Vickers-Armstrongs Limited was a British engineering conglomerate formed by the merger of the assets of

Vickers Limited Vickers Limited was a British engineering conglomerate. The business began in Sheffield in 1828 as a steel foundry and became known for its church bells, going on to make shafts and propellers for ships, armour plate and then artillery. Entir ...

and Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company in 1927. The majority of the company was

nationalised Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization contrasts with ...

in the 1960s and 1970s, with the remainder being divested as

Vickers plc Vickers plc was the remainder of Vickers-Armstrongs after the nationalisation of three of its four operating groups: aviation (as a 50% share since 1960 of British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) in 1977), shipbuilding ( Vickers Limited Shipbuilding ...

in 1977. It featured among Britain's most prominent armaments firms.

History

Vickers merged with the

Tyneside Tyneside is a List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, built-up area across the banks of the River Tyne, England, River Tyne in Northern England. The population of Tyneside as published in the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 census was 774,891 ...

-based engineering company

Armstrong Whitworth Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Co Ltd was a major British manufacturing company of the early years of the 20th century. With headquarters in Elswick, Tyne and Wear, Elswick, Newcastle upon Tyne, Armstrong Whitworth built armaments, ships, locomot ...

, founded by William Armstrong, to become Vickers-Armstrongs. Armstrong Whitworth and Vickers had developed along similar lines, expanding into various military sectors and produced a whole suite of military products. Armstrong Whitworth were notable for their artillery manufacture at Elswick and shipbuilding at a yard at

High Walker Walker is a residential suburb and electoral ward in the south-east of Newcastle upon Tyne, in the county of Tyne and Wear, England. History The place-name 'Walker' is first attested in 1242, where it appears as ''Waucre''. This means 'wall-car ...

on the

River Tyne The River Tyne is a river in North East England. Its length (excluding tributaries) is . It is formed by the North Tyne and the South Tyne, which converge at Warden, Northumberland, Warden near Hexham in Northumberland at a place dubbed 'The ...

1929 saw the merger of the acquired railway business with those of

Cammell Laird Cammell Laird is a British shipbuilding company. It was formed from the merger of Laird Brothers of Birkenhead and Johnson Cammell & Co of Sheffield at the turn of the twentieth century. The company also built railway rolling stock until 1929, ...

to form Metropolitan Cammell Carriage and Wagon (MCCW); Metro Cammell. In 1935, before rearmament began, Vickers-Armstrongs was the third-largest manufacturing employer in Britain, behind

Unilever Unilever PLC () is a British multinational consumer packaged goods company headquartered in London, England. It was founded on 2 September 1929 following the merger of Dutch margarine producer Margarine Unie with British soap maker Lever B ...

and ICI. In 1956

Dorothy Hatfield Dorothy Helen Hatfield OBE FRAeS (née McRither) (January 1940 – 16 April 2024), aeronautical engineer, was in 1956 the first female engineering apprentice at Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft), Brooklands. She became President of the Women's Engin ...

became the first female engineering apprentice at Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft),

Brooklands Brooklands was a motor racing circuit and aerodrome built near Weybridge in Surrey, England, United Kingdom. It opened in 1907 and was the world's first purpose-built 'banked' motor racing circuit as well as one of Britain's first airfields, ...

, followed in 1958 by

Janet Gulland Janet Mary Gulland FRAeS MA CEng (18 July 1934–23 September 2017) was a British aeronautical engineer and the first female graduate engineering apprentice at Vickers-Armstrongs. Education Gulland attended Berkhamsted Girls School and then ...

who was the first female graduate apprentice at the company.

Break-up

In 1960 the aircraft interests were merged with those of

Bristol Bristol () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, the most populous city in the region. Built around the River Avon, Bristol, River Avon, it is bordered by t ...

English Electric The English Electric Company Limited (EE) was a British industrial manufacturer formed after World War I by amalgamating five businesses which, during the war, made munitions, armaments and aeroplanes. It initially specialised in industrial el ...

and

Hunting Aircraft Hunting Aircraft was a British aircraft manufacturer that produced light training aircraft and the initial design that would evolve into the BAC 1-11 jet airliner. Founded as Percival Aircraft Company in 1933, the company later moved to Luton ...

to form the

British Aircraft Corporation The British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) was a British aircraft manufacturer formed from the government-pressured merger of English Electric, English Electric Aviation Ltd., Vickers-Armstrongs, Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft), the Bristol Aeroplane ...

