Charles Stewart Rolls - Pioneer Aviator
Posted by: MeerRescue
N 51° 07.416 E 001° 19.015
31U E 382216 N 5664916
Bronze life size statue of Charles Stewart Rolls - 1877 -1910
Waymark Code: WMDV1C
Location: South East England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 02/25/2012
Views: 3
Sited along Marine Parade on
Dover's seafront. looking across the harbour is the life size statue of Charles
Stewart Rolls, wearing the the flying helmet and gaiters of the early days of
flying, the co-founder of Rolls Royce motor cars. The statue commemorates his
non-stop flight across the English Channel and back (in one flight) on 2nd June
1910. It was a considerable achievement, considering the first ever flight (one
way) across the English Channel had been achieved only a year previously by
Frenchman Louis Bleriot, and Roll's flight both ways was quicker than Bleriot's
one way flight
Charles Rolls was a a founding
member of the Royal Aero Club back in 1903, and was only the second person in
Britain to receive a pilots licence to fly an aeroplane. His co-founder of the
Rolls Royce motor car company, Sir Henry Royce, was unimpressed with Roll's aero
feats and in 1907 turned down a request to design a new aero engine. In 1909,
having resigned as Technical Managing Director of the Rolls Royce Limited,
Charles Rolls purchased one of the six 'Wright Flyers' built by Short Brothers
under licence from the Wright Brothers in the USA. Unfortunately Charles
Rolls was to perish shortly after his record breaking Channel Flight, when on
12th July 1910 he was killed when the tail section broke away on his Wright
aeroplane during an air display at Hengistbury Airfield in Bournemouth. His
death, at the age of 32, became another first in aviation, being the first
Briton to be killed in an aeronautical accident with a powered aircraft.
A bronze plaque on the plinth
reads:
Charles * Stewart * Rolls
The First Man To Cross The
Channel And Return In A Single Flight June 2 1910