Reginald John Ashfield was born on 21 March 1891 in East Molesey, Surrey , the son of John Lewington Ashfield and Eliza Jeanette Ashfield (née Lewington). A small group of schoolboys, of whom he was one, built rubber-driven models of what was intended to be a 'boy-carrying' glider.

Ashfield initially became a schoolteacher at Tiffin School, Kingston upon Thames; a keen aeroplane model-maker, he built a glider with his pupils which they tried at Telegraph Hill, Thames Ditton. One of the pupils at Tiffin during this time was Reginald Foster Dagnall, and it may be possible he was involved in the glider.

Ashfield was also engaged by C.G. Grey of The Aeroplane to write an article on the Sopwith ‘Hybrid’ for that magazine. Whilst at Brooklands, Ashfield was handed copy for an advertisement to be placed in The Aeroplane, with a request that he should pass it on to C.G. Grey upon his return. The advert was for a draughtsman, so, upon reading it, Ashfield decided to apply for the job. He was successful, resigned his £60 p.a. teaching position and on 21 October 1912 started with Sopwith’s at £3.00 per week

The first aircraft at the company had been built by Sopwith and Sigrist without drawings and on a ‘one-off' basis. Although he had no previous experience, Ashfield began by creating drawings for components and structures in co-operation with Fred Sigrist. Ashfield’s GA drawing of the Bat-Boat, D0001, is believed to be the firm's first drawing. Ashfield was gradually given more and more responsibility for design until, when they moved to the Old Skating Rink at Kingston in December 1912, he had his own department with a small staff in the design office.

The Tabloid was the outcome of discussions, involving Sopwith, Sigrist and pilot Harry Hawker, regarding the desirability of a lightweight small aircraft, utilising one of the smaller engines currently available. The prototype was visualised and built as a side-by-side two-seater biplane, powered by an 80hp Gnome rotary engine. The design was said to have been the culmination of a series of full size outlines drawn in chalk on the factory floor by Sigrist with the help of Sopwith, Hawker, Ashfield and others. The diminutive aircraft was built and ready to fly by the end of November 1913.

Aircraft design was beginning to follow scientific principles, but the drawing board and sophisticated mathematics were not yet the prime requirements in the design of new machines. Stress calculations were not yet in general use and, for some time after their introduction, the theory of stress in bridge design was utilised, before it was realised that the effect of stress on airframes did not match to that of such structures. Increasing demand for Sopwith aircraft was leading towards the need for mass production so Ashfield and his assistants were required to produce drawings, in order to establish design requirements for the production environment — ‘one off’ manufacturing techniques were no longer acceptable, as the aircraft were being taken up by the Military and Naval Wings of the Royal Flying Corps.

With the arrival of Herbert Smith at Sopwith Aviation in March 1914, Thomas Sopwith split the design and draughting personnel into two teams, one under Smith and the other under Ashfield’s control. Thereafter Sopwith tended to get the best out of both by encouraging a competitive spirit between the two. Soon after Herbert Smith’s appointment, Sopwith, who had acted as design superviser, promoted him to chief designer with Ashfield appointed Project Engineer.

According to Ashfield, the pace of work had, by this time, become so hot that he was eventually relieved of office supervision. Ashfield described his job as carrying out initial concepts to a logical conclusion. His first job in this position was, he said, the design of the SLTBP (Sopwith Land Tractor Biplane). This evolved from the line that had begun with the Tabloid, then the Schneider and the Baby. It was to become known as the Runabout and the team knew immediately that they had the basis for another winner. It would later be re-engined and become the forerunner of the famous Pup fighter.

Ashfield next produced the drawings for the F.1 Camel fighter, the next aircraft to be based on the Tabloid-Pup sequence of designs. It was said that the completed drawings for the F.1 were passed to Fred Sigrist and Herbert Smith for review. The first item for consideration was the use of common metalwork, where possible, followed by ease of construction. It was whilst discussing the latter that Fred Sigrist suggested that by removing the dihedral from the upper wing he could literally make the flat wings by the mile and just cut them to length. This was thought to be possible and, to compensate, Herbert Smith increased the dihedral on the lower wing, thus creating the unmistakable head-on Camel profile.

At this point, the drawings were passed to W.G. Carter, to be progressed for use in the production departments. Upon completion, these drawings were signed off by Herbert Smith as chief designer. The F.1 Camel prototype was passed for test flying on 22 December 1916.

Ashfield was a quiet, retiring man who was good at his job but no leader of men. Herbert Smith, on the other hand, was a go-getter and much favoured by Sopwith and Sigrist. Ashfield could stand it no longer, for Carter had taken over much of his design responsibility, so early in 1918 Ashfield left Sopwith, commenting on the fact that he had found the mounting pressure of work to be a problem. He joined the Gosport Aircraft Company Ltd, working under Percy Beadle, designing a range of flying boats. Following the demise of Gosport in 1920, he went to work for George Pamall and Co Ltd until 1932, then Vickers-Armstrongs Ltd (1932-1939) and finally to the Fairey Aviation Co Ltd, from where he retired in 1962. While employed by George Pamall, Ashfield designed a single seat biplane glider for the 1923 'Flight' Glider Designing Competition. Although the joint winning design, it was never built.

Reginald John Ashfield died on 1 June 1982 in Birmingham.

1. Cross and Cockade Vol 43/2
2. Flight 19 Jul 1962
3. British Aviation - The Great War and Armistice, Harald Penrose (Putnam, 1969)
4. ancestry.co.uk