The
Nieuport & General Aircraft Co Ltd was formed before the start of the
First World War to license-produce
French Nieuport aircraft. During 1917, after hiring
Henry Folland as chief designer, the company started to design its own aircraft, with the first type, the
Nieuport B.N.1 fighter flying early in 1918. Folland designed the
Nieuport Nighthawk fighter to meet the requirements of RAF Specification Type 1 which specified using the
ABC Dragonfly radial engine, first flying in April 1919. Gloster proceeded to produce a number of derivatives of the Nighthawk, calling them
Gloster Mars, with variants being sold to
Japan (
Gloster Sparrowhawk) and Greece, and being evaluated by the
RAF. The final derivative of the Nighthawk was the
Gloster Mars X, also known as the
Nightjar. This was intended as a single-seat shipboard fighter to replace
Sopwith Camels aboard the
Royal Navy's
aircraft carriers. It was a simple conversion of surplus Nighthawks, with the
Bentley BR2 rotary engine (which was readily available from surplus stocks) replacing the Dragonfly. The Nightjar was a two-bay
biplane of wooden construction, and was fitted with a new, wide-track
undercarriage, with jaws fitted to act as
arresting gear for use with the fore and aft arrestor cables then in use on British aircraft carriers. The first Nightjar was delivered for evaluation by the
Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment in May 1921. A total of 22 Nighthawks were converted to Nightjars in 1922. ==Operational history==