At the Earls Court Motor Show of 1952 Armstrong Siddeley introduced the all new Sapphire 346 saloon to succeed the 16/18HP cars. This image is far below the quality we expect to show on our website and we will display a cleaned up image in a later news item.
The Armstrong Heritage Trust is most fortunate to have in our archives several thousand negatives which were rescued from the Armstrong Siddeley Parkside factory. Back in the 1960s and 70s history and heritage were not high priority and many companies on closure or amalgamation simply threw out papers, photographic materials and any thing not directly of benefit to the new venture. A few enlightened people rescued such items from skips and rubbish awaiting collection. Storage of such materials has not always been ideal during the ensuing 50 years but even the imperfect picture still tells a story. Modern techniques have allowed us to restore many items, albeit often a painstaking task.
Our factory negatives have been augmented by the 'snaps' taken by Ernest Siddeley who after his service during the first WW joined his father John Davenport Siddeley in the work at Parkside. This private collection was passed down through the family and was presented to the Heritage Trust by Derek Ainscow, John Siddeley's grandson and current President of the Armstrong Siddeley Owners Club.
It is our intention to release from time to time, on this page, pictures from our collections with brief explanations of their content.
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