Sepia Saturday 741 - Highs & Lows

When I look at a new SS theme, I usually have an idea of which pictures from the family archive I could use.  But not this time. Fortunately, Alan provided an escape (as he always does). He mentions "a couple of Alpine skiers from almost a century ago, feeling high on the top of a mountain".

I am not a skiing man myself nor do we have mountains in Holland. The highest "mountain" here is a hill called the Vaalserberg in the province of Limburg; it is a little over 300 meters high. Not exactly the type of mountain when you plan to go out skiing. But there is a picture of my grandfather Andreas Miebies (1883-1957) standing in the dunes near The Hague. It was taken over a century ago, during the second part of WW One when he was mobilized. We see him here standing on the very right. His rank is that of sergeant and he is the commanding officer of this group of soldiers serving in the 47th Landweer batallion Hunters (Jagers).

A section of infantry troops belonging to the 47th batallion Hunters
with Sgt. Andreas Miebies on the very right

The rifles you see are the Austrian .256 Manlicher M.95. It was manufactured 

under license in The Netherlands by the Hembrug weapon factory in Zaandam. 

It has been in use until after WW Two.

Manlicher M.95

When my grandparents celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary, their oldest 

son, my father, put together a kind of PowerPoint presentation avant la lettre. 

For that purpose, he made several drawings and stitched them onto a fabric roll. 

On the drawing below he drew himself shortly after his birth on his father's lap 

with Grandma still in bed. At the time, my dad was born in August 1914, 

Granddad apparently served already in the army as the Manlicher rifle was up 

against the wall and his uniform on the chair.

At the beginning of WW Two, the Dutch army Manlichers were confiscated and 

used by the Germans. So it is not impossible that just a few days before the end of 

WW Two, my father and his comrades were shot by Dutch Manlichers in the 

hands of Germans...

Like the drawing, the picture of the military in the dunes was also part of the presentation my father made for his parents. Readers with sharp eyes will 

be able to see the stitch holes on the top side of the photograph.

If you want to see how other Sepians interpreted this month's theme, go to the

Sepia Saturday site and enjoy yourself!

Hello Bandoeng

The post title is the here well known beginning of a 1929 song written by Dutch singer Willy Derby. I am not sure it is still well known today but it certainly was when present day Indonesia was a Dutch colony: the Dutch East Indies (DEI). 
The rather sentimental song is about a mother in Holland calling her dearly missed son in Bandoeng, a large city on the island of Java and over 15,000 kilometers away. In 1979/1980 Soerabaja (also situated on Java) born singer Wieteke van Dort was responsible for a revival of the song. 
In those days making a phone call was an arduous undertaking. I remember when my grandparents wanted to make a call to their daughter in the DEI, a PTT-van* with a transmitter came to their house in The Hague. It was then "flooded" with all kinds of kinds of cables, wires and phones and after hours of preparation the call came into being. I am talking around 1950 now.
This was not the first time for them to communicate with members of the family 

Meinsje Doelman in
Balikpapan (DEI)

in the DEI. My grandmother Antje de Langen-Doelman (1892-1984) had a younger brother and sister who both lived in the East Indies long before WW2. Her sister was Meinsje (Mies) Doelman (1900-1973). She was married to Jan (Bob) Wemmers (1898-1976). He was employed by oil company Shell and a.o. they lived in Balikpapan on the island of Borneo. During WW2 Jan was interned by the Japanese in one of their not so nice camps. His stay there was registered on the card below. Prior to his internment the couple lived in 22 Sawohlaan, Batavia. Later he was transported from the camp to Burma where he was forced to work on the infamous Burma -Thailand railroad. You may remember the movie called Bridge on the River Kwai a.o. starring Sir Alec Guinness and William Holden. Jan survived the railroad but if I remember well, his health was affected.

