The success of the airplane led quickly to the introduction of airmail. The United States was in the vanguard, and on February 17, 1911, Fred Wiseman made the first official airmail flight. He was carrying three letters between Petaluma and Santa Rosa, California. However, on the next day, the French pilot Henri Pequet carried 6,500 letters a distance of 13 km from Allahabad to Naini in India. That same year, on September 9, the first scheduled airmail postal service was inaugurated between Hendon, North London, and Windsor.
British troops stationed in Germany after the First World War received mail by air. In the 1920s, the RAF was responsible for developing routes for airmail to the Middle East. The French airmail service Aeropostale was inaugurated in 1918 at the instigation of Pierre Latecoere, a military aircraft manufacturer who had ambitions to expand into commercial aviation.
In September 1919, he launched a regular service, called simply ”La Ligne”, (the line), between Toulouse and Morocco, which he gradually extended to Dakar in Senegal (then known as French West Africa). Among its early pilots was Antoine de Saint-Exupery, who later became famous for books such as Night Flight and Southern Mail, recounting his flying exploits, and his children’s novella, The Little Prince.
Conditions for long-distance mail pilots were grueling; they had to contend with engine failures, appalling weather, and even attacks by hostile tribesmen. Some downed airmen were captured and held to ransom. The heroes of “The Line” endured such hardships guided by the service motto: The mail must get through!
