Looks like I’ll have to put you guys out of your misery! 🙂
This Wot is the Miller Biplane, built in Melbourne, Victoria by Horrie Miller in 1915.
Horrie had gone to England in late 1913 with Bob Cousins, to join fellow Australians Harry Hawker, Henry (Harry) Busteed and Henry (Harry) Kauper, to spend 12 months working at Sopwith Aviation Company. Having failed to join the RFC at the outbreak of war in 1914, Horrie Miller and Bob Cousins returned to Australia to try and join the AFC. On the voyage home, Horrie designed this Wot, inspired by the Sopwith Tabloid. The engine used was a 50hp Gnome salvaged from a damaged Bleriot that had been owned by ‘Wizard’ Stone.
Permission was sought and granted from the Department of Defence to test this Wot at Point Cook in June 1916. However, during an initial test run of the engine in a blacksmith’s shop, the uncovered aircraft, minus wings, jumped the chocks and hit the back wall and ceiling, injuring Bob Cousins. The aircraft was repaired in short order and towed behind his Fiat automobile (as pictured) to Point Cook. Horrie carried out a number of hops in this machine at Point Cook, even though he had not gone solo in previous pilot training.
AFC No.3 Squadron, of which Horrie was a member by this time, was posted overseas within a week of the test hops, so Horrie was forced to remove from Point Cook and dispose of his aeroplane. The engine was sold to Basil Watson and the airframe stored in a South Yarra garage. It is not know what happened to it subsequently.
Horrie went on to complete his flying training in England and served as a pilot in France. After the war, he returned to Australia and went into commercial aviation, setting up MacRobertson-Miller Airlines in 1928, with MacPherson Robertson, the sponsor of the 1934 London-to-Melbourne Centenary Air Race.
Source – ‘Australian Built Aircraft and the Industry Vol 1’ by Keith Meggs. (When is Vol 2 going to be printed Keith?)
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