Japanese camp registration of Jan Wemmers

The brother, Cornelis Doelman (1895-1983), lived in Batavia (currently Jakarta), capital of the DEI. He was a supervisor of poly technical educational institutions in the East Indies. His Belgium born wife Lea Eulalia Hortensia Libert (1896-1983) was with him ever since they moved there after their marriage in 1921.
During the very early stages of WW2 it was possible to send letters from Holland to the DEI. I have one written by Pieter Doelman (1864-1942). He was the father of Antje, Cornelis and Meinsje. At the time he lived in Antje's house on 18 Mispelstraat, The Hague. On May 30, 1940 he wrote about the surrender of Holland and Belgium and about the bombing of Rotterdam ("26,000 houses destroyed"). Also about a relative who was killed in action during the German invasion.  
But apparently the possibility to communicate by mail was stopped a few months

Red Cross message form

later. That is no surprise as obviously the Germans did not allow any connections by air nor by ship. However, there was still the Red Cross. They provided a kind of Short Message Service avant la lettre. There was a maximum of 25 words. On this form Cornelis informs his father in Holland that the DEI family is okay. The date is Oct. 17, 1940. At the time Cornelis is living in 31 Sawohlaan, Batavia, the same street where his sister Meinsje and her husband lived or had been living. The back of this form was used for the return message. The reply was dated Jan. 7, 1941 suggesting a transportation time for these forms of more than 75 days.
Today we live in a world of almost instant communication possibilities anywhere. We have our mobile/cell phones enabling us to call, to WhatsApp, to ping, to SMS and what have you. And in case you are out of reach of 3G and even 4G networks, there is always the satellite phone. For youngsters such as our grandchildren it may be good to know that it wasn't always like this. People wrote letters that took a month or more to reach their destination. People did not have phones in their homes, one had to go to the Post Office to place a call to a neighboring city. International calls? Call the international operator please; they would return the call when the connection was made. All these changes came about in the course of the last 60, 70 years. But it is good to realize that the world wasn't always as near and as small as it is today.

*PTT is short for Post, Telephone and Telegraph, the governmental provider of all these services.

Sepia Saturday - Words, words, words

Usually the term 'spreading the word' has a different meaning, certainly if the noun in this phrase is written with a capital W. But that is not my interpretation of the theme picture of this week (see at the end of this post). As you can see the word 'tele....' is written on the wall. My guess is that the full text reads something like: "Telegraph a Cablegram". 
Most of the boys/men you see are Western Union messengers and thus involved in the physical distribution of words. In most countries that profession is extinct and overtaken by short message services (SMS), email and other internet applications. However, when my mum and dad married in 's-Gravenhage (The Hague) on November 18, 1942 they received seven congratulatory telegrams. 
In those days telegrams were handled solely by state owned Dutch Postal Authority, the P.T.T. This abbreviation stood for 'Post, Telefoon, Telegraaf'. (The translation of these words won't be a problem for you. Dutch and English seem to be very close here.)
At the time a number of forms were used to present the telegram to the recipient. Of course there was the form for all purposes.

And another form for day to day use.

In case you wonder what the senders of this cable had to pay for its delivery, the P.T.T. people have been kind enough to affix a decal on the back of one of these telegrams.

It reads: "Send a telegram, quick and cheap. In the interior 10 words 25 cents" That doesn't sound too bad but you have to appreciate the fact that the stamp for an ordinary postcard was 4 cents. In other words, the cost was 6 times as high for just a few words.

Next to the standard telegraph format, there were at least two congratulatory forms.

I have to say that I find the envelope of this one (left) a bit amateurish. And the telegram itself (below) doesn't make it any better. But I don't know whether the sender was given a choice which form was to be used at destination.

The second one looks more professional. There are all kinds of symbols depicting happiness: flowers, flying birds and a girl being congratulated with her tennis victory. Also a newly married couple and next to it their future as anticipated by the Postal Authority: the happy couple with a baby in a cradle.

Apparently the postmen also catered for jubilees at work. The three drawings on the right seem to point in that direction. Doing one's duty for say 25 years calls for a cablegram as well, they must have thought.

On one of the cables I found this text in red. Among others it said that you could have your own unique cable address. (If I remember well the address of my former employer KLM Royal Dutch Airlines was TRANSAERA.) The annual maintenance fee amounted to 12 Dutch guilders. Delivery of telegrams was possible on a deluxe form. Additional cost: 25 cents for domestic delivery and 50 cents abroad. Since we are talking 1942 here I wonder whether sending a telegram was possible to any country e.g. to "enemy countries". Probably not.

Apart from these telegrams I have another 35 congratulatory letters and postcards that mark this occasion that took place 2,5 years into WW2. Fortunately the happy couple did not know that the worst was yet to come.

On October 11, 1943 the service to send congratulatory telegrams was cancelled due to a shortage of paper. In 1944 forwarding this type of telegram was cancelled altogether. 

