Biography of RJ Mitchell

No war has every been won due to efforts of just one man, but the inventor and engineer RJ Mitchell came as close to achieving this feat as any man has ever done. It was the work of RJ Mitchell that ensured that the threatened Nazi Invasion of Britain never occurred, Mitchell was after all an inventor, and the man who designed the Supermarine Spitfire, the wonder machine of the Battle of Britain. His designs and creations did much to ensure that the German forces never gained the supremacy needed to cause an end to the war in Europe.

Reginald Joseph Mitchell was born on the 20th May 1895 in the village of Talke, Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire. Mitchell was the eldest child of Herbert Mitchell and Eliza Jane Brain, and ended up with two younger brothers. A middleclass upbringing was secured by his father’s employment as headmaster at local schools, and a later career as owner of a printing business.

RJ Mithcell - PD-life-70

 A good student with some academic ability, Mitchell left Hanley High School at the age of sixteen, and immediately acquired an apprenticeship position at a local engineering firm. The firm, Kerr Stuart & Co, were a locomotive engineering works, and Mitchell was employed in their drawing department. He was though not satisfied with his position, and at night attended night school to improve his mathematics and engineering knowledge.

Mitchell stayed with the firm of Kerr Stuart & Co for five years. His additional schooling though served him well and in 1917 he headed to Southampton to take up a position with the Supermarine Aviation Works. Initially a designer, his skills were such that within a year he had been promoted to the position of Chief Designer and Engineer at the firm.

In his time at the Supermarine Aviation Works, between 1920 and 1936, Mitchell designed twenty-four aircraft. These aircraft ranged from light aircraft, seaplanes, flying boats, to fighters and bombers. His designs impressed the RAF, and in August 1924 they ordered six prototypes of an armed flying-boat, the Southampton. This was despite the fact it would be another six months before they would be built. The Southampton eventually equipped six RAF squadrons and stayed in operation until 1935 when they were replaced by another Mitchell creation, the Walrus’.

Supermarine Walrus - .Aircraft of the Fighting Powers - PD-UK-gov

Such was his reputation that he had been given a ten year contract in 1923, and when Vickers brought the Supermarine firm in 1928, it was on the proviso that Mitchell remained contractually bound until the end of his contract at the earliest.

Mitchell’s name, though, was hardly known outside of aviation and military circles. In 1931 though, this changed with the running of the annual Schneider Trophy. Now promoted to Technical Director, Mitchell designed a seaplane, the Supermarine S6B. The Supermarine firm had had reasonable success in the previous nine runnings but the S6B was special. On the 13th September, 1931, the S6B won the trophy averaging a speed of 340mph. Even this speed was surpassed a few months later when a new world air speed record was set at 407.5mph.

The Air Ministry took notice of the Trophy win and promptly put in a request for a new fighter plane from Mitchell and the Supermarine firm. Thus was born Mitchell’s greatest invention, the single seat Spitfire fighter. Designed between 1934 and 1936, it was the culmination of all of Mitchell’s knowledge and experience, as well as the best parts from other existing planes.

Based on the S6B, the Spitfire was powered by a Rolls Royce Merlin II 1030bhp engine. The first prototype had its maiden flight on the 5th March 1936, from Eastleigh. Tests would show a top speed of 350mph, and even before the tests were completed the RAF were impressed enough to order 310 of the planes. Thus in 1937 the Supermarine Spitfire Mk I went into production, although it is rumoured that Mitchell was not impressed with the Spitfire’ name.

With a successful plane designed, Mitchell moved onto his last project a four-engine bomber, the Type 317, although it was never completed.

Despite a successful career, Mitchell was always a retiring person, and kept his personal life out of the public gaze. Mitchell was married, to Florence Dayson in 1918. Florence had been a headmistress of the Dresden Infants’ School, together they had one son, Gordon (born 1920).

Aside from that his personal life was a mystery although Mitchell was known to have gotten his pilot’s license in 1934.

Even in 1934 though Mitchell was not a well man, and he had had a colostomy in 1933 to treat rectal cancer. The operation, though a success, left him weak. He continued to work and his colleagues had no idea of his pain. In 1936 Mitchell was once again diagnosed with cancer. This time the illness was so severe that in 1937 he had to give up work.

