Leslie George Frise FRAeS (2 July 1895 – 26 September 1979) was a British aerospace engineer and aircraft designer; he designed the Type 156

Bristol Beaufighter The Bristol Type 156 Beaufighter (often called the Beau) is a British multi-role aircraft developed during the Second World War by the Bristol Aeroplane Company. It was originally conceived as a heavy fighter variant of the Bristol Beaufor ...

. He was involved in the development of aircraft and gun-turret hydraulic systems.

Early life

Frise was born in Bristol,

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

, an area which is now known as

South Gloucestershire South Gloucestershire is a unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of Gloucestershire, South West England. Towns in the area include Yate, Chipping Sodbury, Kingswood, Thornbury, Filton, Patchway and Bradley Stoke. The southern p ...

. He was the son of William George Frise and Alice Cecilia Avery, of Hillside in

Westbury-on-Trym Westbury-on-Trym (sometimes written without hyphenation) is a suburb in the north of the City of Bristol, near the suburbs of Stoke Bishop, Westbury Park, Henleaze, Southmead and Henbury, in the southwest of England. The place is partly na ...

, part of Barton Regis Rural District. In November 1887 his parents took part in the same production of ''Boots at the Swan'' by Charles Selby. He was educated at

Bristol Grammar School Bristol Grammar School (BGS) is a 4–18 Mixed-sex education, mixed, Private schools in the United Kingdom, private day school in Bristol, England. It was founded in 1532 by Royal Charter for the teaching of 'good manners and literature', endowe ...

and gained a BSc degree in Mechanical Engineering from the

University of Bristol The University of Bristol is a public university, public research university in Bristol, England. It received its royal charter in 1909, although it can trace its roots to a Merchant Venturers' school founded in 1595 and University College, Br ...

. He had gained a

Merchant Venturers The Society of Merchant Venturers is a charitable organisation in the English city of Bristol. The society can be traced back to a 13th-century guild which went on to fund the 15th-century voyage of John Cabot to Canada. In 1552, it gained a mono ...

scholarship in September 1912. He was awarded a second class degree in July 1915. Early in First World War he served in the

Royal Naval Air Service The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy, under the direction of the Admiralty (United Kingdom), Admiralty's Air Department, and existed formally from 1 July 1914 to 1 April 1918, when it was merged with the British ...

(RNAS). His father died on Sunday 19 December 1943, and was buried at Canford Cemetery. His father was born in 1868 in

Yetminster Yetminster is a village and civil parish in the English county of Dorset. It lies south-west of Sherborne. It is sited on the River Wriggle, a tributary of the River Yeo, and is built almost entirely of honey-coloured limestone, which gives ...

in north-west Dorset, south of Yeovil, the son of William Frise and Harriett King. The Frise family originated from Devon.

Boulton Paul Aircraft

In 1915 he started Boulton Paul Aircraft's first aircraft factory at

Mousehold Heath Mousehold Heath is a freely accessible area of heathland and woodland which lies to the north-east of the Middle Ages, medieval city boundary of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. The name also refers to the much larger area of open ...

, Norwich to make 100

Sopwith Camels The Sopwith Camel is a British World War I, First World War single-seat biplane fighter aircraft that was introduced on the Western Front (World War I), Western Front in 1917. It was developed by the Sopwith Aviation Company as a successor to ...

. The company was previously a general manufacturing firm that had begun in 1873.

Bristol Aeroplane Company

In August 1915, Frank Barnwell rejoined Bristol Aeroplane Company and was looking for an assistant. He interviewed Leslie Frise and employed him in 1916; Frank Barnwell would become one of Bristol's main aircraft designers until his death on 2 August 1938 in an aviation accident. Barnwell developed the 1916 Bristol F.2 Fighter with Frise's assistance. FriseAileron

He invented the

Frise aileron An aileron (French for "little wing" or "fin") is a hinged flight control surface usually forming part of the trailing edge of each wing of a fixed-wing aircraft. Ailerons are used in pairs to control the aircraft in Flight dynamics, roll (or ...

, also known as the slotted aileron, in 1921, which is designed to counteract

adverse yaw Adverse yaw is the natural and undesirable tendency for an aircraft to yaw in the opposite direction of a roll. It is caused by the difference in lift and drag of each wing. The effect can be greatly minimized with ailerons deliberately designed ...

, which won him the

Royal Aeronautical Society The Royal Aeronautical Society, also known as the RAeS, is a British multi-disciplinary professional institution dedicated to the global aerospace community. Founded in 1866, it is the oldest Aeronautics, aeronautical society in the world. Memb ...

's Wakefield Gold Medal (for advances in aviation safety) awarded on 30 May 1933. The Frise aileron has an effect on

parasitic drag Parasitic drag, also known as profile drag, is a type of aerodynamic drag that acts on any object when the object is moving through a fluid. Parasitic drag is defined as the combination of '' form drag'' and '' skin friction drag''. It is named a ...

so that the total drag on both wings is the same when an aircraft executes a

roll Roll may refer to: Physics and engineering * Rolling, a motion of two objects with respect to each-other such that the two stay in contact without sliding * Roll angle (or roll rotation), one of the 3 angular degrees of freedom of any stiff bo ...

. In 1934 he developed, with Frank Barnwell, the Bristol Type 143, a monoplane with retractable undercarriage; only one prototype was made. In 1936, when Barnwell became chief engineer, Frise became chief designer. He was interviewed on the

BBC Forces Programme The BBC Forces Programme was a national radio station which operated from 7 January 1940 until 26 February 1944, when it was replaced by the BBC General Forces Programme. History Development Upon the outbreak of World War II on 1 September 1 ...

at 8pm on Monday 25 May 1942. He left as designer on Wednesday 28 July 1943, becoming chief engineer. He worked for 32 years for Bristol retiring, as chief engineer, in 1946 on grounds of ill health.

