Before Amelia (19 page)

Construction on the new aeroplane progressed slowly, but Blondeau's success at tuning the motor, tightening wires, and making repairs on the school machine caught the attention of would-be purchasers, who approached the partners with orders for new machines. Among the buyers was the Vickers school, which ordered three Farman-type aeroplanes. Space became an immediate problem; in addition, there was no water, light, or power. Writing in later years, Hilda observed: “It was difficult to exist on makeshift, construction had become an engineering proposition.” Early in 1912, Blondeau was offered the position of constructor of the Hanriot aeroplane in England. The partners decided they would move to where they had needed space and services, and Blondeau accepted. They formed a limited company, Hewlett and Blondeau, to manufacture aeroplanes and leased the former Mulliner factory, which built specialty aeroplanes, at 2-16 Vardens Road, Battersea, under their new name “Omnia Works.” It was a tremendous undertaking that would prove important for them personally and the nation. Maurice undoubtedly helped with some of the financing.

The partners, who had invested their entire capital in the new venture, soon found themselves embroiled in labor problems. The workers obtained through the local labor exchange were a mixed lot. Hilda's assessment was: two were really good, two were passable carpenters, and “the others were simply rotters.” The partners set wages according to the men's industry and ability, influenced perhaps by the English Socialists, but the local union organizers would have none of this. They insisted that all should receive the same pay, an idea Hilda thought ridiculous and told them so, adding that she wished to keep the good ones and dismiss the others. This was contrary to union rules and, said the organizers, if she did not comply, not a man would work for her. This was serious. Hilda later wrote that “too late, we learned that Battersea was a hotbed of unions, and no other labour could be got there.”

The partners placed an advertisement in the
South Western Star
in July and August:“Wanted, a few intelligent boys as apprentices; also improvers for aeronautical engineering—Omnia Works, Vardens Road.” Similar advertisements placed in northern and Scottish papers brought immediate replies by letter, even telegram. Within ten days the partners had obtained a suitable workforce, much to the chagrin of the union organizers lurking outside.

The union campaign ended on a Saturday, when Hilda, on leaving work, told the representatives outside: “Good-bye, it's Saturday so you'll get off early.” They replied grudgingly that she had won with a lot of dirty foreigners, but Hilda corrected them, pointing out they had more men from the north than foreigners. The union men declared they were “a stupid lot,” but again Hilda had the last word. She told them she believed in the future of flying, she had taken a great deal of trouble to learn, and she would do her best to overcome any obstacle that got in her way. She congratulated them on being such sporting opponents and asked to shake hands. Then “we shook hands and left in peace.”

Inside the plant, things were still unsettled. A newspaper article dated August 2, 1912, reported that a joiner, Alfred Knight, was charged with assaulting an engineer, John Moncrieff, at the Omnia Works. The joiner had been given notice, whereupon he deliberately struck the engineer on the chin with a plane. The joiner spoke up and insisted he hit the engineer with his fist, that had he used a plane it would have broken his jaw. The Honorable John de Gray, judge of the Police Court, countered: “That depends on how hard you hit him. You had no business to hit him like that. Pay ten shillings.” Once the new force was assembled and trained, work at 2-16 Vardens Road proceeded more smoothly.

The partners had spent most of their capital to equip the works, which meant there was no money for an office staff. Bookkeeping and most of the administrative tasks were done by Hilda, who was also running her home in north London, an hour's travel time each way. Commuting across the city proved impossible; Hilda rented a flat at 34 Park Mansions, Prince of Wales Road, Battersea, a short distance from the Omnia Works. The firm's reputation grew in the next two years, not only as builders of aeroplanes but as suppliers of aeroplane fittings, turnbuckles, wire strainers, oxyacetylene equipment, and a stranded cable, of which they were the lone manufacturers in England. Hewlett and Blondeau advertisements appeared regularly in
Flight,
the journal of the Royal Aero Club; their products were shown at aero shows and received glowing praise for their workmanship.

By November 1912, the firm was making news for its manufacture and sale of two Hanriot single-seaters and one two-seater to the French and Russian governments.
Flight
questioned why machines of English material and workmanship should be sent out of Great Britain to be used for defense in other countries when England needed fast, good aeroplanes for the Army and Navy. The Hanriot had performed well in the 1912 Military Trials in France; it was designed to maintain supremacy in the air.

Later that same month, a
Flight
editorial discussed the improvement in English aviation, due to the ability of certain companies to massproduce their aeroplane design. Hewlett and Blondeau were mentioned as missing an opportunity to build their own aeroplane instead of the Hanriot. The editorial argued that a good model would win them business in quantity, whereas seeing a Hanriot built by Hewlett and Blondeau does nothing for the firm. The writer stressed that the government needed to spend more money on aviation because as a world power it lacked an aeronautical establishment in keeping with its position. Pointing to the Bristol Company, which reported earnings of seventy thousand pounds for the past twelve months, the editor urged other competitors to join the aviation “game” in designing and building machines. The more, the merrier was his attitude, which showed complete ignorance of the efforts of independent aircraft manufacturers to stay afloat.