(BAC). This was owned by Vickers, English Electric and Bristol (holding 40%, 40% and 20% respectively). BAC in turn owned 70% of Hunting. The Supermarine operation was closed in 1963 and the Vickers brand name for aircraft was dropped by BAC in 1965. Under the terms of the

Aircraft and Shipbuilding Industries Act 1977 The Aircraft and Shipbuilding Industries Act 1977 (c. 3) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that nationalised large parts of the UK aerospace and shipbuilding industries and established two corporations, British Aerospace and Br ...

BAC was nationalised to become part of

British Aerospace British Aerospace plc (BAe) was a British aircraft manufacturer, aircraft, munitions and defence-systems manufacturer that was formed in 1977. Its head office was at Warwick House in the Farnborough Aerospace Centre in Farnborough, Hampshire. ...

(later

BAE Systems BAE Systems plc is a British Multinational corporation, multinational Aerospace industry, aerospace, military technology, military and information security company, based in London. It is the largest manufacturer in Britain as of 2017. It is ...

). The Aircraft and Shipbuilding Industries Act also led to the nationalisation of Vickers' shipbuilding division as part of

British Shipbuilders British Shipbuilders (BS) was a public corporation that owned and managed the shipbuilding industry in Great Britain from 1977 through the 1980s. Its head office was at Benton House in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. History The corporation wa ...

. This division was privatised as Vickers Shipbuilding & Engineering in 1986, later passing to GEC as part of Marconi Marine and survives to this day as part of

BAE Systems Submarines BAE Systems Submarines,BAE Systems Submarine Solutions was split out from BAE Systems Marine and operated as such until January 2012. It was named BAE Systems Maritime - Submarines until 2017 before it became BAE Systems Submarines. is a whol ...

. Vickers Container and Packaging Machinery Division, including the Vickers Stitcher and Vickers Hardness Machine business, was bought by Fords Industrial Products, part of Barry Wehmiller in 1986. In 1991 the Vickers Hardness Machinery business was bought by the then field engineers, and continues today as UK Calibrations Limited based in

Kidderminster Kidderminster is a market town and civil parish in Worcestershire, England, south-west of Birmingham and north of Worcester, England, Worcester. Located north of the River Stour, Worcestershire, River Stour and east of the River Severn, in th ...

. The Vickers Stitcher was still being manufactured in India as recently as 2005. The steelmaking division became part of

British Steel Corporation British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and cultur ...

and the remaining interests were divested as the public company

, whose various components were later split. The Vickers name ceased to exist in 2003 when

Rolls-Royce Rolls-Royce (always hyphenated) may refer to: * Rolls-Royce Limited, a British manufacturer of cars and later aero engines, founded in 1906, now defunct Automobiles * Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, the current car manufacturing company incorporated in ...

renamed its acquisition Vinters Engineering.

Businesses

Armaments

Vickers-Armstrongs inherited the

Vickers machine gun The Vickers machine gun or Vickers gun is a Water cooling, water-cooled .303 British (7.7 mm) machine gun produced by Vickers Limited, originally for the British Army. The gun was operated by a three-man crew but typically required more me ...

of 1912 used in World War I from Vickers Limited. There were other Vickers machine guns aside from the regular water-cooled model (known universally as the "Vickers"): the Vickers-Berthier (VB) machine gun used by the

Indian Army The Indian Army (IA) (ISO 15919, ISO: ) is the Land warfare, land-based branch and largest component of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Commander-in-Chief, Supreme Commander of the Indian Army, and its professional head ...

, the Vickers "K" .303 aircraft machine gun developed from it, and the Vickers "S" 40 mm aircraft gun. An unusual machine gun also made was the Vickers Higson. Vickers produced larger weapons such as the

Ordnance QF 2-pounder The Ordnance QF 2-pounder (British ordnance terms#QF, QF denoting "quick firing"), or simply "2 pounder gun", was a British anti-tank gun and vehicle-mounted gun employed in the World War II, Second World War. It was the main anti-tank weapo ...

gun used on tanks. In 1948 Vickers bought the Australian business of Charles Ruwolt Ltd for £750,000 following Ruwolt's death in 1946. During World War II Ruwolt's firm produced armaments for the Australian Government, including field artillery such as

mortars Mortar may refer to: * Mortar (weapon), an indirect-fire infantry weapon * Mortar (masonry), a material used to fill the gaps between blocks and bind them together * Mortar and pestle, a tool pair used to crush or grind * Mortar, Bihar, a village i ...

and

howitzer The howitzer () is an artillery weapon that falls between a cannon (or field gun) and a mortar. It is capable of both low angle fire like a field gun and high angle fire like a mortar, given the distinction between low and high angle fire break ...

cannon.

