... but this hut was built by aviation pioneer who helped defend Britain

SIR Alliott Verdon Roe earned his place in aviation history as the first Briton to build and fly an aeroplane.

Born in April 1877 in Lancashire, he trained as an apprentice in a railway yard before serving as an engineer aboard various ships and travelling the world.

On his voyages he is said to have observed the soaring flight of the albatross and became interested in building a flying machine.

Back in the UK, he heard of the success of the Wright Brothers –

Americans Orville and Wilbur

Wright had successfully flown the first heavier-than-air aircraft in December 1903 – and set out to build his own plane.

After experimenting with models, he won a Daily Mail competition for one of his designs in 1907 and used the £75 prize money to build, full-size, the Roe Biplane, which flew for the first time on 8 June 1908. Although it was a significant milestone in British aviation, the plane’s engine had been built in France.

The following year Roe, pictured, took to the skies in his all-British Avroplane triplane. With his brother Humphrey, in 1910 Rose founded A.V. Roe and Company Ltd – later renamed Avro Aircraft. One of their early models, the Avro 504, was used on bombing missions in the early part of the First World War and served as a trainer for British pilots.

Avro aircraft played an important part in the Second World War, building thousands of Lancaster bombers. The company also developed some of the major air weapons of Britain’s modern air force, including the Vulcan bomber and the Blue Steel missile.

In the Second World War, Roe – knighted in 1929 – lost two of his sons in action with the Royal Air Force. He died on January 4, 1958, at St Mary’s Hospital in Portsmouth.