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Alfred
Herrmann was born in Brussels in 1895. With the end of the First World War he
undertakes studies of engineer at the university of Brussels where he
specializes in the aeronautical construction industry. As soon as graduate,
he integrated in France first
the factories of manufacture of Farman planes then a whole new factory of
aeronautical construction, the "Ateliers des Mureaux" of the Pélabon brothers
and he will pass his pilot's license there..
Of
return in Belgium in 1924, Alfred Herrmann reaches a post of technical
director within the company
ACAZ,
company which had like main goal the construction of entirely metal planes. He
then directs the construction of ACAZ T1 and T2, planes drawn by the the
famous engineers Alfred Renard, who became a close relation, and Emile Allard. Then he draws in
its turn the plans of a new fighter intended for the Belgian Air Force,
C2.
Rene Bulté will assist him in his functions at the time of the construction of
the aircraft.
Acaz T1 |
Acaz C2 |
In 1928, Alfred Herrmann
and some friends created a new company,
Ateliers Fred
Herrmann, in which he participated in the manufacture of the De
Glymes DG X, a two-seater aircraft designed by his friend the engineer Raoul
de Glymes de Hollebecque. The aircraft equipped with a 100 HP
Renard engine was registered in the register of Belgian registration
certificates from 1931 to 1935 under registration 00-AKV. In 1931, pilot R.
Van de Velde, owner of this elegant single-engine, carried out the
Brussels-Nuremberg-Vienna raid (1400 km) in nine hours of flight, that to say
with an average of 155 km/h. On August 22 of the same year, R. Van de Velde
won first place during an air rally organized by the Royal Flying Club of
Belgium, which allowed him to equip the aircraft with a splendid compass,
because the prizes consisted of vouchers for the purchase of aeronautical
equipment. The DG X flew for several years and was removed from the registers
on May 8, 1935 for an unknown reason.
On July 7, 1931, the Ateliers Fred Herrmann company went into voluntary
liquidation.
De Glymes DG X
In 1929, Alfred Herrmann leaves
the aeronautical world, abandons whife and children and leaves to settle in
Romania where he reaches a post of director of a gas works located at Galatz.
He will be also named with the function of Consul of Belgium. He returns to
Belgium at the end of the 1950s where he
will work a few times in Belgonucléaire.
In 1974 he writes an article entitled "A
propos de la mort de Charles Lindbergh"
Some photographs collected by Alfred Herrmann
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