Hewlett helps cover the fuselage of a BE2C, a small military reconnaissance plane, being built at her Omnia Works in Leagrave, England.
MICHAEL GOODALL

Omnia Works was becoming well known despite its lack of an aeroplane model bearing its name. A long article in
Flight,
dated December 7, 1912, described the physical structure of the company, its management, and the administrative concerns of running an aeroplane factory, and, in particular, the construction of the Hanriot machines. Except for one part—a type of wire strainer that was French—the machines were entirely British built. The firm aimed to build machines on a large scale at low cost, to the designs of their clients. Each worker had a number, and when he performed a task, or picked up material, that number was noted with the length of time of the operation, so the cost of the material and labor could be figured, down to the penny. To these costs were added rent, rates, lighting, etc., until the finished product was tallied and placed in the stockroom, or the machine was assembled, which was accounted for down to the last nut. Hilda's strong practical sense was apparent in the shop's management. The shop's motto showed serious purpose: “Remember you have a man's life depending on how you do your work.”

In 1912 the firm was awarded an order for BE2cs, small biplanes designed by the Royal Aircraft Factory for reconnaissance work. A number of these, including an AD Scout, were built at Vardens Road. A seventyor seventy-five-horsepower Renault motor powered the machines. Anticipating more orders from the British government, the partners decided to look for larger work space, as there was little room for expansion in Battersea. In 1914, Omnia Works moved to the Leagrave countryside, near Luton, in Bedfordshire, where it had needed room and an available workforce that expanded to seven hundred during the war years. When war came in August 1914, Omnia was in a better position to aid the aviation effort as the listing below indicates.

Hilda was especially proud of the training school the company established at Leagrave to train young girls and women who, for the duration, performed work normally done by men, including welding. Hilda had firsthand experience, a generation before Rosie the Riveter.

Early in 1914, Hilda wrote a letter to
Flight
regarding relations between the Royal Air Force and Omnia Works in answer to complaints about the RAF elsewhere. Omnia had always found the military fair and helpful in the work done for them. Hilda argued that the time had come for the aviation manufacturers to stop fighting each other and to join together to build the best machines possible at a fair price; complaints against the RAF would vanish, and the various aviation builders would have a return for what they had spent, with time and money left over for new experiments. She pointed to the urgent War Office need for machines in the next two months, which had the RAF working day and night shifts to meet demand, a demand that independent manufacturers could have filled had they not been so occupied “killing each other.” The female half of the partnership had a keen mind; her observations, sharp and to the point, went to the crux of a problem; and she was not afraid to speak up.

Sometime in 1916-17, Hilda found time to write a short booklet entitled “Our Flying Men,” inspired in part by her son's wartime experience. Early in the war, now Flight Commander Hewlett took part in an aerial raid on the German fleet at Cuxhaven, off Heligoland, on Christmas Day, 1914. German gunners and aeroplanes were partially effective in deflecting the English bombing attempts, although zeppelin sheds were reported damaged; six English seaplanes returned safely to their ships, except for Hewlett's machine, which went down. Declared missing for six days, Hewlett landed safely in Ymuiden, Holland, on December 31. He had been picked up by a Dutch fishing trawler that returned to port only when it had a full catch. Within a few days, young Hewlett arrived home to a hero's welcome and a joyful reunion with his parents.

Hilda was very aware of the danger in aerial combat, and her booklet praised the young men serving in aviation. She did not try to tell personal stories, but she wanted the public to understand what was behind the bald statements seen in the press: “Our aircraft was very active and proved of assistance to our artillery,” or “Ten of our machines bombarded a station of great importance; five failed to return.” In very clear language she described the logistics and importance of the work done by aviators. She stressed the newness of aviation as a science and its development almost daily in the war, advances that could never be made in peacetime because “no civilised people would have tolerated the risk of life to attain such proportions for the furtherance of a science. “Thanks to the war, aviation “came into her own as the fourth arm of the war machine.” Ever practical, Hilda gave a lively account of the capture of a Fokker, then compared its technical qualities with the English and French machines in use, pointing out the worthwhile improvements on the German machine. She knew her subject.

Once the war ended, the downturn in the aviation industry claimed another victim when Omnia Works, unable to convert to peacetime production profitably, went into liquidation on October 27, 1920. Seven years later the property was sold to Electrolux, and for the first time, Hilda and Blondeau benefited from their investment and years of hard work. By that time, Hilda's husband had died, and when her daughter, Pia, moved with her family to New Zealand, Hilda went along. She had visited there in 1919 and found it an appealing place.

At that time, as Hilda passed through San Francisco to catch a ship going west, the
San Francisco Chronicle
printed an article filled with inaccuracies—Hilda had won a Brooklands-to-Brighton race, beating ten male competitors; she plans a lecture tour of America shortly; she will establish a flying school in New Zealand—but there was a charming close-up picture in her good leather flying costume. (Actually, Hilda won one competition, a quick start. It was a fun activity organized when students and teachers from several schools at Brooklands had time on their hands. Hilda proved swift on her feet as she ran to the machine, started the motor, and took off in shorter time than the men. It was a onetime event. She had no interest in competing.)