Shipbuilding

After the 1927 merger, the company possessed a major yard on each coast of Britain; the Naval Construction Yard of Vickers at

Barrow-in-Furness Barrow-in-Furness is a port town and civil parish (as just "Barrow") in the Westmorland and Furness district of Cumbria, England. Historic counties of England, Historically in the county of Lancashire, it was incorporated as a municipal borou ...

in Cumbria and the Naval Yard of Armstrong Whitworth at

on the

. Vickers-Armstrongs was one of the most important warship manufacturers in the world. These interests were renamed as Vickers-Armstrongs Shipbuilders in 1955, changing again to Vickers Limited Shipbuilding Group in 1968. The Barrow yard was

and became part of

in 1977, was privatised as VSEL in 1986 and remains in operation to this day as

. Meanwhile, the Naval Yard at

on the

passed to

Swan Hunter Swan Hunter, formerly known as Swan, Hunter & Wigham Richardson, is a shipbuilding design, engineering, and management company, based in Wallsend, Tyne and Wear, England. At its apex, the company represented the combined forces of three pow ...

in 1968, was nationalised and became part of

in 1977, was privatised still as

in 1986 but closed down during the 1980s. Vickers-Armstrong also built the VA-3

hovercraft A hovercraft (: hovercraft), also known as an air-cushion vehicle or ACV, is an amphibious craft capable of travelling over land, water, mud, ice, and various other surfaces. Hovercraft use blowers to produce a large volume of air below the ...

Military vehicles

The company was also known for its

tank A tank is an armoured fighting vehicle intended as a primary offensive weapon in front-line ground combat. Tank designs are a balance of heavy firepower, strong armour, and battlefield mobility provided by tracks and a powerful engine; ...

designs, starting with the widely used

Vickers 6-Ton The Vickers 6-ton tank or Vickers Mark E, also known as the "Six-tonner", was a British light tank designed in 1928 in a private project at Vickers. Though not adopted by the British Army, it was picked up by several other armed forces, and l ...

. It also produced the influential, if never actually produced, Independent A1E1 tank. One of the company's most important designs was the Valentine Infantry Tank, produced in the thousands in World War II. The military vehicle manufacturing interests were divested into

, and would later pass to

Alvis Vickers Alvis PLC was a British motor vehicle manufacturer. It was created when United Scientific Holdings plc acquired the Alvis division of the nationalised vehicle manufacturer British Leyland in 1981. United Scientific maintained its own name un ...

, now part of

BAE Systems Land and Armaments BAE Systems Platforms & Services is a wholly owned subsidiary of BAE Systems Inc. and is a large provider of tracked and wheeled armored combat vehicles, naval guns, naval ship repair and modernization, artillery and missile launching systems, ad ...

. ''Notable Vickers-Armstrongs military vehicles include;'' *

Carden Loyd tankette The Carden Loyd tankettes were a series of British tankettes of the period between the World Wars, the most successful of which was the Mark VI, the only version built in significant numbers. It became a classic tankette design worldwide, was ...

Cruiser Mk I The Tank, Cruiser, Mk I (A9) was a British cruiser tank of the interwar period. It was the first cruiser tank: a fast tank designed to bypass the main enemy lines and engage the enemy's lines of communication, as well as enemy tanks. The Cruis ...

Cruiser Mk II The Tank, Cruiser, Mk II (A10), was a cruiser tank developed alongside the A9 cruiser tank, and was intended to be a heavier, infantry tank version of that type. In practice, it was not deemed suitable for the infantry tank role and was class ...

Vickers 6-ton The Vickers 6-ton tank or Vickers Mark E, also known as the "Six-tonner", was a British light tank designed in 1928 in a private project at Vickers. Though not adopted by the British Army, it was picked up by several other armed forces, and l ...

Light Tank Mk VI The Tank, Light, Mk VI was a British light tank, produced by Vickers-Armstrongs in the late 1930s, which saw service during the Second World War. Development history The Tank, Light, Mk VI was the sixth in the line of light tanks built by V ...

