For anyone wishing to answer the question, there's a book about how aircraft names are allocated:
Gordon Wansbrough-White Names with Wings; The Names & Naming Sysems of Aircraft & Engines Flown by the British Armed Forces 1878-1994 , published by Airlife a few years ago.
I've not read it properly, but it seems to offer the answer to all sorts of questions you might have about how aircraft names come about - and quite a few questions that you probably never, ever would have thought of...