Blackburn

History

Robert Blackburn was born on 26 March 1885 in Kirkstall, Leeds, Yorkshire, the son of George William Blackburn, works manager for Thomas Green and Sons Ltd, Smithfield Iron Works, and Kate Blackburn (neé Naylor). He attended Leeds Modern School and graduated in engineering at the University of Leeds in 1906, whereupon he joined his father’s drawing office.

Leaving Green and Sons, Blackburn traveled through Europe, eventually working with a firm of civil engineering consultants in Rouen. The sight of Wilbur Wright flying at Issy in 1908 encouraged Robert Blackburn to leave the company and to devote his life to aeronautics. He took a room in Paris and there designed his first aircraft. With the lay-out complete, he returned to England with hopes of building the machine at Green and Sons’ premises, but when this was denied and with some financial support from his father, he set up a small workshop in Benson Street, Leeds. In this he was assisted by one of Green’s apprentices, Harry Goodyear.

In April 1909, Blackburn began his trials along the wide stretch of sand between Marske-by-the-Sea and Saltburn on the northeast Yorkshire coast. Painstaking taxying trials continued, but the 35 h.p. Green (no connection to Green and Sons) gave insufficient power for sustained flight. This first machine was of the ‘Demoiselle’ type, with such weighty items as engine, tanks and pilot, well below the mainplane in order to obtain a low C.G. position, but the disadvantages of such an arrangement were not immediately obvious and on 24 May 1910, the aircraft side slipped, dug in the port wing, writing off the machine.

At Benson Street work began on an entirely new design, this time of the Antoinette type. After construction in Benson Street, it was moved to premises Blackburn rented by the coast at Filey. The machine was first flown at Filey on 8 March 1911 in the hands of Bentfield C. Hucks, who was to become Blackburn’s first test pilot.

Following the success of the second machine, a larger two seat machine, the ‘Mercury’, was designed and the works moved to larger premises in Balm Road, Leeds, which were the former Midland Railway stables. Blackburn, who by now styled himself The Blackburn Aeroplane Company, had also formed the Blackburn Flying School at Filey, initially with Hucks as instructor, eventually moving to Hendon in September 1912 under the management of Harold Blackburn (no relation). Blackburn’s monoplanes gained a good reputation with the school and raised Blackburn’s reputation as one of the eminent designers of the day.

In early 1914, Blackburn became a subcontractor for the manufacture of the B.E.2c and, with the need to move to larger premises, in June formed a limited company, The Blackburn Aeroplane and Motor Co., Ltd., with capital of £20,000 to ‘acquire the business of an aeroplane designer and constructor carried on by R. Blackburn as the Blackburn Aeroplane Co.’ The company moved into a disused roller-skating rink on Roundhay Road, which became the Olympia Works. More government contracts followed for the Sopwith Cuckoo and Baby. Blackburn’s desire to develop his private venture seaplanes led to the acquisition of a site at Brough on the river Humber, and the experimental department moved there in 1916. The same year, the somewhat eccentric designer Harris Booth moved to Blackburn from the Air Department of the Admiralty, where his first project, the Blackburn Triplane, was a heavily-revised version of his AD Scout, two of which had already been ordered from Blackburn under Admiralty contract.

Throughout World War I, Blackburn experimented with many designs, predominantly torpedo bombers and anti-Zeppelin attack aircraft. Most only saw minor success whilst none achieved any degree of production. However the company did produce 111 BE2C aircraft for the army, as well as 186 Sopwith Babys and 132 Sopwith Cuckoos. On 1 January 1920, Robert Blackburn was appointed A Member of the Civil Division of the said Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services in connection with the War.

In January 1918, the Admiralty issued specification N.1B. In response, Harris Booth designed the Blackburd, a large, three-bay biplane, whose simple lines were designed to facilitate rapid production. In 1920, Booth designed an ‘aerial lorry’ to take advantage of the Alula wing designed by the Commercial Aeroplane Wing Syndicate, Ltd.

