Henry Royce

Statue of Sir (Frederick) Henry Royce in front of the Rolls-Royce headquarters in Derby

Sir Frederick Henry Royce, 1st Baronet (born March 27, 1863 in Alwalton , Huntingdonshire , England , † April 22, 1933 ) was a British pioneer of automobile construction; together with Charles Stewart Rolls he founded the Rolls-Royce company .

Royce was born to his parents' fifth child. His father James Royce had leased a mill from the Anglican Church. In 1867 the family separated, James went to London with his two youngest sons, including Henry , where he died of Hodgkin disease in 1872 . Then Henry had to work as a newsboy and telegraph delivery man. At the age of 14 he began training in the locomotive works of the Great Northern Railway in Peterborough . He later moved to a machine tool company in Leeds , then to the Electric Lighting and Power Generating Company in London. In 1884 he becomes unemployed due to bankruptcy.

With the electrical engineer Ernest Claremont, he founded an electrical company in Manchester that built doorbells, light bulb sockets, dynamos and electric motors. The breakthrough of this company came when electric motors were used to drive cranes instead of steam engines. From 1894 bridge cranes were built and the company was converted into a stock corporation.

At this point Royce was already seriously ill. His doctor recommends trips in the fresh air. To do this, he bought a Quadricycle - a mixture of car and motorcycle - from De Dion-Bouton .

His first car was a 10 hp two-cylinder model from the Decauville company . It was flawed and Royce decided to build his own car, which became known as the Royce. Three copies were built, none of which has survived. Charles Rolls saw one of these and teamed up with Royce to form Rolls-Royce.

On June 26, 1930 he was given the hereditary title of Baronet , of Seaton in the County of Rutland . Since his marriage to Minnie Punt remained childless, the title expired on his death in 1933.

Web links

Individual evidence

^ The London Gazette : No. 33611 (Supplement), p. 3473 , May 30, 1930.

personal data
SURNAME	Royce, Henry
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Royce, Sir Frederick Henry, 1st Baronet (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	British car pioneer, founder of Rolls-Royce
DATE OF BIRTH	March 27, 1863
PLACE OF BIRTH	Alwalton , Huntingdonshire , England , UK
DATE OF DEATH	April 22, 1933

[1] The London Gazette : No. 33611 (Supplement), p. 3473 , May 30, 1930.