jdvoss wrote:
https://www.uscg.mil/history/aviation/Vought/Vought_O2U2.pdf
Coastie John,
In the above link the last sentence states "...these Corsairs were stationed with the Coast Guard Air Detachment in Texas to suppress illegal immigration."
Hmmm...interesting concept.
JDV
Ya it is. Were there any other CG aircraft pics where you located those two?
Smugglers were prevalent down there both on foot and in the air. I'd have to go back and look but I think smuggling of Chinese thru Mexico was popular back then (as it now too). A few months ago we were able to pull the service record of a notable very early CG pilot who flew for the RCAF and early US Air Corp before coming into the CG. He also did high performance physiology test flying prior to coming into the CG. He was killed during a SAR when his float caught something on takeoff and flipped the plane. Anywho....this guy was an experienced pilot and in his service record were copies of orders directing him to inspect seized planes north and south and ferry other planes along the southern border. His name was LT Luke Christopher. He was a Major in the other services. There are pics out there of him with Earhart and Lindy.
Here are a three snippets from an offline email string from last year. This will add to the USCG and US Customs story on the borders.
At the end of a year operations were transferred from San Antonio to Del Rio, Texas. This placed the Detachment on the border within the area of patrol and made the operation much more effective. The Detachment operated from the commercial airfield and relied upon American Airlines facilities and assistance. Coast Guard Headquarters ordered the relocation of the Detachment to Biggs Field, Fort Bliss Texas in December of 1936. After an amazing chain of endorsements including the Treasury Department, War Department, Army Eighth Corps Fort Sam Houston, Chief of Staff US Army Signal Corp, and the Commanding Officer of the Air Corps Detachment at Fort Bliss, the Coast Guard Air Patrol took up residence in a small hangar at Biggs Field in February 1937. Biggs Field was able to provide better support and El Paso was in fact more centrally located.
When the CG took over the Air Patrol from Customs in 1934 Custom had a confiscated aircraft that were turned over to the Coast Guard.
The 1934 Treasury report says that 15 aircraft were turned over to the Coast Guard by customs.
Custom history source: - Official records are not clear on exactly what these aircraft were, it is believed that in the mix was two Curtiss Falcons, two Curtiss, Robins, a Douglass Mailwing, two New Standards, a Pilgrim, a Command-Aire 5C3, a Sikorsky S39 and two Waco 10s. While on paper this would look good, in reality most of the aircraft were in extremely poor condition and unsuitable. Eventually all were replaced except for the two New Standards. This totals 12 of 15. One of the other three could have been a Pitcairn Biplane.Now this is a snippet regarding the northern border CG aircraft. We now know LT Christopher went up and inspected this aircraft too.
Looks like you might have been key in establishing that US Customs turned over a Pitcairn to the USCG
o/a the time frame that AD BUF was active based on a decision issued by the Federal District Court
for the Western District Court of New York in an undated document issued in the year 1935. The
case involved a seizure of a PITCIARN BIPLANE (no specific type, design, or model listed), NC5026,
was upheld that the US Gov't had the right to seize the aircraft as it was used in a smuggling operation
when it was impounded by the RCMP in Canada, on May 23, 1933. It was then trucked to IGA and
turned over to U.S. Customs on June 1, 1933, where it was operated by Customs out of BUF. The
owner of the aircraft filed suit in Federal Court in an effort to regain use of the aircraft. The Judge
issued his decision in 1935 (no actual date) that the aircraft was property of the U.S.A. and would
not be returned to the original owner.