Meanwhile the air transport firm of North Sea Aerial Navigation Co Ltd. was formed on 23 April 1919 by Robert Blackburn and his brother, Captain Norman William George Blackburn (b. 25 May 1896 in Leeds, Yorkshire - d. 27 January 1966 in Bridlington, Yorkshire), as a subsidiary of the Blackburn Aeroplane and Motor Company with the objective of providing scheduled services from Soldiers Field in Roundhay Park, Blackburn’s flying ground adjacent to the Olympia Works. Although a few flights were operated using demobbed Kangaroos, Roundhay proved to be unsuitable and services were moved to Brough in 1920, with Soldiers Field reverting to its original use as a public park. The scheduled service proved to be a fruitless endeavor, but the company tried to stay afloat in the lucrative business of joyriding. Even this, however, eventually fell into a slump and, in order to keep the company going, made it responsible for all of Blackburn’s road transport. This was reflected in the change of name to the North Sea Aerial and General Transport Co. Ltd. at the end of 1920. Associated with the venture was Capt. Thomas Anthony Gladstone (b. 2 Aug 1898 Stockton-on-Tees – d. 5 May 1931 Harrismith, Free State, South Africa), who had a distinguished war record and was a flying-boat pilot of outstanding ability. In 1924, while on a tour of Central Africa, he was impressed with the possibilities of an air transport service along the Nile between Khartoum and Kisumu, which is in the north-east corner of Victoria Nyanza. About this time Alan Cobham (Sir Alan John Cobham, KBE, AFC, b. 6 May 1894 – d. 21 October 1973) became interested in the idea of an airline from Cairo to the Cape, and after sundry negotiations they joined forces with the Blackburn group, with the result that Cobham-Blackburn Air Lines, Ltd., were registered. The Africa service was however never to take place and towards the end of 1928 Cobham-Blackburn Air Lines, Ltd., entered into an agreement with Imperial Airways, Ltd., with the result that the resources of the two enterprises were amalgamated and a company was formed known as Imperial Airways (South Africa), Ltd., mainly to protect Imperial Airways' interests in South Africa.

The end of hostilities brought for Blackburn, like most of the aviation industry, a sudden loss of work. Luckily the company had become a major supplier of A.G.S. parts and this, along with production of bodies for cars and motor coaches (and even their own Blackburn car) kept the company afloat. The loss of Soldiers Field also left Blackburn without a suitable flying ground in Leeds, requiring all machines to be taken by road to Brough for final erection and test flying. This far from ideal situation was to continue until 1925 when the decision was made to concentrate all of Blackburn’s activities at Brough, closing down the Olympia works. This, however, proved to be a far from easy exercise, the move not being wholly complete until 1932.

Meanwhile, in 1920, Blackburn submitted a private venture submission for a naval torpedo bomber, designed by Major F.A. Bumpus. Bumpus had as his assistant the very capable George Edward Petty (b. 14 April 1895 in Crosshills, Yorkshire – d. 7 January 1984 in Swanland, North Humberside), who himself became chief designer in 1937 with Bumpus assuming the role of chief engineer.

Bumpus was responsible for all of Blackburn’s landplane designs up to the Nautilus of 1929, after which Petty assumed that role. The one exception was the little Bluebird touring biplane. Jackson [1] gives responsibility for this to A.C. Thornton but in a letter to Flight of 7 August 1931, Bumpus writes “The original design of the Bluebird was actually the work of Mr. G. E. Petty, who not only produced the original layout, but was also responsible for the whole of the aerodynamic design and the structural scheme and main stressing. At this stage the job was handed over to Mr. Thornton for completion of detail design and installation work”.

Although producing successful landplanes, Blackburn was also very interested in marine aircraft. To that end, in 1923 they secured the services of Major John Douglas Rennie as float and hull designer, a post he held until his resignation in April 1946. Under Rennie’s leadership, Blackburn produced a series of flying boats from the Iris of 1924 to the unsuccessful B-20 of 1940, his final project being the unbuilt Clydesman of 1945.

In 1924, Robert Blackburn was invited to take over the running of the Greek National Aircraft Factory at Old Phaleron, receiving the first of three contracts for this on 1 July 1925. During Blackburn’s thirteen-year tenure, 12 Blackburn Velos, 24 Avro 504N and 10 Armstrong Whitworth Atlas aircraft were produced, alongside a considerable amount of reconditioning. In recognition, the Greek Government conferred the Golden Cross of the Order of the Redeemer upon Mr. Robert Blackburn, for his services to aviation in Greece.

Also in 1924, the North Sea Aerial and General Transport Co. Ltd. was to return to flying with the award of a contract to form an RAF Reserve training school, which was eventually to become No. 4 Elementary and Reserve Flying Training School (later No. 4 EFTS) in 1935. A subsidiary company, Flying Training Ltd., was formed that same year to operate No. 5 E and RFTS at Hanworth.

