Razzle Dazzle

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Shuffling around a car park underneath the Euston Road, inspecting a hidden hoard of early cars, Bill Boddy paused to inspect a two-seater with a Vauxhall radiator and overhead-cam six-cylinder engine. “Some Vauxhall prototype,” he concluded, and moved on. Boddy was not given to mistakes but he had fallen for the reddest of herrings. It was the 1950s, when much of what is common motoring knowledge was then shrouded in obscurity, and the car gave no sign of its true identity. It was only after some frenzied research that he realised his error.

Straker-Squire X2

The car in question was sired by Bertie Kensington-Moir, long before he became a Bentley Boy. Family connections gave him influence within Straker-Squire and, being young, hot-blooded and liberated from the shackles of war, he determined that Straker-Squire should go racing.

The X2 experimental racer benefitted from knowledge acquired through wartime aero-engine manufacture, and it was unleashed on Brooklands as soon as it reopened in 1920. Until 1923, it ran relentlessly at Brooklands, hill climbs and sand races with great success. Then it suddenly disappeared, disguised as a Vauxhall, until the condemnation of an underground car park brought it to light.

Over time, it became well-known within the VSCC as a run of owners gradually did their bit to return it to its original specification. A few years ago, it went to Argentina but now it’s been repatriated. Mick Walsh gives it a warm homecoming in the March issue of The Automobile, on sale now.

Words by Zack Stiling. Photographs by Tony Baker.

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