For more postmen stories you can turn to the Sepia Saturday site. Alternatively he may call at your door. And if you didn't hear him, remember, the postman always rings twice!

Sepia Saturday - Sales Promotion

The theme picture of this week shows a North Carolina shop front. It seems the proprietors, the Dughi brothers, sell a.o. fruit and vegetables including bananas. The latter surprised me a bit. Assuming they are not grown locally (wrong?), they have been imported. The picture is from the very early part of the 20th century. In those days it must have been quite an achievement to import bananas possibly from Central America and get them to destination in an edible condition. An oyster saloon seems to be part of the Dughi's enterprise. It is difficult for me to imagine what that is. It is the saloon part that intrigues me. To me that is not the most logical venue to eat oysters. Or does the word 'saloon' also have other meanings? But I digress. The fact is that we have very few shopkeepers in the family. And the number of pictures showing their enterprises corresponds with that fact. The best I can do is refer you to an earlier post about my grandfather. He was managing the accounting department of a grocery store procurement organization.
So I allowed my mind to make some overtime to see whether I could come up with an associated subject. After an hour or so, and after having rejected all thoughts about saloons, my brain produced the word 'advertising'. Because that is what the Dughi's have been doing as well. There are a couple of signboards visible and may be they did some advertising in the local newspaper. And, very important, they were also dependant on mouth to mouth advertising. Upsetting their clientele was not in their interest. So advertising it is. I'll show you a few examples from the world where I came from: air transport.
Most pictures are part of a collection of photo's saved from a KLM Copenhagen office by two of my colleagues, the late Bert Besseling and Aris Zwart.

Say it with Flowers

The above Danish poster is a joint advertising campaign of KLM and Fleurop, also known as Interflora. Originally a German organization, Fleurop is instrumental in delivering bunches of cutflowers to individuals worldwide. They started doing this in 1908 and they still do this today!

A fine banking relationship, advantageous travelling

 The background of this ad is the situation just after WW2. In those days it was not allowed to exchange limitless amount of your own currency into foreign denominations. But KLM was claiming that things were possible thanks to the good relations they apparently had with the banking community in Denmark. In the bottom right hand corner it is suggested that foreign currency matters can be handled. My understanding of  the Danish language is no more what it used to be. So my interpretation of this ad may not be 100% correct.

Who gives parcels under 100 kg a service that is beyond the clouds?
KLM's Worldspeed!

KLM's Worldspeed product was a small package serve intended to compete with the so called integrators such as Fedex, DHL and UPS. Despite a worldwide advertising campaign in all kinds of trade journals, it turned out to be failure. My involvement in the development of this product apparently was not decisive...

25% reduced fares for round trips during night time

KLM had its own bus company providing scheduled service from Schiphol Airport to a.o. Amsterdam (Leidseplein) and The Hague (Varkensmarkt). And why not use these buses to display your ads. Here 'red eye specials' to a number of European destinations are being promoted.
The last picture shows that not everything displayed in a shop window is intended for sale. It is a photo I made in the city of Maastricht several years ago. The city is situated in the Dutch province of Limburg. Please also note the photobomb in this picture. For those who think this photo is in reaction to attempts by one Sepian to seduce us with erotica, you are wrong.

For more shops, their owners and their marketing efforts, please click here and you'll get to see everything you (n)ever wanted to buy and more.

Sepia Saturday - Bridges

This week's picture shows a bridge across a river that won't see many tall ships, be it with or without sail. The bridge hardly allows the passage of a rowing boat. If the man at the oars is distracted by the photographer for another ten seconds, he will surely lose his hat if not more. What really intrigues me is the body language of the lady on the bridge. The way she holds her right arm indicates either that she is giving the man a piece of her mind or that she has got a back problem. For the well being of the man I would hope it is the second option. But you may justly find this a woman unfriendly thought. In any case, this picture offers many possibilities. Nevertheless, I'll go for the obvious: bridges.

I know the two starting bridges from own experience. That almost automatically means they are not very sepia. I am not that old, you know. 
The first one is a French bridge. It is situated near Millau in the south of France, part of the A75 and it has been there since 2004. 

My wife looking up at the Viaduc de Millau

The bridge crosses the river Tarn and is almost 2.5 kilometers/1.5 miles long. The highest bridge pillar is 343 meters/1125 ft, the longest span between two pillars 342 meters/1122 ft. My wife (1.64 m/5 ft 5 in) felt like a dwarf looking up! It is a very impressive construction! Here is a 3min 15sec YouTube video worth looking at. 
The next one is a Canadian bridge. I never set foot on it but we saw it from the air when visiting friends in nearby Belleville.

