Pictures from the Heritage Trust

This picture of a Siddeley Deasy Limousine with what we assume is a luggage trailer is not only surprising but an intriguing insight into life at the time.

First let us consider the car. It is an open drive six cylinder long wheel based Limousine powered by a 4962cc  Knight sleeve valved engine. Note the double radiator width which was also augmented by a small radiator fitted between the dumb irons at the front of the vehicle. Through the wire wheels the brake drums for the two wheel braking system can be clearly seen. The battery box on the running board suggests electrically powered lighting and the Sphinx sitting on the radiator cap has quite an air!

Memories of ‘LOADING’ the car in preparation for the annual big holiday trip may well still cause nightmare memories to many car owners. Today, air travel has perhaps made people more aware of the need to save weight and the cost of failing to do so.

Back in the time of horse drawn carriages families would travel distances to visit friends which were governed by the stamina of the horses. The writers’ paternal grandfather was coachman to a very rich jute manufacturer in Dundee who had an estate at a little distance away in Perthshire. Driving a  ‘four in hand’ allowed for visits to more distant friends which usually extended over a weekend to rest the horses before the return trip. Journeys to distant towns or cities were mostly accomplished by rail.

With the arrival of the automobile, which unlike horses did not suffer from fatigue, came the freedom to travel greater distances and return later on the same day.

For grandfather’s employer the annual holiday meant six weeks in Cornwall where a group of friends met up each year. Chauffeur and car loaded with luggage was sent off on the approximately 550 mile journey some three days before the family who then followed by rail.

When we first saw the picture we were reminded of the single wheel attachment fitted behind the Armstrong Siddeley 346 Sapphire in the picture below.

This piece of equipment was commonly known as a ‘fifth wheel’ and carried instrumentation which gave real road performance data to the development engineers, for example being independent of the car’s systems it recorded very accurate road speed.

Footnote.  At Heritage we take great care of our pictures and negatives. Before coming into our care some have suffered over time as a result of careless storage, this unusual and rare picture of the ‘fifth wheel’ is one of such. We have done our best to make it clearly illustrate the methods of the time.