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Aviation History
1913
1913 - 0879.PDF
So F. CODY- THE M IT is with a sense of personal as well as national loss that we sit down to pen our contribution to the mass of appre ciation and sympathy which has been called forth by the tragic death of Colonel S. F. Cody while flying the machine with which he had hoped to have added yet another success to his aerial career, in the shape of the Round - Brit ain prize. So muc h has been written of Cody, the aviator and the man, that it is difficult for us to know where to begin or what to say without once more traversing the ground that others have trodden al ready. More over, the loss that British aviation has sustained,and the affection inspired by the man as we knew him, make it doubly diffi cult for us to express what we feel in this, one of the most tragic moments in the history of aviation in this country. Not since the death of poor Rolls has any- thing hap pened to leave those who have an active interest in the movement with such a keen sense of the tragical and of really personal loss, for Cody was a magnetic personality, and attracted everyone who came into contact with him even casually. Cody was of the real type of which pioneers are made. In the face of discouragement and disaster which would have driven any less enthusiastic or indomitable man to utter despair, he persevered, always with an abiding faith in himself—a faith which latter days showed to be fully justified—until, at last, success came his way. That he should have been thus cut off just when it looked as S. F. CODY.—A characteristic pcrtrait of [IS WORIi. though he were to reap the full reward of his pluck and perseverance seems doubly hard, but it is often thus, and the only consolation his family and friends have in their loss is that he died as he would have wished—in the very act and fact of working for the furtherance of that great movement he loved. With all respect to the occasion and to the sorrow of the be reaved who remain on earth, one may be per- mitted to hope that the spirit of S. F. Cody was able to know some thing of his funeral cere mony. To have seen the crowds that lined the way- side, many deep, from his simple home near North Camp Station at Aldershot, all the way along the two and a-half mile route, that wound its way to the military ceme tery on the hill-top, would have brought home to the dead man how [deeply he had cut his name in the hearts of the people. It is said that no fewer than a hun dred thousand men, women «• Flight" Copyright. and children this famous aviator who-was killed last week, thus paidtheir last token of respect to Cody. Certain it is that there has never been a more impressive funeral at Aldershot, where there have been many funerals of note ; and certain it is also that no individual has ever drawn into his cortege such a com pletely representative gathering of his life's companions as followed on Monday of this week the gun-carriage that took Cody's remains to the grave. For nearly a mile the road was filled with the solemn procession, headed by the Pipers of the Black Watch. 905
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