Thousand Island Bridge crossing the St Lawrence near Gananoque, ON

Our friends Tim & Diana knew of a seaplane operator in Gananoque. The carrier's name was 1000 Island Airways and we flew in a De Haviland B. So we made a very nice trip over the St Lawrence River.
Well, so much for colorful bridges, let's go back to the sepia era.

Bridge over the river Kyll near Kyllburg 50 km north of Trier, Germany

During my mother's high school period many school trips were spent in the western part of Germany. This photo dates from approx 1933. It is difficult to be sure where she is in this picture. She might also have taken it. The only known name is her teacher's name. He is the man on the very right, Mr. Van Ramshorst.

Dausenau a.d. Lahn 100 km northwest of Frankfurt, Germany

During one of those school trips the above picture was taken in the small city of Dausenau in Germany. Again I assume my mother is part of this group but that is not the reason for showing this picture. It is the banner over the street showing the logo of the Nazi-party that makes this photo special. Although WW2 started in 1939, the Germans knew Hitler and his ideas long before that. The banner says:

Adolf Hitler

schaft Arbeit und Brot

Wählt Liste 2

Translated this says: "Adolf Hitler creates labour and bread, Vote list 2."

Obviously social circumstances in Germany were very poor in those days. And Hitler made use of the bleak future staring in the face of many Germans. Promises for a better future and at same time blaming a.o. Jews for the situation they were in, made excellent elections.

Usually the largest party has the lowest sequence number. In January 1933 Hitler became Chancellor of Germany and his Nazi-party the absolute number 1. In combination with my mother's age there, my conclusion is that this photo dates from 1932. Little did these boys and girls know how the banner over their heads would influence their lives in less than 10 years time...

For more ladies, rowing boats, bridges and anything else you would never have thought of, please see my fellow Sepia Saturday bloggers.

Update Apr. 7, 2014
Out of the blue I received the following email from Germany:

Good evening,

I've found this picture of Kyllburg in your blog by accident:

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyZ_oBkGiDJ79fHJx3XNTn0T15-5AS2EV6SZRmQGh5i6odK3pGrsmsLATcGpzo9WuMMBBnO8As-45rVhi_xVr_UKxKajvCIpE0AcZSIFL9Th-qEKpU88bm5Duc7QagdV6zNAooTx1REoQ/s1600/Brug+over+de+Kyll+bij+Kyllburg+50+km+N+van+Trier.jpg

I was born in Kyllburg in 1958, but away from home since I'm 15 year old. I am very interested in the history of my home town. (By the way: Kyllburg is, with a population of about 900 people, the smallest town in the federal state Rheinland-Pfalz. Until  World War II it was a famous spa in the Eifel, specialy for the Dutch.)

The bridge over the river Kyll with your mother on it is probably this:

https://www.google.de/maps/place/50%C2%B002'20.5%22N+6%C2%B035'06.0%22E/@50.039036,6.584998,1684m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m2!3m1!1s0x0:0x0

I have a very private request: Do you have any other pictures or other information from this trip of your mother's school form to Kyllburg in 1933 where this picture was taken? Needless to say that there are a lot of postcards from Kyllburg at the internet. But the private sight of such a trip is of course more exciting for me.

I would be very pleased to hear from you.

Best regards

Toni Nissen

Wiesbaden

Obviously I replied to Tony. Fortunately my mother's album is still in my possession and there are a few more pictures made in Kyllburg which I forwarded to Toni in the meantime. There was also this picture postcard. I was able to put a date to the bridge picture: July 23, 1932. So I was wrong by a year. 

Kyllburg pictured from up high

It is nice when the internet provides you with reactions such as the one above. Thanks, Toni!

Postmarks (3)

In this last post on postmarks I'll show you the remaining nine promoting a wide variety of things. The first three are pre-WW2, the others are all from 1944. In 1944 my country (The Netherlands) was clearly not in good shape anymore. The occupation by the Germans was in its fourth year and the texts reflect certain "problem areas". But first three earlier ones.

July 28, 1932: Nationaal Padvinderskamp Landgoed Oosterbeek
Wassenaar 2-12 augustus 1932

This 1932 postmark refers to a national pathfinders camp in Wassenaar, a city near The Hague.

