Charles Burnett III did not really care what vehicle he drove as long as it was either fast or powerful. At Newtown Park, his country pile near Lymington, Hampshire, classic roadsters shared parking spaces with Chieftain tanks and other military vehicles, which Burnett would drive along the country lanes close to his estate — much to the surprise of passers-by.
Scion of the Garfield Weston family, one of the wealthiest in Canada, Burnett also kept a collection of historical aircraft, including a Harvard military trainer, which could take off from a Second World War airstrip that he had restored in the grounds of his home.
In this multimillionaire’s playground Burnett would bring his “toys” out to play during lavish parties. He once staged re-enactments of battles on his grounds, complete with mock air raids and tank attacks. Party guests were required to turn up in military uniforms, some of which were in questionable taste. “Some people are so busy trying to make money that they never get time to enjoy it,” said Burnett. “I decided early on that this was not for me.” A man of his word, he was said to have spent £100,000 on his own 40th birthday party.
Local opinion was divided about his war games party in 2007 — between anger and cold annoyance. Some of his neighbours were quoted as saying that he had brought “the Blitz” to their sleepy corner of Hampshire, with explosions shaking their windows. He managed to mollify some by inviting them to another party at which the Red Arrows gave a private demonstration.
The well-built, loud-shirted, stetson-wearing Burnett always stood out at such events. Yet at closer quarters he was surprisingly shy, well mannered and softly spoken. While his guests were having fun, he sometimes locked himself away, a Gatsbyesque figure working at his desk. He was wary of strangers, especially if he suspected they wanted money, but his generosity to causes he cared about was notable.
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Like Gatsby he had a tendency to see the world in different colours, and he was at his happiest when he was making mischief — one of his parties featured a row of confessionals where guests were required to reveal their sins before gaining entry to a room called “Heaven”.
Although Burnett had an American father and Canadian mother, he was born in Britain and when breaking world speed records he liked to wrap himself in the Union flag. It featured prominently when he celebrated breaking one of the stranger land-speed records — for a steam-powered vehicle. In 2009 Burnett drove the Inspiration, which became known as the “fastest kettle in the world”, at an average of 139.8mph at Edwards Air Force base in California.
The day after breaking the record he turned to his test driver, Don Wales, grandson of the former land-speed record holder Sir Malcolm Campbell, and invited him to set a new one. He took Wales and his team to a Beach Boys concert, then assembled them at Edwards Air Base the next morning. After turning off some of the safety equipment Wales took Inspiration to a top speed of 160mph and an average speed of 148.3mph, beating Burnett’s record. “He prided himself on bringing joy to those around him,” said Colin Stocker, a close friend.
Although his extravagance knew no bounds — he had three aircraft hangars on his estate, one filled with cars, another with aircraft and a third with boats — he was also a lover of nature, and became the main sponsor of Tiggywinkles wildlife hospital in Buckinghamshire. He took a particular interest in the plight of the hedgehog, but his largesse extended to domestic pets. One friend recalled being with him on the Isle of Man when he found an injured cat. He chartered a private plane to fly it back to England for treatment.
Charles Ryland Burnett III was born in London in 1956, the only child of Charles Burnett Jr, a businessman from Richmond, Virginia, and Miriam Weston Burnett. His mother was the eldest of nine children of Willard Garfield Weston, who was the founder of Associated British Foods, a conglomerate with retail interests including Primark and Kingsmill. Charles spent a good deal of his childhood travelling between family homes in England, Bermuda and South Africa.
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After his father was incapacitated by encephalitis, Burnett had to spend much of his childhood surrounded by nurses and carers and he later spoke of missing a father figure. He attended Pine Crest school in Fort Lauderdale, then studied science at Rice University in Houston and at the University of Richmond, Virginia.
He started his career in business by opening a nightclub in Houston. “I’m not an early riser, so I guessed this would be an intelligent choice,” he said. He moved to London in the mid-1980s and launched Los Locos in Covent Garden, one of the first Tex-Mex eateries in the capital, featuring “tequila girls” selling shots. It made money and he opened a second restaurant.
A man who marched to the beat of his own drum, and was notoriously late for everything, Burnett turned his attention to reducing car fumes in London. He formed a venture to convert black cabs to run on greener fuels, but found that London taxi drivers, conservative by nature, were not ready for a green-fuel revolution. Undeterred, Burnett bought a company in the Netherlands called Prins and developed the first gaseous injection system for passenger cars that would let them run on liquid petroleum gas (LPG) and compressed natural gas (CNG). He claimed that the cost of converting a vehicle could be recovered in 18 months. It was the venture of which he was most proud.
His “need for speed” first manifested itself on the water. Through his company Vulture Ventures he won the Class 2 offshore powerboat world championship for four years running between 1993 and 1996 in a sleek two-pronged powerboat, Cultured Vulture.
His interest in steam-powered vehicles started when his friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu introduced him to a student steam-car project at the University of Southampton. He decided that their theoretical plans deserved to be turned into reality and his pursuit of the record became a passion.
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The British-built vehicle consisted of 7.7m of lightweight carbon fibre and aluminium bodywork, which enclosed 12 boilers that could generate steam at 400C to power the turbines, as well as 3km of steel tubing. Developing a vehicle that was lightweight, safe and capable of generating such heat took a decade.
After the death of his mother in 2008, Burnett inherited her share of the Garfield Weston family fortune. Until then he had subsisted on an annual allowance of about £25 million. He gave money to many causes, including military charities such as Help for Heroes and the RAF Benevolent Fund. He also endowed two chairs at the Yale School of Public Health in America, which helped to improve child vaccination programmes in the UK and to curtail the spread of the ebola virus in Liberia.
Burnett never married, but over the years he rested his head on many pillows. He is survived by his girlfriend, Andra Cobb, a mother of two who was the sole survivor of the helicopter crash, near to Burnett’s 12,000-acre ranch in New Mexico, in which he died. Another victim was Roy Bennett, the Zimbabwean opposition leader. They first met after Bennett was forcibly evicted from his farm in 2003. Needless to say, Burnett became a staunch supporter of the battle for democracy in Zimbabwe.
At the time of his death he was developing another steam-powered vehicle in the hope of breaking the record again. His first vehicle, Inspiration, is displayed at the National Motor Museum in Hampshire. “While his death was premature,” said Lord Montagu, “he went in the way that he might well have chosen — at speed.”
Charles Burnett III, businessman and philanthropist, was born on May 31, 1956. He died in a helicopter crash on January 17, 2018, aged 61