Bert Hinkler, the Australian-born pioneer aviator, came to England in 1913 to work for the Sopwith Aviation Company. After serving in the Royal Navy Air Service during World War One he worked for A.V. Roe at Southampton. He is best remembered as the first person to fly solo from England to Australia, a feat he accomplished in 1928.
His other aviation exploits included in 1931 becoming the first man to fly solo across the South Atlantic. He died in an air crash in Italy in 1933 and was buried in Florence. While in Southampton he lived in Lydgate Road, in a house he named 'Mon Repos' (image 2). A memorial plaque, donated by the Royal Queensland Aero Club, was erected in the garden of 'Mon Repos' in 1974 and in 1983-84 the house was dismantled and re-erected in Hinkler's home town of Bundaberg, Queensland. Hinkler Road in Thornhill was named after him.
1. Bert Hinkler
Photograph, c.1927
2. Mon Repos, Lydgate Road
Photograph of the house with memorial plaque, 1974
See also
Further reading:
Stories of Southampton Streets, by A. G. K. Leonard, p106-110. (HS/h)
Solo: The Bert Hinkler Story. (HS/t)
The last Flight of Bert Hinkler, by Edward P. Wixted. (HS/t)
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2004, Volume 27.
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