January 19, 1933: Steun het Nationaal Crisiscomite

"Support the National Crisis Committee" tried to interest the population in aiding primarily tradespeople but also the unemployed and people forced to work in certain projects set up by municipalities.  The Committee existed from 1931 - 1936 and never was a great success. During those years a total 7.5 million guilders was distributed to those in need. And like in other countries, also here the unemployment rates were high, very high. So the financial aid per person was limited.

June 12, 1934: Adresseer volledig

People were encouraged to provide a full address. I wrote about the background of this recommendation earlier.

January 26, 1944: Help onze industrie aan grondstoffen Lever afval in

"Help our industry to obtain raw materials, hand in your waste."  It is unlikely that the collected materials would go to industries benefiting the population. My guess is that most of it went straight to Germany to keep the war industry going. With imports of all commodities coming to a standstill, Germany had to depend on its own resources and on those of the occupied territories. One of the consequences of material shortages was that a large percentage of all church bells and radio's were confiscated as well.

January 28, 1944: Bewaar oud papier Uit oud wordt nieuw

"Save waste paper New is made from old" If you were of the opinion that recycling of paper is a fairly recent thing, you are wrong. Like many things, it has been tried before.

February 3, 1944: Afvalstoffen bewaren Brandstoffen sparen

The idea behind "Save waste, Save fuel" was probably that waste could serve as fuel for industrial purposes. It would then replace existing fuels such as coal. In this way coal could serve as fuel for vital (read: war) industries.

March 18, 1944: Laat voor den Post langs den gehelen bovenkant 4 cm vrij

Apparently it was a wide spread custom to write the address across the whole face of an envelope. Hence the request to "Allow the Mail to use 4 cms along the top". In this manner both the address and the stamp would remain legible. 

September 21, 1944: Frontzorg is eereplicht Stort op giro 106156

A soldier with a German helmet symbolizes Dutch men who collaborated with the Germans by doing military duties, also abroad. The stamp calls for (financial) support of these men: "Front care is a duty of honor, Transfer money to account 106156". I have been unable to find out how much money was collected for this purpose but I cannot imagine the amount was of any significance.  

October 10, 1944: Zand en water zijn bij brandbominslag de beste bluschmiddelen

"Upon impact of a fire bomb, sand and water are the best extinguishers". Although it is not mentioned here, the implication of this message was that these bombs were used against civilians by the RAF and US Air Force, often en route to Germany. This stamp must therefore be regarded as a subtle hint as to who was the real enemy!  

All stamps shown in this series come from envelopes addressed to my father and mother before and during WW2. The January and February 1944 letters are congratulatory letters written on the happy occasion of my birth. All envelopes are still undamaged and so are the letters. I'll write about those another time.

Postmarks (2)

In the previous post about Dutch postmarks I showed you a number of these government or Post Office sponsored messages. Usually the idea behind them is to draw attention to a certain subject or to trigger some reaction. In Dutch these stamps are called 'flag stamps' (vlagstempels).

September 7, 1939: Adresseer volledig

The text on this first stamp intends to stimulate writers to mention the full address on their correspondence. This sounds silly but it wasn't. When people wrote a letter to someone in the same city or village, many were accustomed to write a persons' name and street but in stead of mentioning the city name, they said ' City'  or 'Local'. That may seem rather odd but in those days it was not unusual that your social circle did not extend beyond the borders of the place where you lived. And when such a letter erroneously ended up in the wrong mail bag...

September 23, 1939: Goedkoope brief-telegrammen

This one intended to promote the use of discounted letter-telegrams. Apparently this was a Post Office product different from the normal telegram, possibly an extended and/or cheaper version thereof.

October 21, 1939: Postzegels-rechts boven in den hoek Vlugger verzending

The cancellation stamp says: "Stamps in the upper right hand corner! Faster shipping". The idea behind this text was explained in the previous post. The difference with this one is the lay out of the message.

October 25, 1939: Post Uw brieven zoodra ze gereed zijn!

'Mail your letters as soon as they are ready!'  I wonder why people needed to be encouraged to do so. Who would benefit by not yet mailing them? Certainly not the addressee!

