Robin Redbreast, 1914 Monoplane, Swansea, Wales
N 51° 37.008 W 003° 56.326
30U E 435004 N 5718836
The Robin Goch (Welsh for (Welsh for ‘robin redbreast’) is one of the few amateur aeroplanes built before 1914 to survive. It is one of the earliest examples of aircraft in the United Kingdom.
Waymark Code: WMDHR5
Location: South Wales, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 01/18/2012
Views: 5
There are no identifying marks, on this plane at all.
It has been stored for most of its life at a local Royal Air Force, engineering base called St Athan. It was recently donated to the Museum of Wales. The Plane is now on Display in the National Waterfront Museum, Swansea. The museum tells the story of industry and innovation in Wales, now and over the last 300 years.
"The Robin Goch built by Charles Horace Watkins around 1908 at Mynachdy Farm in Maindy, Cardiff. The plane is an open wooden structure, cross-braced with piano wire with a partially enclosed cockpit. The pilot's seat came from a kitchen chair. Watkins said that he had flown the monoplane on several occasions in and around Cardiff sometime before 1914. There are no reports or evidence to support this claim, however engineers at RAF St Athan examined the Robin Goch in the 1960s and concluded that the plane was certainly airworthy."
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Wings over Wales :-
"Was Bill Frost of Saundersfoot the first aviator in Wales? Did Charles Watkins of Cardiff really fly his Robin Goch aircraft in 1908? These are two of the mysteries explored in 'Wings Over Wales', a five part series tracing the history of aviation in Wales since 1895.
Programme 1 The Pioneering Years (1894 - 1914)
This is the story of 100 years of flying in Wales. Except that in Wales, the story goes back further than a century when Bill Frost, a Pembrokeshire Carpenter built and flew his own design of Flying Machine in 1894. This programme covers the pioneering years up to the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 and tells the stories of such pioneers as Ernest Willows, Charles Rolls, and Charles Watkins. The race to be the first to fly to Ireland took several lives, but Vivian Hewitt of Rhyl achieved it on April 16th 1912. One year later down in Pembrokeshire, the James Brothers are trying out their first aeroplane. Two WW1 veterans, Hubert Williams (104) and Philip Bristow (101), both from Cardiff, talk about their experiences of answering the nation's call."
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