* Valentine *

Vickers MBT The Vickers MBT is a series of main battle tanks (MBTs) developed as a private venture by British company Vickers-Armstrongs for export. The design makes use of proven components, such as the L7 gun of the Centurion tank, Centurion, the Leyland ...

(and under licence in India as

Vijayanta The ''Vijayanta'' () was a main battle tank built in India based on a licensed design of the Vickers Mk.1. The Vijayanta was the first indigenous tank of the Indian Army. The prototype was completed in 1963 and the tank entered service on Decem ...

)

Aviation

Vickers formed its Aviation Department in 1911. The aircraft interests of Armstrong Whitworth were not acquired in the merger and later passed to the

Hawker Aircraft Hawker Aircraft Limited was a British aircraft manufacturer that was responsible for some of the most famous products in British aviation history. History Hawker had its roots in the aftermath of the First World War, which resulted in the ban ...

group. In 1928 the Aviation Department became Vickers (Aviation) Ltd and soon after acquired

Supermarine Aviation Works Supermarine was a British aircraft manufacturer. It is most famous for producing the Spitfire fighter plane during World War II. The company built a range of seaplanes and flying boats, winning the Schneider Trophy for seaplanes with three cons ...

, which became the Supermarine Aviation Works (Vickers) Ltd and was responsible for producing the revolutionary

Spitfire The Supermarine Spitfire is a British single-seat fighter aircraft that was used by the Royal Air Force and other Allied countries before, during, and after World War II. It was the only British fighter produced continuously throughout the ...

fighter. In 1938, both companies were re-organised as Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd, and a new 'art deco' headquarters designed by architect

C. Howard Crane Charles Howard Crane (August 13, 1885 – August 14, 1952) was an American architect who was primarily active in Detroit, Michigan. His designs include Detroit's Fox Theatre and Olympia Stadium, as well as LeVeque Tower in Columbus, Ohio, whi ...

was built at its

factory in Surrey although the former Supermarine and Vickers works continued to brand their products under their former names. In 1960 the aircraft interests were one of the founding companies merged to form BAC. The hovercraft activities of Vickers-Armstrongs were merged with those of the

Westland Aircraft Westland Aircraft was a British aircraft manufacturer located in Yeovil, Somerset. Formed as a separate company by separation from Petters Limited just before the start of the Second World War, Westland had been building aircraft since 1915. Du ...

company (including those of

Saunders-Roe Saunders-Roe Limited, also known as Saro, was a British aerospace and marine-engineering company based at Columbine Works, East Cowes, Isle of Wight. History The name was adopted in 1929 after Alliott Verdon Roe (see Avro) and John Lord took ...

) to form the

British Hovercraft Corporation British Hovercraft Corporation (BHC) was a British hovercraft manufacturer that designed and produced multiple types of vehicles for both commercial and civil purposes. Created with the intention of producing viable commercial hovercraft in March ...

in 1966 with Vickers holding 25% of the new company. Westland bought out Vickers interest along with other partners in 1970. Vickers formed a subsidiary, the Airship Guarantee Company, under the direction of Cdr

Dennis Burney Sir Charles Dennistoun Burney, 2nd Baronet (28 December 1888 – 11 November 1968, in Bermuda) was an English aeronautical engineer, private inventor and Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party politician.''Oxford Dictionary of National Bio ...

solely for the purpose of producing the

R100 His Majesty's Airship R100 was a privately designed and built British rigid airship made as part of a two-ship competition to develop a commercial airship service for use on British Empire routes as part of the Imperial Airship Scheme. The o ...

airship for the government. Between 1911 and 1970, just over 16,000 aircraft were built under the Vickers name; together the 11,462

Wellington Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the third-largest city in New Zealand (second largest in the North Island ...

and 846

Warwick Warwick ( ) is a market town, civil parish and the county town of Warwickshire in the Warwick District in England, adjacent to the River Avon, Warwickshire, River Avon. It is south of Coventry, and south-east of Birmingham. It is adjoined wit ...

aircraft (which were structurally similar) make up over 75% of this total.

Military aircraft

Vickers became renowned as a manufacturer of large aircraft at its main factory at

in Surrey. In the

interwar period In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period, also known as the interbellum (), lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days) – from the end of World War I (WWI) to the beginning of World War II ( ...

