Walking The Mew.
A rather belated observation here, but anyway.......
Earlier in the thread, Flying Lawyer made this comment;-
'Another snippet -
Forward visibility with the Cape config cockpit was very poor when the aircraft was on the ground. Henshaw taxiied it by walking beside the aircraft with his hand on the throttle!'
It's true to say that the 'XF's later cut-down fuselage restricted visibility. However, Alex's stunt of taxiing the Mew whilst walking alongside it was, I believe, restricted to when he first acquired the machine, long before the fuselage was cut down. I suspect that it only happened a few times early on. Viewing the surviving photos and film footage, Alex is always shown remaining seated whilst taxiing with the machine in it's cut-down configuration. If there is any evidence that he did this later I'd be interested to see it.
Today the Mew appears to some extent to be 'just' a nippy little light aircraft. In the 1930's, most pilots were still only experienced in slow, uncomplicated biplanes. This applied especially to the private pilot community. The Mew was generally viewed, unfairly, with some considerable awe and trepidation and came to Alex with that baggage. Given that he subsequently operated it day and night, heavily-loaded with an aft CofG and in a very fatigued state, we must presume that that initial trepidation had well and truly dissipated...!