In March 1937 he went to a specialist clinic after the insistence of his wife. He was advised that it was too late to treat him. Despite a further trip to the American Foundation in Vienna, it proved futile. Mitchell died on the 11th June 1937 at his house, “Hazeldene” in Southampton. Four days later his ashes were interred at South Stoneham Cemetery in Eastleigh.

Mitchell never got to see his Spitfire fly in combat.

Mitchell was never truly recognised for his work. Whilst he received a CBE in 1932 for his work on high-speed flight his work on the Spitfire was only recognised on film. The 1942 Leslie Howard film “The First of the Few” portrayed the man and his work.

R.J. Mitchell is one of the great engineers of all time and a true unsung hero.

Lyonesse Cornwall's Atlantis

There are tales the world over of lost civilisations, of cities swallowed up by the ocean. These stories range from the coast of India, through the Mediterranean and include the legendary city of Atlantis. Lyonesse is the Cornish equivalent of these lost cities, with the added intrigue of links to Arthurian legends.

Cornish stories tell of a land lying off the coast of the county, between Land’s End and the Scilly Isles. This Cornish Atlantis was known as Lethowstow rather than Lyonesse. Lyonesse was actually an English interpretation of the French, Lonois, which related to the Latinised name for Lothian in Scotland. It wasn’t until the reign of Elizabeth I that the name Lyonesse was linked with Cornwall.
Arthurian legends stated that Lyonesse was ruled by the knight Tristam’s father, Meliodas. Upon Meliodas’s death, Tristam inherited the throne and the land. Tristam though was away at the court of his uncle, King Mark of Cornwall. Before he could return home the land had been swept away into the sea. This is of course in contradiction to the Alfred Lord Tennyson version of the stories which depicted Lyonesse as the setting for the final battle between Arthur and Mordred.

Lyonesse - Robin222 - CC-BY-SA-3.0

Lyonesse also appeared in other myths, with a prominent role in the Celtic stories of Cornwall and Breton. As the Celtic stories though were overtaken by new Christian beliefs, Lyonesse was perceived as the Cornish version of Sodom and Gomorrah. Christian tales would say how the land was swallowed by the sea as retribution for the unholy activities that took place there.

So how much truth is there in the stories of Lyonesse disappearing beneath the waves? There are legends of drowned lands around the world. There is Cantref Gwaelod in Cardigan Bay and Leonais in Brittany to name but two. It is easy to see how stories arise, even in recorded history the city of Dunwich in East Anglia has disappeared beneath the waves of the North Sea.

The coastline of Cornwall has certainly changed in the past two thousand years. Roman description of the Isles of Scilly appears to refer to it as one land mass, rather than individual islands, a land mass that may have stretched to Land’s End. Oceanographic research shows that a drop in sea levels of 10 metres today would result in solid land stretching from Cornwall to the Isles.

Lyonesse - Gerritse from NL - CC-BY-SA-3.0

There are even written reports of the disappearance of the Cornish lands. The Saxon Chronicle gives a date of the 11th November 1099 as the night when the waves drowned Lethowstow. The Chronicle reports on the demise of one hundred and forty churches, as well as additional chapels, baptisteries and holy wells. The Chronicle though did not record the number of people and livestock lost.

Many local stories were gathered in the sixteenth century by William Camden, a local antiquarian. These gave many other dates as opposed to 1099 for the disappearance of Lyonesse/Lethowstow, these dates ranged from 1089 back through to the sixth century. Locals also stated that the capital of Lyonesse was The Town’ which stood where the Seven Stones reef is today, some eighteen miles west of Land’s End. Locals would also tell of how the bells of the drowned churches could still be heard on rough and stormy nights.

Local legends tell of only one survivor. A member of the Trevelyan family from Launceston, who saw the disaster coming and escaped on the back of a white horse, which was said to run on the crests of the waves. He is said to have found shelter in a cave near Marazion, from which he witnessed the total disappearance of the countryside. Even today the coat of arms of the Trevelyan family still displays a white horse rising from the waves.