, the company produced the Wellesley, designed by

Rex Pierson Reginald Kirshaw "Rex" Pierson CBE (9 February 1891 – 10 January 1948) was an English aircraft designer and chief designer at Vickers Limited later Vickers-Armstrongs Aircraft Ltd. He was responsible for the Vickers Vimy, a heavy bomber de ...

using the

geodetic airframe A geodetic airframe is a type of construction for the airframes of aircraft developed by British aeronautical engineer Barnes Wallis in the 1930s (who sometimes spelt it "geodesic"). Earlier, it was used by Prof. Schütte for the Schütte Lan ...

principle of structural engineer

Barnes Wallis Sir Barnes Neville Wallis (26 September 1887 – 30 October 1979) was an English engineer and inventor. He is best known for inventing the bouncing bomb used by the Royal Air Force in Operation Chastise (the "Dambusters" raid) to attack ...

. This would later evolve into the famous

bomber A bomber is a military combat aircraft that utilizes air-to-ground weaponry to drop bombs, launch aerial torpedo, torpedoes, or deploy air-launched cruise missiles. There are two major classifications of bomber: strategic and tactical. Strateg ...

, a mainstay of

RAF Bomber Command RAF Bomber Command controlled the Royal Air Force's bomber forces from 1936 to 1968. Along with the United States Army Air Forces, it played the central role in the Strategic bombing during World War II#Europe, strategic bombing of Germany in W ...

and

RAF Coastal Command RAF Coastal Command was a formation within the Royal Air Force (RAF). It was founded in 1936, when the RAF was restructured into Fighter, Bomber and Coastal commands and played an important role during the Second World War. Maritime Aviation ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. The

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

-era Valiant

V bomber The "V bombers" were the Royal Air Force (RAF) aircraft during the 1950s and 1960s that comprised the Nuclear weapons and the United Kingdom, United Kingdom's strategic nuclear strike force known officially as the V force or Bomber Command Mai ...

was another Vickers product.Force V: The history of Britain's airborne deterrent, by Andrew Brookes. Jane's Publishing Co Ltd; First Edition 1 Jan. 1982, , p.29, 30,31. Military aircraft with the Vickers brand: Vickers also competed for contracts with designs such as: *

Victory Bomber The British "Victory Bomber" was a Second World War design proposal by British inventor and aircraft designer Barnes Wallis while at Vickers-Armstrongs for a large strategic bomber. This aircraft was to have performed what Wallis referred to as ...

Vickers Type 559 The Vickers Type 559 was a supersonic interceptor aircraft design by the British aircraft company Vickers-Armstrongs and was their submission for Operational Requirement F.155 in 1955. It was not accepted for further consideration; the most va ...

– 1950s high altitude supersonic interceptor * Vickers Type 010 Swallow – 1950s supersonic interceptor * Vickers Type 581 - 1950s swing-wing bomber project

Vickers Canada

Canadian Vickers Vancouver The Canadian Vickers Vancouver was a Canadian transport/patrol flying boat of the 1930s built by Canadian Vickers. It was a twin-engine, equal-span biplane. The hull was of metal and the rest of the structure of fabric-covered wood. Development ...

Canadian Vickers Vanessa The Canadian Vickers Vanessa was a Canadian biplane transport floatplane of the 1920s evaluated by the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and used briefly for delivering air-mail. Design and development The Vanessa was developed as a private ventur ...

Canadian Vickers Varuna The Canadian Vickers Varuna was a Canadian flying boat of the 1920s built by Canadian Vickers as a twin-engined, unequal-span biplane, with a wooden hull and steel tube structure. Design and development The Varuna was developed in response to a ...

Canadian Vickers Vedette The Canadian Vickers Vedette was the first aircraft designed and built in Canada to meet a specification for Canadian conditions. It was a single-engine biplane flying boat purchased to meet a Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) demand for a smaller ...

Canadian Vickers Velos The Canadian Vickers Velos was a Canadian twin-engined float-equipped sesquiplane designed and built by Canadian Vickers Limited in 1928. Designed for survey work, it proved difficult to fly and only one was built. Operator ; *Royal Canadian A ...

