“This was an extremely important matter, not by any means solely from the point of view of the Sopwith Co., but much more from the point of view of the French and American Armies in the field, who had then no fighting machines coming forward for the 300 Hispano at all.
“When Harry arrived and I pointed out to him that he must not be too particular, explaining to him the very serious position of matters, he did not hesitate for a moment, but took the machine straightaway in the air, and as there was some little question as to its strength, he gave it a thorough good rolling, spinning, and diving, just to make quite sure it was all right.
“It was so characteristic of the man in showing his complete absence of fear, even when there might be a doubt in his mind as to the capabilities of the machine. As a matter of fact, when this machine was stressed, it was found to be very seriously weak, and before it was put into production it was, of course, stiffened up.
“There is one other characteristic little incident that occurred as illustrating his outspokenness when he knew a machine was not right.
“I took him to the sheds of a certain very famous designer and constructor at Villacoublay to show him the new machine which had just been offered for test to the Technical Section of the French Government, and was supposed to be going to do all sorts of wonderful things.
“It was a weird affair, and its designer and constructor happened to be in the shed at the time. Harry had a careful look over the whole machine and made one or two caustic comments to me. I then introduced him to the designer, who was a fairly tall man, and Harry, looking at him squarely with his brown eyes, enquired which way up the machine was intended to fly!
“It was a tense moment, but Harry’s obvious sincerity completely disarmed the designer, and they went into a discussion of the pros and cons. Unfortunately I have no capacity for describing incidents of this sort, but it really was very comic, for it never occurred to Harry that his remark might cause offence: the design was wrong, and that’s all there was to it!
“I need hardly say he was correct in his views, as the machine never did anything except kill a couple of people: which was what Harry said it would do.
“On another occasion there was a big four-engined Blériot. Harry was on the field when this machine crashed at its first flight. The pilot, I believe, was paid one thousand francs for every minute he remained in the air. Harry was aghast at the whole machine and that it should ever go into the air. He foretold precisely what happened when it was flown.
“The tail twisted off, and the machine, after falling like a stone, caught fire.