia and South Africa. Her officials could, however, have emphasised the tourist potential which Cobham - himself a great publicist - must have recognised: features such as the Lake, Likoma Island, the Kungu fly, game hunting, Zomba scenery, the King's African Rifles and characters such as Edmund Rhoades. They could also have played on the known liking which Cobham and other pioneer aviators ofthe time, such as H G Brackley, had for flying-boats. Cobham's mind was not yet made up and he was prepared to spend a week in Nyasaland, as opposed to only a day in each of Northern and Southern Rhodesia which he visited as off-shoots to his main journey 79.
The Protectorate also possessed two significant levers of direct interest to Cobham. First, there was Lake Nyasa which could extend the flying- boat route southwards to within 370 miles of Salisbury, the capital of Southern Rhodesia, compared with 620 miles between Mpulungu, on Lake Tanganyika in Northern Rhodesia, and Salisbury. Secondly, there was the possibility of the Nyasaland Government contributing to a subsidy to cover the operational costs ofthe air service. Cobham felt that he needed colonial government financial support if the British Government was to be persuaded to develop the London-South Africa route, and in order to secure Nyasaland Government support he was prepared to spend a whole week in the country and to recommend an aeroplane route which would somehow take in both Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland. He had also given Bowring to understand that he would prefer to adopt a line from Tanganyika to Salisbury which passed through Nyasaland rather than a line further to the west "because of the more fertile, and consequently more economically valuable nature ofthe areas which would be served by the former route 80.
These levers cold have been used to exert pressure on Cobham to extend the flying-boat route to Lake Nyasa - rather than stop it in East Africa and continue southwards by aeroplane-in exchange for a subsidy.The Nyasaland Government did have the money: revenue exceeded expenditure during each of the three preceding years and they had an accumulated surplus off 135,000 a sum equal to half the Government's annual expenditure and three times the total annual subsidy required from all sources. The Governors ofKenya, Uganda, Tanganyika and the Sudan had committed themselves to sums of £15,000, £7,000, £5,000, and £3,000 respectively and Cobham was negotiating with South Africa and Southern Rhodesia for significant subsidies; the demands on Nyasaland could not have amounted to more than £5,000 and would probably have been much less. Initially, Bowring accepted the advice ofhis Executive Council "that it would be highly desirable forNyasaland to join with other Governments in the proposed general scheme" but he seems to have quickly changed his mind after a visit of Sir George Schuster to discuss the country's finances and the East Africa Loan. What then worried Bowring was the future other demands on his resources rather than the current demands. With the proposals to build the Zambesi bridge and theNorthern Extension railway from East Africa Loan funds he intended to "embark at once on a policy of departmental expansion" which he wished to negotiate with the Secretary of State, and he would need all his money for this. The interest on the loan could not be charged against capital and would therefore need to be met from revenue and this, he felt,
makes it more important than ever for us to husband our resources with every possible caution... I do not consider it would be wise to complicate ... arrangements by introducing this new project of a Trans-African Air Service into the negotiations 84.
Consequently the Governor's response to Cobham was:
I fear that for financial reasons it will be impossible forNyasaland for the present to assist any commercial air route by means of guarantees of annual contributions 85.
The furthest Bowring would go was to agree to his officials "exploring the possibilities" of assisting by providing and maintaining aerodromes and landing grounds - which, as Wakefield had recognised twenty years earlier 86, and as the Editor of the local newspaper had recently pointed out, would not be required if a flying-boat service were introduced. Even this "exploring of possibilities" came to naught. The British Air Ministry agreed to second F. Tymms, their Superintendent for the Cairo- Karachi air service, to the colonial governments in East and Central Africa to investigate the prospects of civil aviation development and advise on landing facilities, but Bowring was very doubtful "as to whether the expense - £300 for Nyasaland - was justified" and his Treasurer agreed that civil aviation was "a luxury" 87 Tymms did not visit the Protectorate.
