James McCudden, the future VC, joined his squadron. McCudden said that one day, “Major Henderson flew to Croydon in a Martinsyde and I followed in the Bristol Scout. The next morning we left Croydon in a very thick mist to fly back to Dover… the clouds were only at 300 feet and I had to keep within 50 yards of Henderson the whole time… we arrived at Dover at 150 feet... but how Major Henderson found his way still remains a mystery to me.”


Mentioned in dispatches In Flight magazine of 24th February it was reported that he had been ‘mentioned in dispatches’. In June he returned to France to take over No 66 Squadron which was flying Sopwith Pups. One day Henderson had a lucky escape when he made a heavy landing. Luckily he was flung through the central bracing wires of the aero- plane just as it burst into flames. Had he been strapped in he would have died, so from then on he shunned safety harnesses. On 26th July he and McCudden were on patrol when they saw and attacked an Albatross Dlll. Both pilots scored hits on the machine. McCudden described the incident in his book Flying Fury, saying he would follow Henderson anywhere. In the autumn the squadron was upgraded to Sopwith Camels, but this didn’t start well. Henderson collected the first Camel on 14th October but crashed it the next day. He was posted home to take over a training wing and in December was promoted to acting Lt Col. Post-war Henderson decided to become a free- lance aviator. In February 1919 he asked Bath City Council for permission to hold a week-long flying fair there. They agreed but as the Air Min- istry had not lifted its ban on civil flying it did not happen. In March he registered a patent (5666) to improve aeroplane hangars. Three days before Easter, the Air Ministry announced it would allow some local flying to take place over the holiday. Avro hired Henderson to run its joy-riding enter- prise from Hounslow Heath, along with two other pilots. Over the holiday they took 359 passengers on 10-minute trips, which if requested included a loop. The Times newspaper didn’t like this and suggested civilian flying should be limited to the slow and sure kind. Henderson disagreed. He felt stunts at safe altitudes flown in good aeroplanes by competent pilots should be allowed. It was not until May that the government allowed private flying to resume in this country. Helpfully they provided a list of aerodromes. A Daily Mail reporter wanted to get to Plymouth


35


which he noted was to be served by the air station at Cattewater. He arranged for Henderson to fly him there, but when they arrived they could not find an aerodrome! They landed in a field and asked some locals for directions, but to no avail. Eventually someone remembered that he had seen a crashed aeroplane from the golf links near the naval station. They set off but when they arrived there they found the area was festooned with hazards. However Henderson managed to land, eventually an RAF officer emerged and confirmed that this was indeed Cattewater but it was not an aerodrome. The Air Ministry had jumped their own gun – it did intend Cattewater to be a future joint civil and military aerodrome, but currently it was in a prohibited area and it was a seaplane base not an aerodrome. It later became RAF Mountbatten and remained a seaplane station. On Saturday 7th June the LEP Aerial Travel


Bureau arranged a special dance to be held at the South Western Hotel Southampton, for the glitterati of London. Henderson was asked to arrange for the guests and a band to be flown to Southampton. The next day he provided an emergency service to a grounded aeroplane at Ringwood which had a defective magneto. He left Hounslow at 8.15am with the replacement part,


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