Frederick William Hulse
Frederick Williams Hulse (1883-1956)
1883 July 07th. Born at Stoke the son of Thomas Hulse, China and Glass Dealer.
Worked for Pickering, Darby and Allday
1911 Living at Norwood, Bristol Road, near Northfield, Birmingham: Frederick William Hulse (age 27 born Stoke), Automobile Engineer. With his Mother and three brothers. Also a boarder Rowland Broughton Berkeley (age 27 born Broadway), Automobile Engineer.[1]
Designer of the B.S.A. FWD system
1939 Living at 1195 Bristol Road South, Birmingham, Mechanical Engineer
1956 May 26th. Died.
1956 Obituary.[2]
'The funeral will take place at Yardley Crematorium to-morrow of Mr. Frederick William Hulse, of Westfield. Ullenhall, a former general manager of the Small Heath Group of the B.S A. Company. Limited, who has died at Northampton aged 72. Mr. Hulse joined the B.S.A. Company in 1910 as a member of the design and development staff and acquired a considerable reputation for his successful work in connection with the development and manufacture of the Lewis machine-gun, which was produced by the company in large quantities during the 1914-18 war.
After the war he became successively work superintendent, works manager, and general manager in control of design, development and manufacture of the products of the Small Heath Group of the company, including bicycles, motor-cycles, three-wheelers, light cars, guns and rifles.
Mr. Hulse retired from his position in 1935 in order to collaborate with the Chief Superintendent of the Projectile Development Establishment (C.S.P.D.E.) of the Ministry of Supply who later, as Sir Alwyn Crowe, became Director of Projectile Development. In this capacity Mr. Hulse contributed notably to the creation and ultimate success of the rocket projectiles which were in considerable use in the later stages of the 1939-45 war as anti-aircraft and aircraft defence weapons, and also as air-to-ground missiles.
A further contribution which Mr. Hulse made to the rocket programme was his design of the first successful air-pressure operated fuse for firing rocket war-heads: these were produced in enormous quantities during the war under Mr. Hulse's consultative control.