Oct
21
11:00am
Lunchtime Lecture (Midlands): Atlantic Furies: Elsie Mackay’s bid to be the first woman to fly the ocean
By RAF Museum
On Tuesday 21 October 2025 at 12pm, Dr Midge Gillies will consider the life and legacy of Elsie Mackay. This lecture will be hosted virtually via Crowdcast and livestreamed from the RAF Museum's Midlands site.
Talk Outline
In 1927 Charles Lindbergh became the first pilot to fly the Atlantic solo and in doing so unleashed “Atlantic Fever”. His achievement sparked a battle to find the first woman to cross the ocean in a plane and, over the following months, six teams – two from the UK and four from the USA – raced to take the title. Midge Gillies’s talk will focus on one of those attempts, led by two highly experienced and colourful flyers: Elsie Mackay and her co-pilot, Captain Walter Hinchliffe.
Mackay had already enjoyed a career as an actor and interior designer on ocean liners operated by her father, shipping tycoon, Lord Inchcape, when she turned her attention to the Atlantic. She was a glamorous socialite who also enjoyed the physical side of life – whether riding her horses or racing her silver Rolls-Royce around her home in the Scottish borders.
Her family was adamant that she should not risk her life and she was forced to plan the Atlantic crossing in the utmost secrecy. She recruited Hinchliffe, one of the most experienced pilots in the world, as her co-pilot. “Hinch”, who had lost an eye during the Great War, was wary of women flyers but won over by Mackay’s skill as a pilot and his need to earn money to support his family.
Midge will draw on her research at the RAF Museum to describe their attempt, why they were very nearly successful and the curious afterlife of their story. She will explain the prejudice women pilots faced at this time and how each of the Atlantic attempts made a contribution to aviation history. She will argue that, while we now only remember Amelia Earhart, the bravery and determination of these other women played a key part in spurring her on to secure the ultimate prize.
About Dr Midge Gillies
Dr Midge Gillies is the author of ten non-fiction books, including a biography of Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia in 1930. Midge, whose father was a Prisoner of War during the Second World War, has also written about the resourcefulness of Allied POWs in her book, The Barbed-Wire University. In Waiting for Hitler she describes the threat of invasion during the tense summer of 1940. Her latest book, Atlantic Furies examines the role of the early female pilots and the race for the title of first woman to cross the ocean by air. As with her biography of Amy Johnson, Midge made extensive use of the archives at the RAF Museum in London while researching her book. She teaches creative writing at Cambridge University and designed and teaches a programme about memoir for Granta. You can find out more about her work here: Welcome - Midge Gillies
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