English Heritage: Charles Rolls

English Heritage Marker: Charles Rolls

You may not know it - I didn't - but the 'Rolls' in Rolls-Royce is Charles Stewart Rolls who worked in this Mayfair building where Rolls-Royce Limited was once headquartered.  As the plaque says, Rolls was a motoring and aviation pioneer.  He wasn't the technical brains behind the business.  That was Henry Royce, but Rolls provided the finance and business know how that gave birth to the iconic British motorcar and aviation engine manufacturer.

14-15 Conduit St, Mayfair

Charles Rolls appears to have loved a thrill.  In addition to motoring, he had a passion for flying.  In fact, while Rolls-Royce jet engines are well known today, Rolls apparently failed in his attempt to get Henry Royce to design an aircraft engine in the company's early days.

Unfortunately, it was Roll's passion for flight that led to his early death at the age of 32.  He died when the plane he was flying, a Wright Flyer, crashed in 1910.  Rolls-Royce had been in business only 6 years, but his name lived on.