The Early Years

Noel Pemberton-Billing was one of the more questionable characters to come to prominence during the pioneer years of British aviation, and there are more than a few to choose from. Described by some variously as a maverick, eccentric or visionary his brief time in the aviation spotlight was marked by controversy. Maverick, yes, but only in the most negative definition of the term, eccentric, certainly but in a disagreeable and aggressive way, and visionary, not in the slightest. His arrogance, certainty in his own ability and judgement, total distain for those who held contrary views, and desire to be disruptive proved ultimately to be his undoing. But before that he has to be commended for establishing his own aircraft construction company and for employing

Hubert Scott-Paine as his works manager. ScottPaine would prove to be a most capable leader, steering the fledgling company through the First World War and growing it during the harsh years that followed.

It has to be said that Billing certainly had if not exactly friends then those who admired his energy and were supportive of his efforts in his early years in the world of aviation. Foremost among them were the editorial staff of both The Aeroplane and Flight, and he had no difficulty in getting articles of a favourable nature written about his activities.

In late 1913 Billing established an aircraft construction company, Pemberton-Billing Ltd, at a former ship chandler’s site at Woolston on the river Itchen just outside of Southampton. The company was launched with the clear intent to specialise in the construction of marine aircraft, an aim set out in a brochure issued prior to the Aero & Marine Exhibition at Olympia in April 1914 where its first aircraft was displayed, a small single-seat, singleengine flying boat given the name Supermarine PB-1 or P.B.1. This aircraft failed to fly but before Billing could embark on the construction of further flying boat designs war broke out. To his credit, he threw the resources of his company, distinctly limited as they were, towards war work.

The Seven-Day Bus

Billing, along with his friend and works manager Hubert Scott-Paine, had spent the formative months of the company’s life acquiring at auction a collection of useful material and part-built components from defunct aircraft businesses. They now had a ready stock upon which to draw. Billing said later that he had approached the heads of the new Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS), established on 1st July 1914, to seek specifications for the type of aircraft for which they had an immediate requirement. These were duly provided and formed the basis for the first aircraft he set out to build, the P.B.9 or P.B. ‘Scout’ IX, as it appears on the sole remaining company drawing. However this sounds like typical Billing embellishment as the P.B.9 showed every sign of

The Pemberton-Billing P.B ‘Scout’ IX. Drawings adjusted from those prepared by the company for publication to reflect the aircraft as it actually appeared being no more than a cheap, simplistic copy of an aircraft for which the Royal Flying Corp (RFC) had awarded contracts back in 1913 and which was in service already – the Sopwith ‘SS’ Scout or Tabloid.

This aircraft was very well known and had been illustrated and described in detail in the aviation press, not least when an example on floats won the 1914 Schneider Trophy Contest in April. Whether Billing really started by sketching the outline of the P.B.9 on the wall of the works is not verifiable, but stories of this type are common and pepper the narrative of aircraft and racing car design.

As was to be expected, the structure of the aircraft was entirely conventional. The fuselage was built on four longerons which on each side converged at the nose to meet and secure the ends of the forward engine mount beam. This was so similar to the arrangement on the Tabloid that the sketch drawings in Flight, copied from Pemberton-Billing company originals, resemble that aircraft rather more than the P.B.9 as it actually appeared when built. It has been suggested that the wings were modified from a set that Billing had acquired from the dissolved Radley-England company, which may explain how the aircraft was built so quickly. It may also explain the rather crude manner in which the wings attached to the fuselage.

Fig2 enabled the whole wing cell to be assembled as one unit and then slid along the fuselage to be attached. The spars of the lower wing were said to have been secured to the lower longerons by nothing more sophisticated than simple ‘U’ bolts clamped around them, and photographs certainly appear to support this. The tops of the front pair of inner struts were stabilised laterally by a couple of cross wires above the fuselage in front of the cockpit. It was a distinctly crude arrangement but effective. The tail surfaces were broadly similar to those on the Sopwith Tabloid. Billing had intended that the P.B.9 should be powered by an 80hp Gnome rotary engine but none were available. He therefore took the 50hp Gnome from the defunct P.B.1 flying boat and had that installed.

Flight reported that work on the drawings for the aircraft commenced on a Monday and construction the following day. On Tuesday of the following week, 11th August, the aircraft was complete and ready for testing. As a consequence of this truncated timescale it subsequently acquired the nickname of ‘The Seven-Day Bus’.

The only qualified pilot in the company was Billing himself and it is by no means certain that he had made any flights since acquiring his Aviator’s Certificate the previous year. This, famously, was done after no more than two or three hours’ tuition as part of a bet with Fred Handley-Page, a wager that Billing won. The first flight of the P.B.9 would need to be undertaken by a considerably more experienced pilot. As business had become tight in the summer of 1914, Billing had rented out part of the works to Sopwith who were in need of a waterside facility from which to test their Bat Boat. Through this connection he had met Victor Mahl, one of Sopwith’s top engineers and one of the small group who had been with the company’s support team for their successful challenge for the Schneider Trophy in April.

Mahl had been taught to fly by Howard Pixton, the pilot of the Schneider aeroplane, who had taken over the duties of chief test pilot during Harry Hawker’s sales trip to Australia. He had obtained his Aviator’s Certificate on 14th May and very soon thereafter became an accomplished deputy to Pixton. It was Mahl who was asked to take the P.B.9 up for its first flights, which took place on 12th August. No problems were reported following these flight and it is said that a top speed of around 75mph had been achieved, which is not bad for just 50hp, if indeed the aging engine produced that much.

