Historic Harmsworth Mercédès back on the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run

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One of the world's most historic and original cars returns to the Brighton Run for the first time since 1971

This weekend’s London to Brighton Veteran Car Run on Sunday, November 3rd, will feature one of the finest cars ever built. It’s one of just five remaining Mercédès 60hps, and was sold for the first time since leaving the factory earlier this year. Until its recent sale, the beautifully preserved Mercédès had been in the sole possession of the Harmsworth family for 121 years.
 
The 60hp was one of the very first cars to wear the Mercédès badge. It was also one of the fastest and most expensive cars of its day, being ahead of its time in many respects. With its 9¼-litre, four-cylinder engine providing a top speed in excess of 80mph, the 60hp was the flagship of the Mercédès line. It combined unprecedented performance with an impressive chassis well-suited to stylish coachwork, and so helped to establish Mercédès's reputation for luxurious motor cars of an all-round superior quality. Just over a hundred examples were built.

This beautiful example was originally sold to publishing magnate and motoring pioneer Alfred Harmsworth, later Lord Northcliffe, in 1903. As a motor sport enthusiast, Harmsworth entered his new 60hp into various competitions, setting fastest times at the Nice Speed Week and Castlewellan Hill-Climb. The car was also the unused reserve racer for the German team in the 1903 Gordon Bennett Cup. When its motor sport career ended, Harmsworth dispatched his Mercédès to J. Rothschild et Fils in Paris for a new touring body to be fitted in the Roi-des-Belges style, reputedly so-called after King Leopold II. of Belgium had one of his cars bodied in a similar style.

The Mercédès stayed in the Harmsworth family’s possession after Lord Northcliffe's death in 1922, and in the 1950s its preservation was entrusted to the Montagu Motor Museum in Beaulieu, where it remained on display for the next six decades. During that time, it also participated in several London to Brighton Runs with high-profile drivers including Stirling Moss, Jim Clark and Lord Montagu himself at the wheel.

Following its sale in Florida earlier this year, the very special Mercédès was shipped back home to Britain to be recommissioned under the guidance of John Bentley M.B.E. in his Harrogate workshop.

“It was so original that it would have been a tragedy to have restored it, so instead we have done very, very sensitive conservation,” explained Bentley. “Aside from fitting a replicated hood and frame, as they were missing, we have done very little mechanical invasion. It drives just like it did when it left the factory in 1903. I’ve done around 150 miles so far and, hopefully, it is good to go all the way to Brighton on Sunday.”

With the presence of both the Mercédès 60hp and the 16.2-litre 1907 FIAT 130hp on the Veteran Car Run, Sunday’s event will feature two of the most important surviving racing cars from both the veteran and Edwardian eras. In total, close to 400 veteran vehicles will be leaving Hyde Park at sunrise on the jaunt to Madeira Drive on the Sussex coast. All those wishing to watch the pioneering cars en route can enjoy the sights and sounds of early motoring at the following times and locations:

6:45am                 Ceremonial tearing of red flag, Hyde Park
7:00am                 The start, Hyde Park
7:00am-8:45am    Constitution Hill
7:00am-8:45am    The Mall
7:10am-9:00am    Whitehall
7:10am-9:00am    Westminster Bridge
7:10am-9:00am    Lambeth Palace
7:20am-9:20am    Clapham Common
7:25am-9:50am    Mitcham, Surrey
7:35am-11:05am  Coulsdon High Street, Surrey
7:40am-11:05am  Merstham, Surrey
7:55am-11:35am  Redhill, Surrey
8:10am-2:00pm    Crawley, Sussex
8:25am-2:10pm    Handcross High Street, Sussex
8:30am-2:25pm    Staplefield, Sussex
8:50am-2:35pm    Cuckfield High Street, Sussex
10:00am-4:25pm  Brighton, Sussex
 
The run is just one event in the Royal Automobile Club’s London Motor Week, a seven-day celebration of all things motoring, which includes the Motoring Lectures, the 11th Motoring Book of the Year Awards, and the Art of Motoring Exhibition at the Iconic Images Gallery, a stone’s throw from Pall Mall. More information is available on the Club’s website and social media, and at www.theartofmotoring.co.uk.

Two other highlights are the RM Sotheby’s London sale and the new free-to-view St. James’s Motoring Spectacle, both taking place on the eve of the run on Saturday, November 2nd. The former now takes place at the Peninsula Hotel on Grosvenor Place and the latter right outside the Royal Automobile Club’s old-established clubhouse on Pall Mall, which is closed to through-traffic for the duration.

For more details of the event visit www.veterancarrun.com.

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