Charles Ulm was born in Melbourne in 1898. At the outbreak of war in 1914 he enlisted in the A.I.F. despite being under age. He served at Gallipoli where he was wounded and subsequently repatriated to Australia. When authorities became aware of his age he was discharged from the army. However Ulm Senior was vehemently anti-German and urged Charles to re-enlist once he turned 18. Once again he joined the AIF, serving on the Western Front, and again he was wounded. Whilst he was recuperating in England he became interested in aviation; enough to influence him to eventually embark on an aviation career.
Pacific Flight
His early business ventures were dogged by failure but a meeting with Charles Kingsford Smith in 1927 put the seal on a famous partnership. Ulm, with his organizing skills was the perfect foil for Smithy, the impulsive trailblazer. Following their historic Pacific crossing of 1928 Smithy and Ulm became national heroes.
Australian National Airlines
On New Year’s Day 1930 Smithy and Ulm took a quantum leap and launched Australian National Airlines; with facilities at Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. All of Ulm’s organizing skills were needed to create and maintain the operation. Air travel in those depression years was regarded as an unnecessary luxury, and strictly the realm of the elite. Smithy’s casual attitude to his airline was quite astounding; preferring to continue on with his gregarious lifestyle and record-breaking flights. In reality ANA could not have survived without the dynamic Ulm at the helm. But in 1931 it went into liquidation following the disappearance of their flagship ‘Southern Cloud’ on a scheduled flight from Sydney to Melbourne.
New Projects
The partners went their separate ways; Smithy continued his trail-blazing flights while Ulm scraped out a precarious living on various aviation schemes. Some involved P.G. Taylor and Scotty Allan; both of whom could be regarded as iconic figures in Australian aviation. Following Ulm’s unsuccessful tender for an airmail service to the U.K. he was offered a crumb of hope with a future Government contract for an inter-city service in Australia. With assistance from Scotty Allan, he drew up information to demonstrate the feasibility of world flights; in particular the weather conditions for relevant areas.
Stella Australis
Somehow Ulm raised the capital to order a twin-engine Envoy from the Airspeed firm in Portsmouth, who installed additional tankage for the proposed long ocean hauls. Ulm chose to ignore Allan’s advice about making the Pacific crossing from America in March/April. Instead he insisted on leaving in January, which was totally unacceptable to Allan who resigned from the venture. As a consequence, Ulm engaged Sydney-based George Littlejohn as co-pilot and Leon Skilling as navigator. Skilling’s experience however was limited to marine navigation; a much more forgiving area than aerial navigation; which requires a distinct feel for the conditions. Airspeed also questioned Ulm’s insistence on the siting of the additional fuel tank. It was located between pilot and navigator positions, thereby isolating one another in the event of a crisis. Ulm remained adamant about the arrangement and test-flew the Envoy, which he named ‘Stella Australis’. After expressing his satisfaction, he then had it shipped to The United States.
Fatal Flight
In December 1934 they took off in the early evening from San Francisco for the first stage to Honolulu, with an expected arrival on the following morning. Somewhere into the flight they ran into difficulties and missed Honolulu. General consensus was that a stronger than predicted tail wind had pushed them west of Hawaii. One can only imagine the final desperate hours of ‘Stella Australis’, with its navigator isolated and unable to ascertain their position.
Their calls were heard throughout the morning and early afternoon; until the final message that they were about to ditch. An extensive air search failed to locate the aircraft or its crew who were finally listed as: Lost at sea, presumed dead.
Charles Ulm’s impatience and obstinacy had sewn the seeds for a needless disaster and with it the loss of one of Australia’s most enthusiastic aviation pioneers.
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