When an air service between Britain and South Africa was eventually inaugurated in 1932 - by British Imperial Airways which had merged with Cobham's company - it used aeroplanes which took the western route via Lusaka and Livingstone in Northern Rhodesia to Cape Town; and when flying-boats were first used, in 1937, they travelled from the upper Nile down to and along the east coast of Africa to Durban. It was not until after the Second World War that flying-boats took an inland route, through Central Africa, and even then they did so by the western arm, via the Victoria Falls. In each case Nyasaland was bypassed. It was only in the last year of that post-war service, from November 1949 to October 1950, that the route included Nyasaland, that flying-boats again alighted on Lake Nyasa, and that a different Governor was able to use the precedent - which he himself created - of the country for the first time, albeit temporarily, being on a direct international air route, to secure the finances to develop an airport to full international standards so as, somewhat later, to enable the country to be placed permanently on an international and intercontinental air-route and thus occupy a crossroads position which it could have occupied much earlier.
Notes
1. L.A.C. Raphael, The Cape to Cairo Dream: a study in British Imperialism, New York: Columbia University Press, 1936, passim
2. E.S. Grogan and A.H. Sharpe, From the Cape to Cairo, London: Hurst and Blackett, 1900; M. Hall, A Woman's Trek from the Cape to Cairo. London: Methuen, 1907.
A.J. Cobham, "A Flight of Survey Round Africa", a publicity brochure, 1927, in possession of G. Bruce, formerly Company Secretary, Short Brothers; NT 2nd March, 1928.
NT 10th April, 1928.
Nam, S1/1590/27, Ward to Davidson-Houston, 22.9.1027; Ward to Bowring, 1.10.1927; Cobham to Bowring, 13.10.1927, 14.10.1927, 26.10.1927.
NT 10th October, 1949, p. 1.
Cobham, p. 161.
NT 2nd March, 1928.
NT 6th March, 1928 and Cobham, p. 162.
W.V. Brelsford,
Rhodesia and Nyasaland, London: Cassell, 1960,
. 80Indians in Kenya,
Legislative Council Proceedings
Cobham, pp. 173-175.
Nam, S 1/1590/27, Bowring to Amery, 28.3.1928
Protectorate Annual Estimates, 1928, P. 7.
NAM, S1/1590/27, Bowring to Amery, 28.3.1928
NAM, Executive Council Minute 52 of 8.3.1928
34th Session, 1927, p.7 London: HMSO, Cmd. 1922, 1923, p. 10.1928, p. 7.op.cit., p. 111; Nyasaland Government Gazette, 30th September, 1922, 30th July, 1927 29 February, 1928, 30th April, 1928.1927, p. 90.1923, p. 12; Nyasaland Government Gazette. 31st March, 1924; Legislative Council Proceedings,_ 34th Session, May 1927, p. 5.1928, p. K.39th Session, April 1929, p. 6. 85. Nyasaland Legislative Council Proceedings 36th session, April, 1928, p. 7.
Allwood, op.
cit., p. 17. NAM, 760/1928, Governor's minute of 21.5.1928, and Treasurer's minute of 22.5.1928 34th Session, May 1927, p. 18. 62. Protectorate Annual Report,
National Archives of Malawi (hereafter NAM) , S 1/1590/27, Ward to Bowring, 1.10.1927.
M. Allward, Seaplanes and Flying-boats, Ashbourne: Moorland, 1981, p. 39; H. Montgomery Hyde, BritishAir Policy Between the Wars, London: Heinemann, 1976, pp. 190-191
NAM, SMP 1425/1926
H. Penrose, British Aviation: the adventuring years, 1928 -1929, London: Putnam, 1973, p. 516: Nyasaland Times (here after referred to as NT), 28th December, 1927, 13th, 20th and 31st January, 1928.A. Cobham, Twenty Thousand Miles in a Flying-Boat, London: Harrap, 1930 (here after referred to as Cobham), p.5.
Cobham, p.3.
NAM, S1/1590/27, Ward to Bowring, 1.10.1927
H. Penrose, op.cit, p. 523; Nt 13th and 17th January and 21st February, 1928; and C.R. Samson, A Flight from Cairo to Cape Town and Back,