Percival Aircraft

Frise joined

Percival 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, ...

in 1948 as technical director and chief engineer. He joined Percival in November 1948. He designed a naval version of the

Percival Prince The Percival Prince is a British light transport of the early postwar period. It was a twin-engine, high-wing, cantilever monoplane of all-metal stressed-skin construction; the undercarriage was of retractable, tricycle type. Development ...

and the Percival Sea Prince. He also designed the

Percival Provost The Percival P.56 Provost is a basic trainer aircraft that was designed and manufactured by British aviation company Hunting Aircraft, Percival. During the 1950s, the Provost was developed for the Royal Air Force (RAF) as a replacement for the ...

basic trainer and a jet-powered version the Jet Provost. In 1956 he left to become Director of Special Projects with

Blackburn Aircraft Blackburn Aircraft Limited was a British aircraft manufacturer from 1914 to 1963 that concentrated mainly on naval and maritime aircraft. History Blackburn Aircraft was founded by Robert Blackburn (aviation pioneer), Robert Blackburn and Jessy ...

. At the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Barnwell memorial lecture in March 1967, he gave a lecture about the Beaufighter.

Aircraft designed

Frise was involved in the design of or lead the design team as chief engineer for the following aircraft: *

Bristol Beaufort The Bristol Beaufort (manufacturer designation Type 152) is a British twin-engined torpedo bomber designed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, and developed from experience gained designing and building the earlier Bristol Blenheim, Blenheim li ...

Bristol Blenheim The Bristol Blenheim is a British light bomber designed and built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, which was used extensively in the first two years of the Second World War, with examples still being used as trainers until the end of the war. ...

Bristol Brabazon The Bristol Type 167 Brabazon was a large British piston engine, piston-engined Propeller (aircraft), propeller-driven airliner designed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company to fly Transatlantic flight, transatlantic routes between the UK and the ...

Bristol Brigand The Bristol Brigand was a British anti-shipping/ground attack/dive bomber aircraft, developed by the Bristol Aeroplane Company as a replacement for the Beaufighter. A total of 147 were built and were used by the Royal Air Force in Malaya duri ...

Bristol Bulldog The Bristol Bulldog is a British Royal Air Force single-seat biplane Fighter aircraft, fighter designed during the 1920s by the Bristol Aeroplane Company. More than 400 Bulldogs were produced for the RAF and overseas customers, and it was one ...

Bristol Freighter The Bristol Type 170 Freighter is a British twin-engine aircraft designed and built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company as both a freighter and airliner. Its best known use was as an air ferry to carry cars and their passengers over relatively s ...

* Hunting-Percival Jet Provost *

* Percival Sea Prince

Personal life

Frise married in 1922 in Bristol; they had a son born in 1938 and a daughter in 1948. He died in Bristol aged 84. He regularly played golf competitively, in

foursomes Foursomes, also known as alternate shot, is a pairs playing format in the sport of golf. Golfers compete in teams of two, using only one ball per team, and taking alternate shots until the hole is completed. Team members take turns in teeing off ...

. He married Sybil Childs Knight, the daughter of Frederick Knight, of St Andrews, Bristol, on Saturday 29 April 1922 in

Bishopston, Bristol Bishopston is a suburb of the city of Bristol in south west England. Bishopston is around Gloucester Road ( A38), the main northern arterial road in the city and Bishop Road. Bishopston is named after the bishop of the local diocese who con ...

, at St Michael and All Angels, on the A38 (demolished in the 1990s), conducted by Rev Ridgwell Barker. His elder brother (William) Donald Frise (7 January 1894 - September 1977) married Vera Dorothy Pope on 16 June 1923. Donald's son was born on 26 May 1926, and another son, Derek Raymond King Frise, who studied English at

Jesus College, Cambridge Jesus College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Jesus College was established in 1496 on the site of the twelfth-century Benedictine nunnery of St Radegund's Priory, Cambridge, St ...

, who stood for the Conservatives in the Whitchurch Park ward in the 1999 Bristol City Council election. His son was born on 27 April 1938, at St Brenda's Maternity Hospital in Clifton. Leslie Barnaby Knight Frise, son, attended Harrow School in the early 1950s, later lived at Frampton Cotterell in the early 1970s. He married Lorna Barrett, of Harrow, in 1965, and died aged 67 on Sunday July 17 2005 in

Grass Valley, California Grass Valley is a city in Nevada County, California, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, its population was 14,016. Situated at roughly in elevation in the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range, this norther ...

. Lorna died on 22 February 2016. He has a granddaughter Julia, in California. When living on Bamville Wood at East Common, in Harpenden, his wife died on 30 July 1955. Sybil was born in 1898.

Honours and awards

Frise was admitted to the

Freedom of the City of London The Freedom of the City of London started around 1237 as the status of a 'free man' or 'citizen', protected by the charter of the City of London and not under the jurisdiction of a feudal lord. In the Middle Ages, this developed into a freedom or ...

in 1948.

References

External links

Biography

Aviation Archive
{{DEFAULTSORT:Frise, Leslie 1895 births 1979 deaths Aircraft designers Alumni of the University of Bristol British aviation pioneers Bristol Aeroplane Company British World War I pilots English aerospace engineers Fellows of the Royal Aeronautical Society People educated at Bristol Grammar School Engineers from Bristol Royal Naval Air Service aviators