Handley Page
8 types · 0 airframes
Pre-1950 Narrative
Founded by Frederick Handley Page (later Sir Frederick) in 1909, it was the United Kingdom's first publicly traded aircraft manufacturing company. His company, founded on 17 June 1909, became the first British public company to build aircraft. In 1912, Handley Page established an aircraft factory at Cricklewood after moving from Barking. During the First World War, Handley Page produced a series of heavy bombers for the Royal Navy to bomb the German Zeppelin yards, with the ultimate intent of bombing Berlin in revenge for the Zeppelin attacks on London. These aircraft included the O/100 of 1915, the O/400 of 1918 and the four-engined V/1500 with the range to reach Berlin. The V/1500 had only just entered operational service as the war ended in 1918.
Aircraft Types
Handley Page Halifax
The Handley Page Halifax was a British four-engined heavy bomber of the Second World War, built by Handley Page and flown mainly by the Royal Air Force. Developed from a twin-engined design, it entered service in 1940 and, with the Lancaster, composed the majority of Bomber Command's Main Force in the last three years of the war. It also towed gliders, dropped agents and supplies, and served with Coastal Command. A total of 6,176 were built; three complete examples survive.
Handley Page Hampden
The Handley Page Hampden was a British twin-engined medium bomber that entered RAF service in 1938, one of Bomber Command's three modern twin-engined bombers at the outbreak of the Second World War. Its narrow fuselage made it fast but cramped and weakly defended; driven from daylight operations, it bombed by night until Bomber Command withdrew it in September 1942, then served Coastal Command as a torpedo bomber. Production totalled 1,432 aircraft: 502 by Handley Page, 770 by English Electric and 160 built in Canada.
Handley Page Harrow
A twin-engine heavy bomber built by Handley Page as a stop-gap for the RAF's rapid pre-war expansion, the H.P.54 Harrow was ordered in August 1936, before the prototype flew, and was superseded as a bomber before the Second World War began. It spent the war as a transport and air ambulance — the converted ambulance form was renamed the Sparrow — and the last Harrows were retired in May 1945.
Handley Page Hermes
The Handley Page Hermes was a British pressurised airliner built by Handley Page as the civil counterpart of the RAF's Hastings transport. The first prototype was lost on its maiden flight in December 1945, and the production Hermes IV did not enter BOAC service until 6 August 1950, on routes to West and South Africa. Handley Page built 29 in all at Radlett: one Hermes I and one Hermes II prototype, 25 Hermes IVs and two turboprop Hermes V development aircraft. BOAC replaced the type with Canadair Argonauts in 1952, but second-hand aircraft flew on with British independent airlines on trooping and charter work until 1964. Only a fuselage survives, at Duxford.
Handley Page Heyford
The Handley Page Heyford was a British twin-engine biplane heavy night bomber, the last biplane heavy bomber to serve with the RAF. Built to Specification B.19/27, it first flew in June 1930 with its fuselage hung from the upper wing, a layout that gave the crew an unusually good view from a cockpit seventeen feet off the ground. Handley Page delivered 124 production aircraft between 1933 and 1936, and eleven squadrons flew the type; it stood armed and ready at the Munich crisis of 1938, yet never fired a shot in anger, and it left front-line service on 2 September 1939. It flew on as a trainer and glider tug until 1941, and no complete example survives.
Handley Page HP.42
The Handley Page HP.42 was a four-engine biplane airliner built by Handley Page for Imperial Airways, entering service in 1931. This record covers the family as the sources frame it: the long-range Eastern HP.42 and the shorter-range, higher-capacity Western HP.45. Eight aircraft were built, four of each variant, and their two Pullman-style cabins made them the airline's land-based flagships. In nine years of civilian service the fleet flew more than ten million miles without a fatality, a record scoped to civilian service: one aircraft burned in a hangar fire in 1937, and the seven that reached the war were all destroyed by the end of 1940, the last condemned airframe being scrapped in 1941. None survives.
Handley Page Victor
The Handley Page Victor was a British jet strategic bomber built by Handley Page, the last of the RAF's three V-bombers to enter service. It first flew on 24 December 1952 and joined the RAF in 1958 as a carrier of Britain's nuclear deterrent. Handley Page built 86 in all — two prototypes, 50 B.1s and 34 B.2s — and after the bombers were retired in 1968 many were converted to reconnaissance aircraft and in-flight refuelling tankers. As a tanker it supported the Black Buck raids in the 1982 Falklands conflict and flew in the 1991 Gulf War, staying in service until 1993, longer than the Vulcan or the Valiant. Four aircraft survive in British museums.
Handley Page W.8
The Handley Page W.8 was a British biplane airliner first flown in 1919: Handley Page's first purpose-built civil airliner, developed from the wartime O/400 bomber. This record covers the Type W family as the sources frame it — the twin-engined W.8 and W.8b, the three-engined W.8e and W.8f Hamilton, the W.9 Hampstead and the W.10. Twenty-five were built for civil service, twelve by Handley Page and thirteen by SABCA in Belgium. They served Handley Page Transport, Imperial Airways and Sabena, on the London–Paris route and other European services, from 1921 until the HP.42 replaced them in 1931. The two W.10s that outlasted airline service became flight-refuelling tankers for Sir Alan Cobham's company; none is known preserved in a British museum.