SOUTHAMPTON MEDICAL SOCIETY

President: Dr Alan Roberts FRCP

A meeting of the Southampton Medical Society was held on Zoom on December 1st 2021. The President was in the chair. The minutes of the previous meeting were approved.

The President introduced the speaker Dr Martin Radford who spoke to the title “Bert Hinkler - Local Hero”. Dr Radford said that Bert Hinkler is almost unheard of locally though he lived in Southampton and his achievements were comparable to those of Amy Johnson and Lindberg. He was born in 1892 in Bundaberg, Australia, where he grew up. He was very bright but left school at 14 and had various jobs. Living near a lake he was fascinated by the flight of the ibis with led to an interest in flight and aerodynamics. He built a large glider on which the pilot’s position was lying on his mother’s ironing board onto which it had been bolted. It was pulled into flight by his friends running along the beach.

In 1909 Bleriot made the first crossing by plane of the English Channel. An American Entrepreneur Arthur B Stone, purchased one of these machines and shipped it to Australia where he flew it at country shows. In Bundaberg it developed mechanical problems which were fixed by Bert Hinkler, who was then hired as Mr Stones’ mechanic. In 1913 he worked his passage to the UK and got work at the Sopwith factory before joining the RN Air Service in 1914 as a gunner. He was awarded the DSM and recommended for pilot training. Throughout this period he was designing improvements for the aircraft. After demob he became a test pilot for Alliot Verdon Roe in Hamble. In the early nineteen twenties the firm started making planes for personal use called the Avro Baby. Bert purchased one and flew over the Alps to Turin non-stop a journey of 918Km. This was the first time it had been done by a small plane and he was awarded the Britannia Trophy for the achievement. He shipped the plane to Australia and flew from Sydney to Bundaberg a distance of 1270 Km. Back in the UK he was promoted to Chief Test Pilot for Avro and tested the Avro Aldershot, a heavy bomber, and early versions of autogyros which were the precursors of modern helicopters. In 1923 he won the prize for best aerobatic display at the Lympne Annual Airshow. He followed this by becoming the first man to land a plane on a mountain when he landed on Helvellyn which just happened to be witnessed by a lone walker, a Professor Dodds who signed a statement to confirm the event. His next achievement was flying from London to Riga a distance of 1660Km. He decided to raise funds for a flight to Australia and purchased an Avro Evian. The route had to be planned around available fuel stops. For navigation he used pages torn out from the Times Atlas of the World. He had to fly over the Alps in daylight which meant it was night when he arrived in Rome. The airport was closed and he had to land without assistance in the dark using only a torch. He took a bus to a Rome Hotel for the night and picked up his plane in the morning. Then onto Malta, Benghazi and Ramleh. He made an emergency landing in the desert and was helped by Bedouins. Then onto Karachi, which he just made after the plane developed a leak. There the world’s press discovered him and would then fete him at every landing from then on. By this time he had already beaten the world record for a solo flight. Then onto Calcutta, Rangoon, Singapore and over the water to Darwin where there was a great reception.He then flew to Brisbane and onto Bundaberg. After which he returned to England. In 1929 he designed and flew an Amphibian plane which he called the Ibis. Unfortunately there was no market for it in the UK due to the Great Depression so he took it to Canada and the USA but still with no success. He decided that his future lay in epic flights. He acquired a De Havilland Puss Moth and flew to England from Canada via Brazil and Morocco which was another first. He was unable to find work in the UK and so returned to the USA. In 1932 he started to plan another epic flight to Australia. He departed from the airfield at Heathrow on January 7th 1933. He still needed to cross the Alps in daylight but the planned departure at 2am was delayed by fog. Two friends who came to see him off had to park their cars at the end of the runway with their headlights on so he could see the direction of the runway to take off. By the end of June 8th he still had not arrived in Rome. Doubts about which route he had taken impeded searches and it was not until the spring thaw that he was found dead by a shepherd under a tree with the wrecked plane nearby. An autopsy showed he had died from injuries and exposure. Mussolini, who knew about Bert’s achievements, ordered a state funeral. He was buried in Florence.

His house in Thornhill was bought by Southampton City Council and used for letting. A plaque was placed on it. In 1982 SCC decided to demolish it to make way for a housing estate. A Bundaberg resident heard about this and raised funds to buy it and ship it out to Bundaberg where it was rebuilt. It is now the Bert Hinkler Museum.

In his lifetime he won many awards but in Southampton there is only Hinkler Road and a pub named after him. There is a small plaque in a Southampton park.

Dr Radford was thanked by the President for his interesting talk. There being no other business the meeting was closed at 9pm.