Career
In 1912, while an apprentice at an engine factory, he obtained his aviator's certificate. At the beginning of World War I he joined the Royal Naval Air Service, serving as an instructor until 1917, when he succeeded in being assigned to combat duty. The Distinguished Service Cross was awarded him in September of that year. He was active in long-distance bombing until his capture by the Turks after a forced landing over the Dardanelles late in 1917. Returning to England after the end of the war, he joined Vickers, Ltd., as a test pilot, and persuaded the company to compete for the London Daily Mail prize of £10,000p10,000 for the first nonstop flight across the Atlantic. With Lieut. Arthur Whitten Brown as a navigator, he left St. John's, Newfoundland, in a Vickers-Vimy biplane using two Rolls-Royce engines, on June 14, 1919, and arrived at Clifden, Ireland, 16 hours and 12 minutes later, on June 15. Both aviators were knighted for the flight. On Dec. 18, 1919, Alcock's plane crashed 25 miles (40 km) from Rouen, France, and he died on the same day.