Born: 31 December 1894, United Kingdom
Died: 1960
Country most active: United Kingdom
Also known as: Mrs. Oliver Atkey, Dulcibella Evangeline Clifford
The following is republished with permission from Women Engineers’ History and was written by Nina C. Baker.
In 1923 Lord Edward Grosvenor put up a trophy for a 400-mile flying race: the “Grosvenor Challenge Cup“. The press reported that a woman was one of the entrants, thought to be the first time a woman had entered a flying race: Mrs Oliver Atkey in “a machine of the D.H. type” (Western Daily Press – Friday 15 June 1923). The time trial challenge was for British light aircraft with engines of less than 150hp and they were to fly from Lympne aerodrome in Kent. Sadly I have not found any records of how Mrs Atkey fared but the better news is that in 1955 a highly successful woman pilot – Freydis Leaf – actually won the cup.
So, who was the rather serious-looking woman preparing her plane in the picture above?
In most references to her in the press, she is given her married name in the style of those days, using her husband’s first name as well as surname, but her ‘own’ name is dramatic enough! She was born Dulcibella Evangeline Clifford on the 31st December of one of 3 years – take your pick – 1886 if you believe the census returns, 1894 if you believe her 3 different aviator’s certificates from the Royal Aero Club, or 1896 if you care to believe the 1939 ID card records.
Dulcibella was born in in Richmond, Surrey. Her father Philip Henry Clifford was a barrister, her mother Edith Neville Wodehouse was the daugher of a retired army officer and there was a sister, Margaret. Even though her father died not long after she was born they continued to live in fairly upmarket parts of London with servants so we can perhaps assume a continuing comfortable life. Unfortunately I haven’t had any luck finding out where she went to school, but it is possible she and her sister were educated at home as the 1901 census shows there was a governess living with them then. In 1911, when the census assumes she was 22, she was living on ‘private means’ with an aunt (also on private means), 2 cousins and 8 servants at 10 Queens Gate, near the Royal Albert Hall, Kensington.
The next insight into Dulcibella’s life comes in 1915 when she was serving as a nurse in a Belgian Field Hospital from April to July (see bottom line in the page of those entitled to Victory Medals, below). However if you also look at the very top of the same page you will note Dr (Surgeon) Oliver Atkey serving at the same place and time! Clearly there must have been a whirlwind romance as they were married “very quietly” with only family and a few close friends in attendance on 3rd July 1915 at Holy Trinity Church, Sloane Street, just round the corner from her family home, in Lurgan Mansions, Sloane Square.
Dulcibella’s husband was Oliver Francis Henry Atkey a medical doctor and surgeon about 8 years her senior (his birth years seem to vary too!). He had qualified as a doctor (1904) and surgeon (FRCS, LRCP 1905), who had worked at the Royal Free, Kings College and the Ormond Street childrens hospitals before taking up a post with the Sudan Medical Department, Khartoum in 1907. Medical directories still have him there in 1915 but evidently he was back in Europe for at least enough time to go to Belgium to meet and marry Dulcibella. He had a long and eminent career in the Sudan, initiating a medical school – the first in northern tropical Africa – and massively increasing the coverage of medical services for the local population. He was also active in supporting British women setting up extensive midwifery services, also with a school, and trying to stop the brutal tradition of female circumcision. He was a very sporty character – riding and polo in particular – and followed Dulcibella into flying, getting his aviator’s certificate in 1932. His services to Sudan and Egypt were rewarded with a CMG and the Order of the Nile.
It seems likely that Dulcibella mostly remained in the UK, living with her mother, whilst Oliver was away in the Sudan. Perhaps that was why she took up flying – as a thing to do while he was away. As we have seen above, she got her first aviator’s certificate in 1920 and it is significant that it is endorsed as a ‘Competitor’s certificate’ as she would be entering the Grosvenor Challenge in 1923. But before that she was in the press in 1922 for what the journalists claimed as a record length of flight by a female pilot, from Leeds to Edgeware, with a passenger:
In 1924 she flew across the Channel, still considered a newsworthy trip by a female pilot.
In 1932 the Atkeys bought a secondhand plane from the final batch of DH.60G wooden Moths from Phillips & Powis Aircraft [Reading] Ltd, Woodley, but sold it on again in 1935.
Perhaps to celebrate Oliver’s retirement and permanent return to the UK, they went on a 7 month tour of Europe in 1933, probably mostly by plane. We also know that they bought a bought a Hawk Major (G-ACWX) in August 1934. Tragically it crashed when being flown by another pilot, killing him. The plane was a write-off so they bought a newer one (G-AEGE) in April 1936, which would ultimately become one of many older planes ‘impressed’ in 1941 by the government for use as decoys in the Second World War.. This was presumably in preparation for their ambitious plan to fly from Cairo to South Africa. However the trip ended when they crashed the plane in Tanganyika. Oliver is said to have never flown again. Curiously, the first attemt at the Cairo-to-the-Cape flight, by 4 parallel teams (in 1920) included one sponsored The Times newspaper, piloted by Stanley Cockerell, which also came to grief when that flight also crashed in Tanganyika. The only team to make it all the way to Capet Town was led by Lt Col Von Reneveld (of South Africa) but he wrecked 2 planes and had to borrow a third in the process. However by thime of the Atkeys’ attempt, Imperial Airways had been running a route since 1932.
In any case the Second World War arrived. They were both too old for call-up but, living now at Latymer Court in Hammersmith, Oliver was employed by the Ministry of Health to inspect First Aid posts across London, and assist with medical provision for evacuations and Dulcibella became an ambulance attendant with the Hammersmith ARP (Air Raid Precautions).
After the war they continued to live the leisured life of the money-class, taking cruises etc. The both died in 1960, having had no children, and leaving about £110k (approx £3million today).