The Hon. Charles Stewart Rolls meets Henry Royce at the Midland Hotel, Manchester on 4th May 1904 / 122nd Memorial Lunch, Warsaw May 2nd 2026

May 4th again!

My sentimental celebration of the 122nd anniversary meeting of Sir Charles Rolls and Sir Henry Royce at the Midland Hotel Manchester on 4th May 1904 rolls around again. This historic event was customarily celebrated by the CCC and the Secretary of the RREC Polish Section at the Hotel Bristol in Warsaw, Poland. However, this year the location of a newly established tradition needed to be different.

Fig. 1 In 1908, Rolls had the 70 hp 40/50 chassis number 60785 sent to the well-regarded H.J. Mulliner coachbuilding company, and fitted with a unique body. Officially a roadster style, it featured a large rear platform for storing the wicker basket of a small hot air balloon, and even had patent leather flexible rear fenders to make loading and unloading the basket much easier. It quickly picked up the unofficial name of the Balloon Car.

Fig. 2  Charles Stewart Rolls (left) and Miss Vera Hedges Butler (center) in the gondola of a gas balloon. The lady at right has been identified by a reader as the Hon. Mrs. May Constance Assheton Harbord (née Cunigham), who was the first woman in the United Kingdom to earn an aeronaut’s certificate. The gentleman to the rear is not known at this time.

The Hon. Charles Rolls, co-founder of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, was famous for his consumption of champagne during balloon flights in the 1900s. In 1901, he adventured in a balloon named The City of New York over Sidcup, Kent. As travelling companions he took Vera Hedges Butler (the daughter of Frank Butler, a wealthy wine merchant who helped found the Royal Automobile Club) and Stanley Spencer (aeronaut and professional balloonist). They grandly ‘sipped champagne’ while discussing the formation of the Royal Aero Club. The ‘Rolls champagne’ may well have been Charles Heidsieck, well known and appreciated in Royal European circles and Edwardian England (particularly by 'Bertie' - Edward VII).

SIR HENRY ROYCE (March 27th.1863 - April 22nd.1933)

DRIVEN BY PERFECTION

·                  Any look at his remarkable life work reveals a driven, even obsessive character with a relentless work ethic forged in childhood poverty and frequent adversity. 

              The quest for perfection extended to every aspect of Royce’s professional and personal life

·                  His famous maxim “Strive for perfection in everything you do. Take the best that exists and make it better” still informs and inspires the company’s activities today.

“Sir Henry Royce bequeathed to the world an extraordinary legacy of engineering innovation and achievement. He also left us, his successors at Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, an unequivocal instruction: ‘Strive for perfection in everything you do. Take the best that exists and make it better’. Sir Henry himself lived out this maxim in every aspect of his personal and professional life. Today, as we mark the 160th anniversary of his birth, his challenge still informs and inspires everything we do. It serves as a constant reminder that perfection is a moving target: it is never ‘done’. There is always something we can refine, adjust, rework, reinvent or innovate in our pursuit of perfection; and that is what makes our life and work here so exciting.”

Torsten Müller-Ötvös, Former Chief Executive Officer, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars

[Courtesy of the Rolls-Royce Press Club]

Yes, of course a commemoration such as this was not easy to arrange as it is always  a Polish national holiday weekend and everyone is away! Friday the 1st May was known in the past as Labour Day and is now a state holiday. I stocked up on food and champagne to stylishly celebrate 'The Meeting'. Our Rolls-Royce celebration took place on Saturday afternoon May 2nd.

In the present war climate of fraught notions of sovereignty and the apparent abandonment by too many in political power of international law and moral values, this Constitution Day was particularly emotional and intensely nationalistic. 

The first written constitution in Europe was promulgated in Poland on May 3 1791, emerging from a peculiarly Polish obsession with the notion of national sovereignty and personal freedom. ‘For your freedom and ours!’ was the cry in many foreign engagements on the side of liberty. King Stanisław Augustus was triumphantly carried shoulder high through the streets of the capital upon its proclamation.

Based on Enlightenment principles, it created an hereditary monarchy, reformed the government and limited the powers of the szlachta (Polish gentry). The day is still a public holiday in Poland marked by mounted military parades in full 17th Century costume and modern camouflage dress, folk dancing and re-enactments of the King’s proclamation by actors in the forecourt of the Palace on the Island in picturesque Łazienki Park. Edmund Burke celebrated this Polish Revolution by declaring in a eulogy that the constitution was ‘founded on similar principles towards the stable excellency of a British constitution.’

In response, Catherine the Great massed her Russian troops and precipitated a year long war. In 1793 the defeated Poles were forced to rescind the constitution, Prussia and Russia gorged on more of the country and the Second Partition came into being. The same foe has created increased vigilance and concentrated defense spending in Poland once again.

The interest in older Rolls-Royce motor cars in Poland is rather limited, but for me May 4th is May 4th even if it conflicts with public holidays! However, driving our cars in dense holiday traffic on an excursion is not enjoyable. 

As a replacement activity, on Saturday afternoon, I offered at my home in Warsaw a glass of French champagne - Charles Heidsieck Brut Reserve was a favourite in Edwardian days and possibly sipped by Charles Rolls high above the Kent landscape. This together with freshly baked French puff pastry snacks, baked  chicken legs marinated in honey with salad, grilled prunes wrapped in bacon, superb chocolate mousse and other sweet goodies. Some Alsace Riesling may also have crept in!

 

Some RREC Polish Section Members gathered at lunch in Warsaw

The Secretary pouring a drop of Charles Heidsieck

For drivers with slow metabolism, I have also found an excellent German non-medicinal, non-alcoholic sparkling wine, called Dr. LO. 

Various other diversions were offered to the CCC (my Casual Car Club) and the RREC Polish Section members who attended. This rather intimate, growing commemoration tradition is a particularly pleasant occasion, leafing through many Rolls-Royce and Bentley large format books which of course included, among others, those monumental and magnificent Davide Bassoli volumes. In addition, we perused recent editions of Spirit & Speed, the brilliant Swiss Section's Alpine Eagle publication and the 20-Ghost Club News & Record magazine.

I also screened the warmly charming film The Yellow Rolls-Royce with its glittering cast, written by the brilliant Terence Rattigan: Ingrid Bergman, Rex Harrison, Alain Delon, Jeanne Moreau and Omar Sharif. 

Chassis 9JS  in the film is a 1932 Rolls-Royce Phantom II Barker Sedanca de Ville. 

A still from The Yellow Rolls-Royce

(London: National Screen Service / MGM, 1964)

RREC and CCC Members at home watching The Yellow Rolls Royce 

As darkness and a damp chill fell over parkland, the members gathered to leave. It was clear an unexpectedly memorable anniversary had evolved and been celebrated once again. 

Two close RREC friends say a late goodnight in Warsaw. Guy Pinsent in his 1958 Silver Cloud I LSGE438 and Michael Moran in his 1974 Silver Shadow SRH18723, now owned for 40 years. The windscreen slip in Polish indicates the occasion to the curious 

For me May 4th is May 4th even if it conflicts with holidays and for convenience this year, celebrated a little early !