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In 1903, when a canopy and windscreen were fitted, the De Dietrichwas used as the wedding car for the Hon Rupert and his brideGwendolen, daughter of the 4th Earl of Onslow. Three years later,he used the De Dietrich, fitted with a closed landaulet body, in hiscampaign when running as Unionist candidate for the East LondonHaggerston constituency.But in 1912 the De Dietrich, fitted again with its original tonneaubody, was driven into the stable at the Hon Rupert’s home, PyrfordCourt at Woking in Surrey, and put up on blocks. There it wouldstay until 1940, when a bomb dropped during a German air raiddemolished the stable. The car was undamaged and was moved tothe Guinness Dairy Farm in Old Woking, where it stood out in theopen, “a roosting place for the birds of the air and a plaything for thelocal brats”.1The Hon. Rupert Guinness aboard the De Deitrich2 and 3‘A2 101’ on the London to Brighton Run, 1950’s4‘A2 101’ crossing Westminster Bridge on theLondon to Brighton Run, 2009Then in March 1942 the ever-vigilant Bill Boddy, editor of MotorSport, published a list of 50 veteran, Edwardian and vintage carsmost at risk from the national scrap metal drive. Included in that listwas “DE DIETRICH, Type 8, four-cylinder Roi de Belge, rough, notyres, big engine, chain drive (Surrey).”Veteran Car Club committee member Francis Hutton-Stott decidedit was worth expending what little of the wartime “basic” petrolration remained in the tank of his Morgan 4/4 to take a look at thecar and realised from its automatic inlet valves, gilled-tube radiatorand flitch-plated wooden chassis that it could be no later than1903 in date. Lord Iveagh (the Hon Rupert had succeeded to thetitle in 1927) was not at home, but Hutton-Stott located the Earl’schauffeur, who recommended writing to Lord Iveagh and asking ifhe would dispose of the car to a good home. The Earl respondedthat he would be happy to give Hutton-Stott the car without chargeif he could arrange transport.A breakdown truck was quickly arranged, and the car was towedto Hutton-Stott’s home, where in due course a “firing-up” party wasarranged with luminaries of the old car world John Bolster, “Bunny”Tubbs, Laurence Pomeroy and Cecil “Sam” Clutton in attendance.Amazingly, after lying idle for 30 years, the engine fired almostimmediately and kept running. Though the clutch was inoperativeand the gear lever was missing, Clutton engaged second gear witha screwdriver and was push-started down the drive. Fortunately theclutch freed in time to avert disaster, and the car circled a flowerbedin a cloud of smoke “touching a speed that may have been 25 mphbut looked three times as fast”.4Motor Cars | 159