DH.60 Gipsy Moth G-AAEL at Armthorpe.
On Bank Holiday Monday, 1st August 1932 a flying gala was held at Armthorpe "Park Lane" aerodrome by the Doncaster Aviation Club and this Gipsy Moth was used to take up fare paying passengers. The club's instructor, Mr Eric Swiss, was their fully qualified pilot who was able to take paying passengers but at the time of this flight he was giving a flight to Scarborough with two competion winners in another aircraft, Puss Moth G-ABEC. The pilot of G-AAEL was a director of the Doncaster Aviation Company who was a qualified pilot but he did not hold the correct licence to take paying passengers. He only held an "A-Licence". Other directors of the club knew he was not qualified to take fare-paying passengers but allowed him to make several flights with passengers during the gala. At the end of the day the flying was all but concluded, the bulk of the visitors had left, Puss Moth G-ABEC had not yet returned from Scarborough and the organisers were about to end the gala. The director of the club and pilot of G-AAEL was informed that when a boy was particularly keen to have a flight and as to not disappoint him he decided he would give the boy a short flight in the Gipsy Moth. Another director of the Doncaster Aviation Company decided he would also fly with the boy as the pilot believed he would need a responsible person to fly with him. The DH.60 Moth was a two seater aircraft but the child sat on the knee of the adult passenger in the front seat. The aircraft took off from Armthorpe aerodrome at around 20.30hrs and climbed to 1500 feet, a loop was made but then the aircraft entered a spin at around 500 feet off the ground, control was not regained by the time it crashed. It crashed in a cornfield two fields away from the aerodrome. The adult passenger in the front seat was killed and the child died of his injuries the next day while the pilot, in the rear seat, survived with less serious injuries. The pilot later stated that the aircraft's rudder had suddenly been moved causing him to loose control. Puss Moth G-ABEC returned to Armthorpe after the crash and the pilot had to overfly the crash site to land. A lengthy inquest into the deaths was held and the pilot of G-AAEL was deemed to blame for the accident, his flying licence was suspended. Doncaster Aviation Company Ltd were deemed negligent at the inquest because the company knew the pilot was not qualfied to take passengers in such a manner.
Pilot - Mr Augustus Grey Dixwell Alderson. Director of Doncaster Aviation Company. Injured.
Passenger - Mr Harry Addy. Director of Doncaster Aviation Company. Aged 21 or 22. Buried Hyde Park Cemetery, Doncaster.
Passenger - Mr Mark Allinson, aged 14, died 2nd August 1932. Buried Armthorpe, Doncaster.
Augustus Alderson's father was Rev Augustus Dixon Alderson, he had been vicar at St.Leonards on Sea, Hastings when Augustus (Jnr) was born there on 10th May 1898. He moved to be vicar at Tickhill, Yorkshire in 1899, Tockwith in 1911 and then to Loversall, Doncaster in 1929. Augustus Grey Alderson had served in the RFC during WW1, flying as early as Summer 1916. On 6th February 1918 he was reported as missing in action on a flight over the front flying a Sopwith Camel but was found to have been injured and in German hands. With his injuries requiring treatment he was later repatriated and spent some months in hospital back in the UK. He reliquished his commission in the RAF on 20th June 1920. Following his civilian flying being suspended he then rejoined the RAF in 1936 and appears to have served until 1954. He died in Maidstone, Kent in 1996. He wrote the book "The First World War in the Air 1914-1918 : by a Fighter Pilot No.3 Squadron Royal Flying Corps."
The initial Doncaster Aviation Company appears to have been formed around the time that the directors formed the "Danum Aero Club" in early 1932 with the aerodrome at Armthorpe being licenced for their use. Thomas John Mammatt put up the initial thousand pounds and the company was formed. By June 1932 Doncaster Aviation Company Ltd was then registered, Thomas Mammatt was Managing Director, with Directors Augustus Alderson (who was also chairman of Danum Aero Club) and Harry Addy (possibly also J G Sanderson). Doncaster National Aviation Day on 16th June 1932 saw the opening event at the Danum Aero Club with Sir Alan Cobham's Air Circus visiting. The company acquired the use of two aeroplanes from the London Aeroplane Club, Stag Lane Aerodrome; these two must have been Gipsy Moth G-AAEL and Puss Moth G-ABEC registered to them around the end of July 1932. Eric Swiss was appointed as the company's official pilot in late-July 1932 and on 1st August 1932 the company / club organised the flying gala at Armthorpe. After loosing G-AAEL in the crash in August 1932 the company appear to be purchased at least one replacement aeroplanes. By the end of 1932 the Doncaster Aviation Company Ltd was in significant debt and was wound up as bankrupt. Following the crash in August 1932 detailed above the insurance company refused to admit liability, almost certainly because the company directors knew the pilot was not qualified to take passengers, the pilot was also a director of the company and the chairman of the flying club, and that the aeroplane was not designed for three persons. A later Doncaster flying club appears to have had no links to this failed business.