While the boom in newer classic cars continues all the more reason to keep Alvis cars in the public eye to show they remain useable and rewarding cars to drive.



This Speed 20 Charlesworth had a spell in the USA and was last heard of in Australia.
This Silver Eagle was last heard of in Germany a long time ago – does it survive?


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GY7177. Registration plate.
This registration was originally issued to SA Speed Twenty Chassis Number 9885 in 1932, a Vanden Plas sports, first owner C.P. Joseland. The car still exists although it ‘lost’ its registration plate in 1936 and was issued with a then current Gloucestershire plate BDD834. It was still on the car in the 1980’s when it visited Club events at Sherborne.
In 1933, 9885 was sold to the Earl of Shrewsbury and Talbot; it is not known how long he kept the SA but someone transferred GY7177 from 9885 to the SC Speed Twenty Charlesworth dhc in 1936.
In 2004 a later owner of 9885 succeeded in recovering GY7177 and put it back on 9885 so presumably the SC Charlesworth had given up the plate sometime between the pictures showing it at Crystal Palace and 2004. 9885, somewhat altered bodily, has been advertised for sale for some time.
Nick Simpson
Hi
I have the Speed 20 SC having GY 7177 registration in 1997 when it was sold to a Swiss gentleman so that was probably about the time that the registration was given up. Interestingly enough the Speed 20 SC register gives GY 7177 as its original registration so did the owner of the SA sell his car but kept the registration and put it on his next Alvis
Dave Culshaw commented: GY 7177 ~ a dual identity – this ‘Post’, reminded me that it had been one of the first of my
‘mystery’ cars, originating from when I first observed it at a Northern Alvis Day long ago, in the late Jim Betterton’s hands, bearing this registration, clearly of an earlier period.
The ‘denouement’, as it were, would take several years to unravel. It emerged that the mark GY 7177 was first applied to an SA Speed Twenty, chassis 9885. (one of several ‘GY’s in Follett’s London C.C. allocation). The first recorded owner was C. Percy Joseland , a former assistant manager at Alvis Ltd. ( Lots about him in ” The Vintage Alvis 2 ). C.P.J. did not keep it long, and it was duly acquired by the Earl of Shrewsbury. The story then moves on to the despatch of SC Speed Twenty chassis 12772, also to Follett’s, in 1935, where apparently, in an early example of Cherished Number Transfer, GY 7177, from the SA, was transferred to it. The SA ( 9885 ) then apparently was sold in the Gloucestershire area, ( where there was a prominent Alvis dealership of Haines and Strange at Cheltenham ) The Gloucester records do not show to whom it was then registered, merely that their last recorded owner was in 1960 ~ one Edwin F. Clark of Glasgow W2, after which the documents were sent to East Suffolk CC in 1965, and thence in 1971 to Central Repository.
All arcane stuff, but rewarding that both cars survive, with their later histories not in doubt.
A year or two back I provided evidence under the V 765 scheme, for 9885 ( then BDD 834 ) to revert to its original GY 7177, which it still has. Be interesting to see what happens if 12772 ever returns to the UK.