Little is known about the subsequent history of the aircraft although it was certainly transported to Hendon for further assessment, where it was viewed by Flight in January 1915, but no orders were forthcoming. Claims that it was still in service in 1918 are clearly incorrect as Billing used the airframe, stripped down and covered in slogans, as a pulpit from which to address crowds during his parliamentary election campaigns in early 1916. While the design of the aircraft may not have impressed, especially when compared to similar single-seat tractor types coming from Sopwith, Bristol, the Royal Aircraft Factory and others, the workforce had demonstrated their ability to build to an acceptable standard, quickly and efficiently.

Billing’s military career

Billing’s mercurial nature and desire for action saw him sign up for the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve, which he joined on 20th October 1914 as a subLieutenant (temporary), reporting to the training depot HMS Pembroke III.

On 21st November Billing was a participant in a raid on the Zeppelin sheds at Friedrichshafen, located on the shores of Lake Constance. His exact role in this is far from certain as he is virtually the sole source for the narrative, but other officers in the RNAS described him as a transport officer. Three BE2c aircraft took off from a French airfield close to the border with Germany, made their way across Lake Constance and dropped nine bombs. One aircraft was brought down by gunfire and the pilot, Briggs, was captured. The other two returned to base, unsure whether they had been successful.

The three pilots who participated in the raid, Sdr Com E. F. Briggs, Flt Com. J. T. Babington and Flt Lt S. V. Sippe were all mentioned in dispatches and awarded the Distinguished Service Order as well as the French Légion d’honneur. Billing was not mentioned, despite his claims of having made a clandestine reconnaissance trip and other acts of derring-do. German records became available for review after the war and it was found that the raid had caused negligible damage. The reports made at the time, provided by an anonymous Swiss contact of Billing’s that told of both the Zeppelin and adjacent hydrogen generation plant having been destroyed, were total fantasy.

Billing was promoted to the rank of Flight Lieutenant (acting) on 1st January 1915 and on the 14th transferred to the RNAS. It is around this time that he decided to hyphenate his name, as Pemberton-Billing. What exactly he was engaged upon on behalf of the RNAS after his return to Britain remains somewhat obscure but when he resigned his commission at the end of the year he was promoted again to the rank of Temporary Squadron Commander on 1st January 1916. Some authors have questioned the veracity of that but it was definitely gazetted officially on 7th January 1916. During 1915 his company had been engaged in the design and construction of aircraft that Billing believed were essential for the defence of Britain from aerial attack.

The defence of Great Cities

In 1916 Billing published a book laying out his vision of how the aerial defence of Britain should be structured. This book, Air War: How to Wage it – with some suggestions for the defence of Great Cities, was an assemblage of articles he had written for various newspapers in the preceding years connected by new writing. In this he described the aircraft types that would be necessary for ‘The Defence of Great Cities’ as follows:

“(A) Patrol plane for home defence, especially by night… Horse-power required, 350 minimum, therefore the employment of two engines of 200-horse power will not only meet these requirements but will also provide that duplicate power plant which is essential to night flying.

(B) The observation machine—the eyes of the Navy and the Army. ….The horse-power necessary would be 150-175 minimum. Here I should install one 200-horse power engine.

(C) The bomb-dropper; possibly the most effective method of aeroplane offensive—the ‘longrange gun.’… Horse-power required, 125 minimum. Engine employed same as type B.

(D) The battleplane. Experimental, but must be rapidly developed and designed to carry the largest guns possible, up to 5in. This type should be specialised in and completed by a single firm in contradistinction with the methods of parts manufactured for the small standardisable machines… Horse-power 600 minimum. The design of the battleplane is largely experimental. Some constructors are ‘banking’ on the employment of three or more power plants. In these cases the standard 200-horse power engine can be employed.

“For the rapid development of this type of warplane I personally favour the immediate production of a higher power unit (i.e. 450-horse power). As all practical designs permit the use of two or three power units I would propose for the duration of this war not to standardise an engine over 450-horse power.”

In a later chapter he went into greater detail on two types that would need to be built – an outline of designs that were already complete or under construction at Woolston.

“A fleet of defending aeroplanes is necessary. Each machine must be so armed as to be capable of destroying an airship at a range equal to the range of its own searchlight, which must be not less than one mile. It must also carry a searchlight driven independently of the engines. It must have at least a speed of 80 miles an hour in order to overtake airships. It must be able to fly as slowly as 35 miles an hour in order to economise fuel and to render accurate gunfire and night landing possible. It must be able to carry fuel for 12 hours’ cruising at low speed, to enable it to chase an airship to the coast.

“It must be able to climb to 10,000 feet in not more than 20 minutes. It must be fitted with control-gear for two pilots, to allow one to relieve the other, and in the event of a gunner not being carried, each or either pilot must have equal facilities for working guns, bombs, and searchlight. The engines must be silenced. The pilots must have a clear view and arc of fire above, in front and below. The pilots must have a clear view and arc of fire above, in front and below.

“In addition to these machines each squadron of five patrol machines should have attached to it five high-speed ‘pusher’ fighting machines to act as ‘destroyers’ against the heavier-than-the-air machine. These must have a speed of at least 115 miles per hour, with a climbing rate of 10,000ft in not more than twelve minutes. (As a technical detail of prime importance they must have engines capable of carburettor adjustment to suit variations in atmospheric conditions at varying altitudes, and be very lightly loaded to enable them to retain their speed in a rarefied atmosphere.) They must be single seaters armed with a machine-gun firing explosive bullets. Vital parts must be armoured.”

There was nothing exceptional about Billing’s description of types A, B and C, they were aircraft types already in service or under development elsewhere, but type D was a fight of fantasy. Many self-proclaimed visionaries have made similar proposals over the years – the idea of a massive gunship having considerable appeal – but the practicality of carrying aloft a 5in gun, or similar, and dealing with the stresses and loads imposed when firing it was almost always underestimated or ignored. His notion of two ‘defending’ types had some merit, however.