Addlestone
NOTE: This map only shows the position of Addlestone within the UK.
ADDLESTONE: Aircraft factory only I think…although rumours that flying took place exist.
Operated by: The Blériot Company*
Activities: Manufacturing and, although unlikely…. possibly flight testing? By 2013 I had become quite certain that no flying took place here. But, am I correct?
Period of operation: 1913 to WW1 - possibly before? *
NOTES: The Blériot works were at BROOKLANDS from 1913. Also the Varioplane Co had, according to Ron Smith in British Built Aircraft Vol.3, operations at ADDLESTONE and BROOKLANDS, (both in SURREY of course), plus NORTHOLT (LONDON) and SHERBURN-in-ELMET (YORKSHIRE).
* Andrew Renwick, Curator of Photographs at the RAF Museum, Hendon, maintains the Addlestone factory opened in 1917. He also sent me chapter and verse on the history of the factory from which I think these excerpts are helpful for this Guide: “….in June 1916 Blériot’s British company became Blériot & SPAD in 1917, before becoming the Air Navigation Co Ltd on 1 January 1918. The change to Blériot & SPAD coincided with the move to Addlestone. Although only 100 SPAD 7 aircraft were ordered by the RFC…..the factory was used to build other types, including at least two batches each of 50 Avro 504A aircraft and two batches each of 200 SE.5a aircraft and another for 100 SE.5a aircraft.”
Two other reasons for including this site, if it can be proved that a small airfield didn’t exist in ADDLESTONE, is:
A) Separating myth from fact can be very difficult indeed, if not impossible. Indeed, even the most respected aviation historians can be mistaken regarding when and where flying sites existed.
B) It has always intrigued me exactly why even a major aircraft manufacturer should choose to build a factory some distance from a suitable aerodrome?
I suppose I am still clutching at straws, to prove that a flying site might once have existed here, but we need to remember that a field measuring about 300 metres square was considered quite adequate by the RFC for night flying operations.
Another very important point is that this 'Guide' is just that - a 'Guide' and open to discussion.
NOTES: In December 2021 I was kindly contacted by Jasmine Richards. She tells us that they lived 300 yards from the Vickers Armstrong factory on the Ham Moore Estate, and that her father worked there throughout WW2 as a sheet metal worker. Making parts she believes for Wellington bombers. The factory was attacked several times, her father telling her that 200 workers were killed in one night during a raid.
It is of course entirely possible that people confuse this site with ADDLESTONE MOOR. See seperate entry.
Marti
This comment was written on: 2021-05-05 00:04:15My grandfather worked at the Addlestone aircraft factory as a carpenter making the propellers during World War 1. This site was only a few miles away from the Brooklands aircraft factory and motor racing circuit, which was located between Byfleet and Weybridge..
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