Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Rolls, Charles Stewart
ROLLS, CHARLES STEWART (1877–1910), engineer and aviator, born on 28 Aug. 1877 at 35 Hill Street, Berkeley Square, London, was third son of John Allan Rolls, first Baron Llangattock (1837–1912), of The Hendre, Monmouth, by his wife Georgiana Marcia, fourth daughter of Sir Charles FitzRoy Maclean, ninth baronet, of Morvaren. After education at Eton from 1890 to 1893, where he specialised in practical electricity, he matriculated from Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1895, graduating B.A. in mechanical engineering and applied sciences in 1898, and proceeding M.A. in 1902. Rolls was a cyclist from boyhood, riding the high bicycle, and obtaining considerable reputation in the amateur racing field; he won his 'half-blue' for cycling at Cambridge in 1896, and was captain of the university racing team in 1897.
After leaving the university Rolls made a study of practical engineering; he spent some time at the L. & N. W. railway works at Crewe, obtained a third engineer's (marine) certificate and for a time was engineer on his father's yacht 'Ave Maria.' Already in his first year as an undergraduate Rolls had interested himself in the then recent French invention of the motor car. In Dec. 1895 he purchased and imported into England a 3¾ h.p. Peugeot car, then the most powerful made. Sir David Salomons, the Hon. Evelyn Ellis, and Mr. T. R. B. Elliot were the only Englishmen who previously owned automobiles. The traffic legislation at the time forbade self-propelled vehicles to travel faster than four miles an hour, and a man carrying a red flag had to precede them on highways. On procuring his car Rolls set out from Victoria station, London, for Cambridge, and was stopped by a policeman owing to the absence of a red flag. He made the journey to Cambridge in 11 ¾ hours — travelling at 4 ½ miles an hour. In Aug. 1896 the Locomotives on Highways Act freed motor traffic of some of its restrictions. The maximum speed, which was then limited to twelve miles an hour, was raised to twenty by a new Act of 1903. Rolls was prominent among the EngUshmen whose sedulous experiments in driving brought motor cars into general use in Great Britain. He met with many hairbreadth escapes, but his courage was indomitable. He tested with intelligent eagerness the numerovis improvements in mechanism, with a view to increased speed, which the French pioneers devised. Joining the Self-propelled Traffic Association, he was soon a member of the Automobile Club of France, which was started in 1895, and in 1897 he became a member of the (Royal) Automobile Club in London, serving on the committee till 1908. He soon took part in the races and reliability trials organised by both these clubs. In 1900 he won on a 12 h.p. Panhard the gold medal of the EngUsh club for the best performance on the part of an amateur in the thousand miles motor trip between London and Edinburgh. In the next few years he competed in the French motor races between Paris and Madrid, Viemia, Berlin, Boulogne, and Ostend, and in 1905 he was the British representative in the race in France for the Gordon Bennett trophy.
Meanwhile he had formed in London a business, 'C. S. Rolls & Co.,' for the manufacture of motor cars in England, and was joint general manager with Mr. Claude Johnson. The two joined in March 1904 Mr. F. H. Royce, an electrical and mechanical engineer, who had greatly developed the efficiency of the vehicle, and they established the company of ' Rolls-Royce, Ltd.' Mr Royce became engineer-in-chief. Rolls technical managing director, and Mr. Johnson managing director. Works were constructed in 1898 at Derby. The Rolls-Royce cars proved exceptionally powerful, and from 1906 onwards Rolls drove in racing competitions one of his own cars with, great success. He broke the record in 1906 for the journey from Monte Carlo to London with a 20 h.p. Rolls-Royce car, driving 771 miles on end from Monte Carlo to Boulogne in 28 hours 14 minutes.
In 1903 he had become a captain in the motor volunteer corps, afterwards reconstituted as the army motor reserve. He was a delegate for the Royal Automobile Club and the Roads Improvement Association at the International Road Congress in 1908. Aeronautics meanwhile had caught Rolls's attention. In the course of 1901 he began making balloon ascents, which before his death reached a total of 170. He helped to found the Aero Club in England in 1903, and joined the Aero Club of France in 1906. On 1 Oct. of the last year, in the Gordon Bennett international balloon race, he was the British representative, and crossing the Charmel from Paris was awarded the gold medal for the longest time spent in the air. At the end of 1908 he visited Le Mans in France to study Wilbur Wright's experiments with his newly invented aeroplane. He was one of the first to fly with Wright, and he published an account of the experience in 'Un vol en aeroplane Wright,' an article in 'La Conquete de l'Air,' Brussels (Nov. 1908).
Acquiring a Wright aeroplane for use in England, he was soon an expert aviator. In June 1910 he made a great reputation by a cross-Channel flight in a Wright aeroplane. He left Dover at 6.30 on the evening of 2 June, and arrived at Calais at 7 o'clock ; a quarter of an hour later, after circling round the semaphore station at Sangatte, he started on the homeward journey without touching French soil, and reached Dover at five minutes past eight, at the point from which he set out. This record exploit attracted universal attention.
Next month he took part in a flying tournament at Bournemouth, and was killed on 12 July 1910 through the collapse of the tail-plane of his machine while he was making a steep gliding descent to the aerodrome. He was the first Englishman to be killed while flying on an aeroplane. He was buried at Llangattock-Vibon-Avel church, near Monmouth. A bronze statue over sixteen feet high, by Sir William Goscombe John, R.A., representing Rolls in the costume in which he flew across the Channel, was unveiled by Lord Raglan in Agincourt Square, Monmouth, on 19 Oct. 1911. Another statue by W. C. May was unveiled at Dover on 27 April 1912. A stained glass window in joint memory of Rolls and of Cecil A. Grace, who disappeared while flying on an aeroplane from Calais to Dover on 22 Nov. 1910, was unveiled at Eastchurch church, Kent, on 26 July 1912. Rolls, who was unmarried, was a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and of the Royal Metallurgical Society as well as an associate member of the Institute of Mechanical Engineering.
He frequently lectured on motors and the history and development of mechanical road locomotion, and besides the publications mentioned contributed a chapter on 'The Caprices of Petrol Motors' in the Badminton volume on 'Motors' (1902 pp. 164 seq.) and the article on pleasure motors to the eleventh edition of the ’Encyclopædia Britannica.' A paper read by Rolls at the Automobile Club of Great Britain and Ireland was privately printed in 1904. An article, 'My Voyage in the World's Greatest Airship,' was also privately reprinted from the ’London Magazine' (May 1908). Rolls was an accomplished amateur musician and actor, and a good football player.
[The Times, 13–18 July 1910; 20 Oct. 1911; Pearson's Mag., July 1904; M.A.P., art. by Rolls entitled In the Days of my Youth; Page's Engineering Biographies, 1908; Aeronaut. Journ., July 1910 (portrait); Motors, in Badminton Series, 1902; a life of Rolls by Lady Llangattock is in preparation.]