X-Nico

unusual facts about Ernest Hives, 1st Baron Hives



Ernest Hives, 1st Baron Hives

In 1941 Hives quickly decided ‘to go all out for the gas turbine’, ensuring the company’s leading role in developing jet engines for civil and military aviation.

Hillington, Scotland

Having developed a new facility themselves in Crewe, production director Ernest Hives was looking for a northern-based greenfield site with easy transport access, an available skilled workforce, and a local authority willing to build the required associated housing: Rolls had been let down in Crewe, and didn't want to repeat the experience.

Rolls-Royce Peregrine

In August 1940 Ernest Hives, head of the Rolls-Royce aero engine division, wrote to Air Chief Marshal Wilfrid Freeman expressing his wish to stop work on the Peregrine, Vulture and another engine development project, the Rolls-Royce Exe to concentrate efforts on the Merlin and Griffon, but Freeman disagreed and stated that Peregrine production should continue.


see also