Felix Amiot

Felix Amiot (Cherbourg, October 17th, 1894 - Paris, December 21st, 1974) was a French industrialist, manufacturer of Avion S, of which certain models were useful in the French Air force during the Second world war, and of war and pleasure, fishing vessels, Cherbourg, of which the fast patrol boats of the type Fighting .

History

Born in a relatively easy family, Felix Amiot passes his childhood to Cherbourg, where it contracts probably an early passion for mechanics in general and aviation in particular. In 1908, its family leaves Cherbourg to settle in Issy-les-Moulineaux, where the pioneers of aviation - Blériot, Voisin, the Farman brothers - install their hangars and carry out the tests of their machines, on a parade ground reserved for the drives of the regiments of cavalry. It is undoubtedly this proximity which encourages Felix Amiot to cross the step. In 1912, in a garage located close to the training ground of Issy-les-Moulineaux, Felix Amiot builds its first plane, a two-seater Monoplan indicated under the name of Amiot 01. In spite of the transitory existence of this apparatus (broken in 1913), Felix Amiot perseveres. In September 1913, it deposits a first bearing patent on a " delivery system for fixed or rotary spark-ignition engines to two or four temps". In September 1914, Felix Amiot commits himself going to the face. There remains until October 1915 there, date on which he is recalled to the back at the request of the Morane-Saulnier company. It is there that it develops a process of assembly of metal parts per revolutionary stamping, which interests the aircraft industry in the first chief and who draws to him the attention of Louis Loucheur, in charge of the questions of the industry of defense within the government. Squinter proposes in Amiot to take the direction of a factory of aeronautical engineering. With the financial aid of Pierre Wertheimer, in particular owner of the perfumes Chanel and Bourjois, Amiot founds his first company, the SECM (Company of Stamping and Mechanical engineering). Avenue of the Terns, in Paris, where it is installed, the SECM manufactures and repairs of Morane-Saulnier, Bréguet or Sopwith. At the end of 1917, a second workshop is installed in Colombes.En 1919, the SECM leaves the workshop of the Terns to settle in a new factory bright burning coal in Colombes. In the years 1920, and modest private planes developed were built. Other planes with use Militaire were studied and built in the years 1930. They beat some important records.

In 1929, the government forms the SGA, General society of Aeronautics by amalgamating several airframe manufacturers around Lorraine-Dietrich. The brothers Wertheimer and Amiot, just as the shareholders, recover impressive dividends. But in 1934, it is the failure. To avoid the scandal politico-soldier, the state authorizes Amiot and Bloch to repurchase the company at low prices. Amiot and the Wertheimer brothers repurchase it for a bread mouthful.

“Of Doves in Cherbourg Amiot directs the aeronautical Building sites of Normandy, EDGE, Amiot has teams of iron”. It makes wonder. Its bombers, its new models, the 370, the 350 and the 340, are recognized and admired by the Germans. However the collaboration of the SECM and the army occurs badly. Amiot makes some errors, but the ministry is also responsible for many excuses, policy change, times of payments, brutal reduction in appropriations, etc Aussi, construction in series posing problem in France, Pierre Wertheimer leaves in January 1939 to State-Plain with plans, to consider a factory of assembly with La Nouvelle-Orléans. With the declaration of war, the Wertheimer brothers very quickly leave France towards Brazil then settles in New York, charging Amiot with taking care on their goods.

June 3rd, 1940, in Le Bourget, the workshops and the factories are bombarded severely. Two days later, it is the turn of Cherbourg. June 10th, Amiot evacuates its personnel (3000 people) towards the South of France. It n the other hand obtains 3 franc million of the government in Bordeaux of its orders of pre-war period. It must repatriate its personnel in Paris. “But I succeeded in withdrawing to maintain the research department and it in free zone”, written Amiot. It precisely installs it in Vichy to try to continue to recover late payments and to be made finance. Amiot reconstitutes a factory with Marseilles and thus withdrawn many workmen from STO. This action will be recognized when one will judge his attitude during the war.

In spring 1942, employees of Amiot seek to recreate their activity. They turn to Pierre Wertheimer, become administrator of the aeronautical manufacturer Bell in the United States. The junction proves to be impossible and they try to constitute a flotilla with the colors of Free France in North Africa. F. Amiot finances its pocket a network which will succeed in making pass ten people to North Africa and also to forward of the information to English. Unfortunately the network is dismantled in May 1943 with the arrest by Gestapo of the person in charge, Yves Maurice, in Perpignan.

However Amiot has extremely to make to preserve the interests of Wertheimer: it repurchases their companies of perfumery (they will dispute after the war at the time to regulate the accounts of Bourjois and Chanel), it makes forgeries to prove that these companies are purely Aryan, and it proves its good will while joining the German company Junkers Flugzeug und Motorenwerke to build 370 planes (order of 1,2 billion francs). Amiot will have all the same some troubles without following days on behalf of Gestapo, in September 1942. But it can take again the management of the castles, factories, designers houses, stables, etc of the Wertheimer brothers and receives, as of the Release of Paris, the Général Bradley at his place, with the castle of Boissière-Beauchamps with Lévis-Saint-Name. It sends a telegram triumphing to his Wertheimer friends who return even richer than before the war.

After the war, the Wertheimer brothers set in motion procedures against Amiot to recover the maximum. But this one leaves the war in good financial position. It is somewhat worried, but leaves itself there very well. It is devoted to its Shipyards of Cherbourg, which become the Mechanical engineering of Normandy. It builds various types of boats there. It has as principal customers the skippers moment, like Olivier de Kersauson for example. Skilful business man, it conceives thanks to a good market research, the Fighting , military high-speed motorboats that the company exports in the whole world. Among those, some become famous in Christmas 1969 under the name of Vedettes of Cherbourg, while being unduly delivered to Israel, against the order of embargo of the de Gaulle General in 1969. It is then 75 years old.

Some Models

Amiot 144
Amiot 354

See too

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