Geoffrey Shaw with his private plane. Photograph courtesy of John Pollock 
Picture Stockton Archive
A Pictorial History of Stockton-on-Tees
Geoffrey Shaw with his private plane. Photograph courtesy of John Pollock
Geoffrey Shaw finished the war as a Group Captain and was Senior Air Staff Officer at Gibraltar. During the war he flew Ansons, Bothas, Blenheims, Wellingtons, Hudsons, Liberators, Catalinas and a Gladiator made up from spare parts at Gibraltar. However, the engine seized up and he had to ditch it. He stood upright in the cockpit as the fixed undercarriage hit the water and he was thrown out as the plane somersaulted. He didn’t like the Klemm, describing it as a floater – almost impossible to get it to land. The colour was white. After it was sold, it was crashed into the sea between Corsica and Sardinia. His Monospar was also crashed after it was flown away by a ministry pilot after the start of the war. His two brothers-in-law, Myles and Hilary Duke-Woolley also flew with the RAF in the war.01/04/2012 23:56:34
The MacRobertson air race was actually from Mildenhall in Suffolk to Melbourne in Australia. It is well documented, however, very little is known about Flight Lieutenant G.Shaw. Would love to know more about this solo pilot. This year is the 75th anniversary and I’m involved in a commemoration project with my local museum. Does anyone happen to know the full colour scheme and markings for the above Klemm Eagle?
My father bought this aircraft, which was a Klemm Eagle, to compete in the MacRobertson air race from Croydon to Melbourne. It was perhaps the only aircraft with a retractable undercarriage in the race. However, the undercarriage collapsed on the rough runway at Bushire in Persia. His race number was 47. The plane came back by ship with the wings literally sawn off by hacksaw. Later, he and my mother went on honeymoon in the aircraft to Hungary. Before the Eagle, he owned an Avro Avian and later he owned a Monospar. After the war, he bought a Sokol from Czechoslovakia in which I flew with him many times.