H I S TO RY
SOPHIE BLAN C H ARD The honour of being the first woman to fly in an untethered hot air balloon went to Elisabeth Thible who had flown alongside a M. Fleurant as a passenger in the montgolfier, La Gustave, on 4 June 1784. She was credited with feeding the balloon’s fire box en route. Sophie’s story is a very different one. Nervous on the ground but always comfortable in the air, she became the first professional female balloonist and what a show she put on! Her ballooning history started with her marriage to Jean-Pierre Blanchard, a balloon manufacturer and showman himself who had fallen on hard times. He had decided that a woman “onboard” would attract the crowds and Sophie, who was said to be terrified of riding in a horse-drawn carriage, took to it like a duck to water. Tiny, nervous and with “sharp birdlike features” as one reporter wrote, she found it to be incomparable and made her first solo balloon flight in 1805, earning her licence. These balloons were far different from those we see today and had small, low gondola style “baskets” in which stood a resplendent Sophie in flowing gown and feathered hat. All went fairly well for several years until Jean-Pierre had a heart attack standing next to Sophie whilst flying over the Hague and fell to his death.
The Local Buzz • May - June 2021
He left many debts so she continued to fly, paying off creditors and making sure she put on a spectacular display by launching fireworks from beneath the hydrogen balloon! Such was her performance that she became Napoleon’s “Aeronaut of the Official Festivals” and made a celebration flight for his 1810 wedding to Marie Louise. She was also made chief air minister of ballooning, working on what turned out to be impossible plans for an aerial invasion of England, with French troops in balloons. Later King Louis XVIII kept her on as “Official Aeronaut of the Restoration”. Nowadays, balloons tend to land at dusk and take off at dawn but Sophie preferred to fly at night, staying airborne until dawn and even sleeping in her hydrogen balloon. Apparently she once ascended to avoid a hailstorm and passed out, nearly freezing to death at altitude and, on another occasion, nearly drowned after landing in a swamp. Her exploits with fireworks brought her showmanship to an end on 6 July in 1819 when her “Bengal Fire” demonstration went horribly wrong and flames leapt from the top of her balloon. She tried to slow her descent by losing ballast and almost made it but, instead, she landed on the roof of a house and Sophie tipped out, falling to her death on the street below. A sorry end for an incredible lady.
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