In 1934, following the successful application of the Cirrus Hermes powerplant in the Bluebird, the Cirrus Hermes Engineering Co. Ltd transferred its works from Croydon to Brough, with Robert Blackburn becoming chairman. This, along with contracts to support the governments rearmament programme, created a need for extra manufacturing space leading to both expansion at Brough and the reopening of the Olympia works in Leeds. In order to support even larger contracts, Blackburn consolidated all their interests in a new public company, Blackburn Aircraft Ltd., registered on 2 April 1936.

In a move to support further expansion, Blackburn entered into an agreement with the Scottish shipbuilding firm of William Denny and Bros Ltd of Dumbarton to establish a new factory at Dumbarton on land owned by Denny, which was completed in 1937. This new enterprise was put under the leadership of Major Bumpus, with H.J. Steiger, late of General Aircraft, being taken on to assist him. The same year also saw the complete absorption of Cirrus Hermes Engineering into Blackburn, their product from then on being known as Blackburn Cirrus.

The years leading up to the Second World War were predominantly occupied with production of the Shark and development of the Skua and Botha. By the beginning of hostilities, though, the Shark was somewhat outdated and the others were perhaps less successful than hoped for. However, Blackburn did build many other aircraft under subcontract; Brough produced some 635 Fairey Barracuda, 250 Short Sunderland were built at Dumbarton and in 1940 a new factory was built at Sherburn-in-Elmet which produced 1700 Fairey Swordfish under the management of Norman Blackburn. Norman, a Blackburn director since 1920, was put in full charge of all Blackburn factories in Yorkshire from 1944.

In the immediate post war years, as with the end of World War one, an immediate reduction in military orders ensued. Production of the Firebrand was under way at both Brough and Olympia, and from 1948 Blackburn resources were also used for building 125 Percival Prentice trainers for the RAF. However, none of this could keep the existing facilities busy. Olympia and Sherburn were both closed. Brough undertook a variety of non-aviation related fabrication, while Dumbarton, reconstituted as Blackburn (Dumbarton) Ltd., was kept busy building prefabricated houses. Meanwhile, further south, the General Aircraft Co. Ltd was facing problems of a different nature. GAL were in the process of building the prototype GAL.60 tactical transport. If it were to go into production, not only would larger facilities be required, but GAL’s airfield at Hanworth, being only a grass strip, was ill suited for such a large machine.

As a result, the two companies merged to form Blackburn and General Aircraft Ltd., the company registered on 23 February 1949, GAL’s intellectual property having been transferred to the new company as of 1 January. H.V. Gort, managing director of General Aircraft, Ltd., and Capt. Norman Blackburn became joint managing directors in place of Robert Blackburn and Major Bumpus, with Major Bumpus remaining as managing director of Blackburn Aircraft (Dumbarton), Ltd. F.F. Crocombe, chief designer at GAL was appointed to the same position in the amalgamated company. None of these appointments were to last long, however. Gort and Norman Blackburn ceased as joint managing directors in August of 1950, being replaced by Major Bumpus as acting managing director, himself replaced by Eric Turner in May of 1951. Crocombe left to join Boulton Paul in 1952, to be replaced as chief designer by B.P. Laight.

In mid-1953, under doctor’s orders, Robert Blackburn, OBE, FRAeS went into semi-retirement in Devonshire, where he died on 10 September 1955.

The next few years saw significant changes in the company, which by 1958 had reverted to being called Blackburn Aircraft Limited. The lean times of the 1950s were also coming to an end with design of the highly advanced B-103, later to become the Buccaneer. As part of the governments push to rationalise the aircraft industry, in the beginning of 1960 the Hawker Siddeley Group made a successful takeover bid for Blackburn and in May 1963 the company’s name was change to Hawker Siddeley Aviation, Hawker Blackburn Division. This unwieldy name was not to last and from 12 July 1963 the Blackburn name was lost altogether and Brough was just another facility in the Hawker Siddeley Group.

Company References

1. Blackburn Aircraft Since 1909, A.J. Jackson (Putnam, 1968 and 1989)
2. Flight 31 July 1914
3. Flight 7 August 1931
4. Flight 12 November 1936
5. Flight 6 January 1949
6. Flight 4 May 1950
7. Flight 3 August 1950
8. Flight 11 May 1951
9. Flight 23 September 1955
10. Flight 11 December 1959
11. Flight 4 March 1960
12. ancestry.com