A_P_2015_04

32 African Pilot April 2015

Thomas Octave Murdoch Sopwith was born on 18 January

1888 in London, England. He was his parents’ eighth child and

he had seven elder sisters. As a teenager, Sopwith participated

in motorcycle racing and ice hockey tournaments. He studied

at an engineering college and learned to fl y a balloon by the

age of eighteen. Four years later, he became Britain’s 31st

fi xed-wing aircraft pilot. During the 1910s, Sopwith worked as a

stunt pilot in Britain, Europe, but mostly in the USA. This generated

enough income for him to start his own company, Sopwith Aviation

Company. Sopwith’s company received its fi rst order for military

aircraft late in 1912. During World War I, which lasted from 1914

to 1918, his company built more than 10 000 aircraft. Almost

6 000 examples of Sopwith’s most successful aircraft, the Camel,

were produced. After the war, Sopwith’s company went bankrupt,

so he teamed up with his test pilot and engineer Harry Hawker,

to found Hawker Engineering, which was later renamed Hawker

Aircraft. Sopwith then purchased Gloster and Armstrong Siddeley

and became chairman of the Hawker Siddeley Group. At the same

time, during the interwar years, he participated in the America’s

Cup yacht races. The Hawker Siddeley Group produced more

than 40 000 aircraft used in World War II (1939-1945). During the

late 1970s, the group was nationalised and absorbed into British

Aerospace. Sopwith continued to serve as a consultant until 1980.

He died on 27 January 1989 at the age of 101. Quite an innings.

By Divan Muller

Timeline:

1888 - Born in London, England

1910 - Earned pilot’s certifi cate

1912 - Founded Sopwith Aviation Company

1918 - Awarded Order of the British Empire

1920 - Hawker Engineering founded

1953 - Knighted by Queen Elizabeth II

1980 - Retired from British Aerospace

1989 - Died in Hampshire, England

Sopwith Camel during World War I