* Canadian Vickers Vigil * Canadian Vickers Vista

Missiles and other weapons

*"Upkeep" and "Highball"

bouncing bomb A bouncing bomb is a bomb designed to bounce to a target across water in a calculated manner to avoid obstacles such as torpedo nets, and to allow both the bomb's speed on arrival at the target and the timing of its detonation to be predeterm ...

s *

Tallboy bomb Tallboy or Bomb, Medium Capacity, 12,000 lb was an earthquake bomb developed by the British aeronautical engineer Barnes Wallis and used by the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the Second World War."Medium capacity" refers to the ratio of bomb ...

Grand Slam bomb The Bomb, Medium Capacity, (Grand Slam) was a earthquake bomb used by RAF Bomber Command against German targets towards the end of the Second World War. The bomb was originally called Tallboy Large until the term Tallboy got into the press a ...

* UB.109T – Company designation was Vickers 825. * Blue Boar – Air-to Surface television-guided

glider bomb A glide bomb or stand-off bomb is a standoff weapon with flight control surfaces to give it a flatter, gliding flight path than that of a conventional bomb without such surfaces. This allows it to be released at a distance from the target rather ...

from the 1950s. * Green lizard – Surface-to-air missile project from the 1950s. * Orange William – Anti-tank missile project from the late 1950s. *

Red Dean Red Dean, a rainbow code name, was a large air-to-air missile developed for the Royal Air Force during the 1950s. Originally planned to use an active radar seeker to offer all-aspect performance and true fire-and-forget engagements, the valve ...

– Air-to-air missile project. *

Red Hebe Red Hebe was a large active radar homing air-to-air missile developed by Vickers for the Royal Air Force's Operational Requirement F.155 interceptor aircraft. It was a development of the earlier Red Dean, which was not suitable for launch by the ...

– Air-to-air missile project. *

Vickers Vigilant The Vickers Vigilant was a British 1960s era MCLOS Wire-guided missile, wire-guided anti-tank missile used by the British Army. It was also licence-built in the United States by Clevite for the US Marine Corps, and sometimes known as Clevite roun ...

* R.A.E. - Vickers Transonic Research Rocket

Civilian aircraft

Vickers was a pioneer in producing

airliner An airliner is a type of airplane for transporting passengers and air cargo. Such aircraft are most often operated by airlines. The modern and most common variant of the airliner is a long, tube shaped, and jet powered aircraft. The largest ...

s, early examples being converted from

Vimy Vimy lemish: Wimi or ; ) is a commune in the French department of Pas-de-Calais. Located west of Vimy is the Canadian National Vimy Memorial dedicated to the Battle of Vimy Ridge and the Canadian soldiers who were killed during the First Wor ...

bombers. Post-WWII, Vickers went on to manufacture the piston-engined

Vickers VC.1 Viking The Vickers VC.1 Viking is a British twin-engine short-range airliner derived from the Vickers Wellington bomber and built by Vickers-Armstrongs, Vickers-Armstrongs Limited at Brooklands near Weybridge in Surrey. After the Second World War, ...

airliner, the

Viscount A viscount ( , for male) or viscountess (, for female) is a title used in certain European countries for a noble of varying status. The status and any domain held by a viscount is a viscounty. In the case of French viscounts, the title is ...

and

Vanguard The vanguard (sometimes abbreviated to van and also called the advance guard) is the leading part of an advancing military formation. It has a number of functions, including seeking out the enemy and securing ground in advance of the main force. ...

turboprop airliners and (as part of BAC) the

VC10 The Vickers VC10 is a retired mid-sized, narrow-body long-range British jet airliner designed and built by Vickers-Armstrongs, Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd and first flown at Brooklands, Surrey, in 1962. The VC10 is often compared to th ...

jet airliner, which was used in RAF service as an

aerial refuelling Aerial refueling ( en-us), or aerial refuelling ( en-gb), also referred to as air refueling, in-flight refueling (IFR), air-to-air refueling (AAR), and tanking, is the process of transferring aviation fuel from one aircraft (the tanker) to ano ...

tanker until 2013. * Vickers Vimy Commercial *

Vickers Vulcan The Vickers Vulcan was a British single-engine biplane airliner of the 1920s built by Vickers Limited at Brooklands, Brooklands Aerodrome, Surrey. It carried eight passengers and a pilot. Development The Vickers Vulcan was designed by Regin ...

(1920s) * Vickers Type 170 Vanguard (1923) * Vickers Viastra *

Vickers Vellox Vickers was a British engineering company that existed from 1828 until 1999. It was formed in Sheffield as a steel foundry by Edward Vickers and his father-in-law, and soon became famous for casting church bells. The company went public in 18 ...

