The MkVI, first of the Standard Steel Crewe saloons based on the rationalised chassis and B60 F-head straight-six, had a £4500 price-tag that could buy you two Armstrong Siddeleys and leave enough change for a new MkVII Jaguar, Britain’s other 100mph luxury saloon. Then again, it wasn’t really in the Bentley’s price bracket. If the appeal and prestige of the Bentley is still understood today, it’s harder to get a sense of the Armstrong’s place in the hierarchy of British luxury cars well up-scale of a Humber or a Wolseley, it came with a hard-earned reputation for sound engineering and construction but lacked the instant recognition of the Bentley as a glamour car. Imposing enough to be chauffeured in, yet handy enough to be owner-driven when the mood or moment was right, these saloons were the pinnacle of boardroom ambition in early ’50s Britain. These were not merely status symbols but necessities of life for the managing directors and company chairmen for whom long-distance travel was a requirement before email and conference calls. Thus, to own a MkVI Bentley or an Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire 346 was the wealthy man’s passport out of this ’50s motoring strife. Journeys that take a few hours on our modern high-speed roads could be a day’s slog in the ’50s, as you dodged the cyclists, grindingly slow heavy goods vehicles, buses and coaches (which accounted for 40% of trips) and bumbling ageing pre-war saloons.įighting for every inch of road put comfort and acceleration at a premium for the long-distance motorist who didn’t have to worry much about fuel economy or initial outlay.
MAGIC ENGINE SAPPHIRE DRIVERS
Motorways were years away, and with few bypasses drivers had to motor straight through the middle of our already congested towns and cities on the way to somewhere else. With only 30% of journeys being taken by car in the early ’50s, very little money had been spent on any road infrastructure that supported the increasingly numerous private motor car as a mass means of travel. It’s better than a pushbike, and more convenient than British Railways, but faced with the realities of Britain’s roads circa 1953 it would be a vehicle you would find severely wanting. Petrol is off the ration and you can go where you please in this under-geared nightmare with Rexine seats and glacial acceleration. With every plucky, morale-boosting triumph, such as the conquering of Everest or Roger Bannister’s sub-four-minute mile, there seemingly followed a correspondingly humiliating kick in the goolies, be it a spy scandal, Suez or Comet aircraft falling from the sky.īut let’s say, having dodged the choking smog, polio, National Service and capital punishment, you manage to get yourself a modest family saloon.
Sound good? But before you fire up the time machine it’s worth pointing out that the ’50s had its frustrations. Where you were not made to feel guilty about every past supposed misdeed of a country that, rather than being hobbled by self-loathing (and despite having been smashed and bankrupted by a World War), still believed in itself as an industrial entity that actually made things, while at the same time leading the world in the technologies that would come to define the second half of the century: jet engines and computers. Imagine, if you will, a world where you didn’t want to smash your car radio to bits with a lump hammer whenever you tuned in to the BBC. No speed limits out of town, few parking restrictions and a fraction of the traffic and population density it sounds like a kind of utopia. Motoring in the 1950s, like so much else about post-war Britain, was an activity that bears almost no relationship to our modern, highly regulated experience. For the latest classic car news, features, buyer’s guides and classifieds, sign up to the C&SC newsletter here
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