It seems unreasonable though to suggest that there are no other records to substantiate the local tales. If there were one hundred and forty churches on the landmass, surely there would be records attaching them to a cathedral, abbey or priory? Even in the Dark Ages there are such written accounts for other parishes.

What is certain though is that on a calm day it is possible to see remnants of walls beneath the surface of the sea. Field boundaries can also be observed along the Sampson Flats between the islands of Tresco and Sampson. People still claim to have heard the church bells chime on stormy nights even today.

Whether there is a lost city off the coast of Cornwall is unknown there is certainly enough archaeological evidence to show some sort of habitude. Local tales also indicate knowledge of when a dry land existed in the area. More important though than any evidence is the romantic image of bells of long lost churches still being heard today.

Copyright - First Published 29th March 2008

Trellech Lost city of Wales

Driving through the countryside between Monmouth and Chepstow you may happen across the sleepy hamlet of Trellech. Today, Trellech is a small village but this small settlement hides evidence of previous one, giving rise to the legend of “the lost city of Ancient Wales”.

Written evidence tells of how Trellech has a history dating back a thousand years, and at its peak, the settlement was one of the most important cities of mediaeval Wales.

There is little physical evidence of this mediaeval city though, and as a result there is much that is unknown about it.

Looking towards Trellech - Ros Hallett - CC-BY-SA-2.0

The name Trellech means “three stones”, and is a name that signifies the presence of standing stones in the area. Locally these leaning stones are known as “Harold’s Stones”, supposedly in reference to the king of England defeated at Hastings. Of course, the stones predate King Harold by hundreds of years, with supposition being that they are from the Bronze Age, and aligned for the winter solstice.
There is obvious physical evidence for occupation of the area in the time of King Harold, as a Norman castle’s motte was located on the 40 foot high mound that is “Terret Tump”.

Historians are today mostly interested in the period from when the castle was constructed, as it was a period when William the Conqueror built a string of castles to secure the Welsh border. Around such castles grew settlements, and the Trellech castle would have protected the local workings of charcoal and iron ore.

Within two hundred years of the Norman conquest, the settlement of Trellech was made up of 378 burgage plots, or houses, making it larger than Cardiff or Chepstow from the same period.

This though was in 1288; the limited written evidence suggests that three years after this date, much of Trellech was destroyed. The cause of the destruction being in relation to a case of deer poaching.
The town though survived in the hands of the de Clare family of Marcher lords, but the fourteenth century brought further hardship for the settlement as the Black Death hit the area in 1340 and 1350.
Further tragedy hit Trellech though when the town was burnt down in the early part of the fifteenth century.

The blame for this has been put down to Owain Glyndr and his men. Owain was the last native Prince of Wales, and the man who led an unsuccessful rebellion against the English crown.

Despite this destruction, Trellech still existed in some form, as it had a mayor and market recorded in 1695.

At some point the old settlement disappeared and the new village appeared, and the original site of the four hundred burgages was lost.

Trellech's Holy Well - Roy Parkhouse - CC-BY-SA-2.0

The local Monmouth Archaeological Society has been searching for the exact location for the last thirty years. There only point of reference was the local church, St Nicholas’, a church that has been dated back to the 13th century, making it part of the original settlement.

Since 2004 the Monmouth Archaeological Society has been digging to the south of the present village. One member of the Society was so convinced that they were on the right track he (Stuart Wilson) brought a field to enable further excavations. Wilson’s story was told on the BBC Radio 4 programme “The Boy Who Bought a Field” in 2006.

Excavating the field has proved to show some success in recent years. Walls of houses have been uncovered as has yard-paving. Ceramic finds have also been discovered indicating that the village was burnt down in the 1290′s. The Society believes that the evidence points to a severe fire destroying about a hundred of the burgages. This fire they blame on Welsh nationalists trying to drive out the Norman English from the settlement.

Many settlements throughout the British Isles disappeared during the mediaeval period. Some disappeared due to the population being wiped out by the Black Death, other settlements were also flattened to allow the landscaping of huge country estates.

Trellech though is by far the largest settlement known to have disappeared from the British landscape. Whether it is a true lost city though is debatable because of the existence of St Nicholas’ church and Trellech castle pinpointing at least the rough location.

Copyright - First Published 28th March 2008