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I hope Mr Rees will forgive me for posting this story only I think its best read in his own words.
The Leonardo Da Vinci
As a young boy I sometimes spent my spare time helping the driver of J.M Simth`s lorry delivering groceries and other goods,earning a few pence in tips in the process.From memory,most of this work was done on a Saturday morning,but,as will be shown later, memory cannot be relied upon,and can lead to the wrong conclusions.On one of these trips the driver heard that there was something going on down at the beach and he made the diversion to investigate.On arrival,the cause of excitement was obvious;an aeroplane had landed and was parked on the hard sand below the old promenade.The aircraft was a high wing single engined monoplane dark red in color.With the name "Leonardo Da Vinci" painted on its fuselage.There was on man with a flying helmet,who was presumably the pilot talking to a policeman,and even from several yards away it was obvious that english was not his normal language.Because there was other delivery's to be made we could not stop to see the fate of the plane,and by the afternoon the aircraft had gone.Over the years,particularly while serving in the R.A.F,I often wondered what had happened to that aeroplane,but did nothing to find out.Then about five years ago I saw a letter in an old edition of country quest which stated that the aircraft of that name had crashed on Carn Ingli near Newport,Pembs.This letter also provided the first surprise;the date given was Aug 1954 before I had reached my ninth birthday.Was I really doing that sort of thing at eight years of age?my memory would have placed it at least two years later.Efforts to follow up this information failed the library files of the local Guardian started in 1937 and a search of the Evening Post for the Sat of Aug 1934 found nothing.Recently however photos of the aircraft were given to me and the search was on again.
Haverfordwest library give several references and advised me to contact Pembs Aviation Research Group.John Evans that organisation supplied press cutting relating to the crash but was unaware of a landing at Aberavon.The aircraft was a Bellancia with 300 Hp engine and the crew were Capt George Pound an American and Lt Cresare Sabelli of Italy.They had flown the plane from America to Rome and were attempting the return flight.Their destination on this leg of the journey was Dublin,but over the Irish sea they encountered heavy mist fog and rain,and after flying blind for about an hour they returned to the welsh coast at about 1,000 feet and circled hoping to make a landing at dawn,but crashed near the summit of Carn Ingli at about midnight.The plane flipped over on its back, but neither man was seriously hurt.What followed was almost farcical.After extricating themselves from the wreckage the two men made their way by torch light to the nearest farm house to seek help,but was thought to be tramps and were told to "clear off and shut the gate" and had to return to the crash site where they spent the night sleeping on the wings of the aircraft.Shortly after dawn they walked to another farmhouse where they had better luck and were taken to the commercial hotel in Newport.For the next few days they were virtually feted,being invited to dinner at Newport Castle as well as other engagements.The wreckage of the aircraft was taken to fishguard harbour to await return to america by sea.
These were the fact of the crash, but the timing of the two incidents did not fit.Assuming that as I remembered,the aircraft left Aberavon about midday,then,with a moderate ground speed of 70 mph it should have been over ireland by mid afternoon,long before it crashed on Carn Ingli.An appeal for help inserted in the Port Talbot Courier by Walter Perry produced no new information.The Port Talbot Library now has microfilm of the early editions of the Guardian,but a search of the Aug 1934 issues again drew a blank, however,with the cutting of the crash report it was possible to deduce an exact date,Sat,18th of Aug,1934.
with this information Walter Perry who was now now as interested as the writer was able to find the Evening Post report of the crash which the discrepancy in the times of the two incidents.The crash occurred on the return flights,where as the forced landing had been made 3 months earlier on the outward journey the two men,were in reality aviation pioneers attempting to make the first none stop nlights from New York to Rome.Unfortunately engine trouble forced them to land near the west coast of Ireland,with the aircraft being damaged on landing.After repairs had been affected,there was further trouble on take off and a further stop was made at Dublin.The engine trouble recurred whilst crossing the Irish sea but the pilot managed to remain airborne by warming up the engine but eventually decided to land because the engine was leaking.They had seen the stretch of sand at Aberavon,circled and landed at the briton ferry end and taxied along to the beach to the promenade
The first person to meet the aircraft were the Coastguard William Matthews (see elsewhere on this site for more on Mr Matthews )who had seen it rising and dipping low over the sea.When it circled over the dunes,he made his way to the promenade and was able to assist Cpt Pound contact the appropriate authorities.Pound was obviously put in touch with Cardiff aerodrome (then on Pengam Moors)who arranged for an engineer to be flown to Aberavon;the police would also have been alerted.News of the landing spread quickly and a large crowd soon gathered.The Mayor,Alderman G Brown,and his daughters went to the scene and offered their sympathy to the fliers at not being able to achieve their aim.
The plane from Cardiff arrived about noon and after the engineer had worked on the motor for about an half an hour,it was restarted and the crew indicated they were prepared to take off.A few minutes later they followed the Cardiff plane into the air,waved goodbye to the crowd and disappeared from sight.The aircraft did reach Rome although there is no information on how long they were delayed.In Rome they were given a wonderful reception and the two pilots were presented with gold cigarette cases by Mussolini.They left Rome at seven o clock on Sat,18th Aug,hoping to reach Dublin before attempting was was probably the first double crossing of the atlantic.However,the Irish sea again proved unlucky for them although they were fortunate to survive the crash with only minor injuries.Had the achieved either of their aims their name would have gone down in aviation history along with Alcock and Brown and Lindberg,but fate was against them and they are remembered as surviving one of the earliest air crashes in Pembrokeshire.Capt Pound is reputed to have visited the site in resent years the writer would like to express his thanks to John Evans and particularly Walter Perry for help in the research into this incident.Personally,I have learned that however vivid the memory,it must be supported by documentary evidence not only was this incident earlier than I thought,but what I thought was a Saturday in August proved to be a Thursdays in the Whitsun Hiolday.
From an Account by Mr Arthur Rees in the Port Talbot Historian
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