17th of February.
One machine, piloted by Captain Becke, arrived at its destination that
night. The others were stranded by engine failure, loss of direction,
and the like. Lieutenant Longcroft had a forced landing at Littlemore,
near Oxford, and spent the night in the Littlemore lunatic asylum. By
the 20th all five machines had reached Towcester, and started on their
next stages--to Newark and York. At Knavesmire racecourse, near York,
part of a morning was spent in writing autographs for boys, some of
whom, perhaps, may have become pilots in the later years of the war. On
the 22nd the squadron moved off for Newcastle. It was a day of fog and
haze; only two of the pilots found the landing-ground at Gosforth Park
that night, and these two had to land many times to get their bearings.
The directions given them would have been helpful to foot-travellers;
but turnings in the road and well-known public-houses are not easy to
recognize from the air. On the 25th the squadron moved to Edinburgh, and
on the following morning to Montrose. At both places they were
tumultuously received and liberally entertained. The mechanics in charge
of the machines and transport did their business so well, often working
at night, in the rain, with no sort of shelter, that both the transport
lorries and the machines arrived at Montrose in perfect order.

At their new quarters training in flight and reconnaissance was
strenuously carried on, and the squadron flew on an average about a
thousand miles a week. Many non-commissioned officers and warrant
officers were instructed in aviation. Some thirty miles south of
Montrose, across the Firth of Tay, there is a three miles stretch of
level sand at St. Andrews, and this was used for instruction in
aviation--not without trouble and difficulty from the irresponsible and
wandering habits of spectators. The more skilled of the pilots gained
much experience in long-distance flying. All deliveries of new machines
were made by air. Inspecting officers and other visitors to the camp
were commonly met at Edinburgh in the morning, were then flown to
Montrose to spend the day, and back again to Edinburgh in time to catch
the night mail for the south.

In August 1913 Captain Longcroft, with Lieutenant-Colonel Sykes as
passenger, flew from Farnborough to Montrose in one day, landing only
once on the way, at Alnmouth. The machine was a B.E. fitted with a
special auxiliary tank under the passenger's seat, and th