August 29, 1941 Elke bosch- of heidebrand is verlies voor stad en land

In an effort to raise the awareness that the use of open fire outside can be dangerous, this stamp says that 'any forest or heath fire is a loss for town and country'. I am not aware of any particular reason why this stamp was issued. Possibly it was caused by heat waves in June and July 1941. Temperatures over 33º Centigrade (91º Fahrenheit) were no exception.

February 12, 1942: Ook straatnaam en huisnummer in het adres Adresseer volledig

Apparently it was still necessary to ask senders to mention 'Also street name and number in the address Address in full'. Addressing a letter to John Doe, Rotterdam obviously creates unnecessary extra work for the Post Office people. 

November 13, 1942: WHN Loterij 1942 Uw kans 1 op 3

The letters WHN in this 'WHN lottery 1942 Your chance 1 in 3'-stamp require some explanation. WHN stands for 'Winterhulp Nederland' a nazi-organisation aiming at helping the poor and the needy among the Dutch population during WW2. The idea was that this structure would replace all government, church and other aid programs. 
According to the nazi doctrine poverty did not exist except maybe during wintertime. Hence the name 'Winterhelp'. 
WHN obtained its revenue from money collections, organizing lotteries and a kind of profit tax imposed on businesses (5%). Also employees had to pay a tax of 1% levied on wages. Obviously WHN was not very popular the lotteries excepted. Apparently the population liked to gamble now and then even when the proceeds benefit an organization such as WHN. 
Initially also needy Jews were eligible to be helped. But that support ended soon...
In case you wonder why a pig is portrayed in the stamp, the following may serve. I found this explanation here (it is in Dutch). The English word 'swine' comes very close to its German equivalent 'Schwein'. 'Schweinen' in German means 'to be lucky'.  Hence the use of a swine in conjunction with a lottery.

All these stamps come from cards and letters my Mother gave me some time ago. They all go back to the 30s and 40s of the previous century.  I still have some nine stamps left and I'll share those in the next (and last) post on this subject. The original envelopes with these stamps are still intact. There is so much to be learned from an envelope!

To be continued

Saved from the dustbin (9)

Among the many pictures saved by my colleagues Aris Zwart and Bert Besseling in Denmark, there are a number that clearly depict war situations. It can hardly be anything else, there is too much detail pointing in that direction. There is only one problem, I have no idea when and where they have been taken. I think it is a safe bet that all photos have been taken during WWII, although some of these aircraft look very WWI-ish. However, during WWI Denmark was neutral so if these are Danish images, it almost must be WWII. Some pictures carry the mark of  the Statens Filmcensur. This is (also?) Danish for "National Film Censorship". So I assume that we see Danish combat situations. But if anybody can further clarify this, I would be grateful. Please let me know by making a comment at the end of this post.
The first two pictures both probably show the same incident. 

Crashing aircraft. Was it shot down?

(German?) soldiers looking at the (Danish?) aircraft.

Comparing the backgrounds in both pictures, it is likely that we see the same crash. If you click on the images you can see the circular aircraft marks. They resemble the Danish one.

Attacking planes and fleeing soldiers? In the bottom
right hand corner it says 'Statens Filmcensur'.

A German airship being attacked by a Danish (?)
plane. Note the man leaving the balloon basket.

Train under attack. The text on the locomotive is
illegible (to me).

War plane. Note the machine gun(ner) up front. 

There will be more war pictures in my next blog.

For those who have known Bert Besseling, it is my sad duty to inform you that Bert passed away on July 7 last. We will remember him as a fine colleague and a dear friend.

Update August 27, 2012:
Received the following information from Mr. Niels M. Schaiffel-Nielsen of the Danmarks Flyvehistoriske Selskab, the Danish Aviation Historical Society.

"To my best opinion, none of the pictures you showed in your mail is related to the Danish flying forces during WW I.

There was no Danish aircraft operational which has nationality markings on top of the wings.

I have failed to find any report on Danish military aircraft taking part in any war operations during WW I. I must underline that Denmark during WW I had declared her Neutrality which was respected by both Germany and Great Britain and later the United States.

The Royal Navy Air Service) had only one aircraft in service during WWI, a Friederichshafen F.F. 29, delivered to the Navy on the 24. Of February 1917. The aircraft wrecked in the Great Belt (Storebaelt) on the 16. Og October 1917.

The  Army Air Corps had in its inventory four Maurice Farman aircraft, and three Henri Farman aircrafts and none of them had nationality markings on top of the upper wing. See the attached pictures."