Vickers Viscount The Vickers Viscount is a retired British medium-range turboprop airliner first flown in 1948 by Vickers-Armstrongs. A design requirement from the Brabazon Committee, it entered service in 1953 and was the first turboprop-powered airliner. T ...

Vickers Viscount variants The Vickers Viscount was a medium-range airliner driven by four turboprop engines. The type was designed and manufactured in the United Kingdom from 1948 to 1963. Prototypes ;Type 630 :First prototype, with short fuselage (74 ft 6 i ...

Vickers Vanguard The Vickers Vanguard was a short/medium-range turboprop airliner designed and produced by the British aircraft manufacturer Vickers-Armstrongs. The Vanguard was developed during the mid-to-late 1950s in response to a specification issued by ...

* Vickers V-1000 – not completed *

Vickers VC10 The Vickers VC10 is a retired mid-sized, narrow-body long-range British jet airliner designed and built by Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd and first flown at Brooklands, Surrey, in 1962. The VC10 is often compared to the larger Soviet Ily ...

Marine engines

Vickers-Armstrongs was one of the few British manufacturers of marine

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after the German engineer Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which Combustion, ignition of diesel fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to Mechanics, mechanical Compr ...

s, notably for

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

S, T-class and

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

n submarines during World War II.

Civilian Target and Sporting Rifles

After the Great War Vickers needed to diversify when the military contracts ended. Between WWI and the Second World War they introduced ranges of target and sporting rifles and shotguns, the most successful of which were their small-bore .22 rimfire target rifles. These were serious competitors to the Birmingham Small Arms equivalent products, and Vickers .22 target rifles were at the top of the major competitions' results for more than a decade. Initially these rifles were named solely for Vickers, but, after the 1927 amalgamation with Armstrongs, they became Vickers Armstrongs' products. See referenc
Vickers and Vickers-Armstrongs Martini target rifles and Sporting guns

In fiction

* In ''

The Adventures of Tintin ''The Adventures of Tintin'' ( ) is a series of 24 comic albums created by Belgians, Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, who wrote under the pen name Hergé. The series was one of the most popular European comics of the 20th century. By 2007, a c ...

'' comic ''

The Broken Ear ''The Broken Ear'' (, originally published in English as ''Tintin and the Broken Ear'') is the sixth volume of ''The Adventures of Tintin'', the comics series by the Belgian cartoonist Hergé. Commissioned by the conservative Belgian newspaper ...

'', the role of Vickers-Armstrongs in the

Chaco War The Chaco War (, Basil Zaharoff Sir Basil Zaharoff (born Zacharias Basileios Zacharoff; 6 October 1849 – 27 November 1936) was a Greek arms dealer and industrialist. One of the richest men in the world during his lifetime, Zaharoff was described as both a "merchant of death" ...

selling cannon and ordnance to both warring countries. * A handgun described in a trial of

Walter Mitty Walter Jackson Mitty is a fictional character in James Thurber's short story " The Secret Life of Walter Mitty", first published in ''The New Yorker'' on March 18, 1939, and in book form in '' My World—and Welcome to It'' in 1942. Thurber loo ...

's alter ego is a .50 caliber Webley-Vickers revolver.

References

Bibliography

* * * Lynch, Brendan. ''Yesterday We Were in America - Alcock and Brown - First to fly the Atlantic non-stop''. Yeovil, England: Haynes Publishing, 2009 *

External links

Vickers and Vickers-Armstrongs Martini Target Rifles and Sporting Guns
''Flight'' 1961
Vickers Photographic Archive
{{Authority control Defunct manufacturing companies of the United Kingdom Defunct firearms manufacturers of the United Kingdom Defunct aircraft manufacturers of the United Kingdom Defunct shipbuilding companies of the United Kingdom Scotswood British companies established in 1927 Manufacturing companies established in 1927 Vehicle manufacturing companies established in 1927 Manufacturing companies disestablished in 1977 1927 establishments in England 1977 disestablishments in England Defunct manufacturing companies of England British Shipbuilders Former submarine builders

History

Break-up

Businesses

Armaments

Shipbuilding

Military vehicles

Aviation

Military aircraft

Vickers Canada

Missiles and other weapons

Civilian aircraft

Marine engines

Civilian Target and Sporting Rifles

In fiction

See also

References

Bibliography

External links