1936 Phantom III (3AZ174) Freestone & Webb Drop Head Coupé owned by George Howitt

 Model                                          Phantom III

Year of Manufacture                   1936

Engine No                                   W54D

Coachbuilder                              Freestone & Webb

Registration No                          ??????

Chassis No                                 3AZ174

Body name/type                         Drop Head Coupé

Body colours                              Grey and Black

Main colour                                 Grey

3AZ174 was ‘On Test’ at Derby on 28^th August 1936 and ‘Off Test’ on 25^th September 1936 when the long type chassis, with ‘F’ rake steering, was despatched per LMS Goods Train to Rolls-Royce Lillie Hall depot. On 17^th October the chassis was sent to coachbuilder Freestone & Webb, who built a 4-seater drophead Sedanca Coupé body, to design 1774; the second body to this design on a Phantom III chassis was on 3BU136. The body number was 1225, and weighed 10 hundredweight, three pounds. The car was finished in olive green with sage wings and a fawn hood, and mottled green leather upholstery. Equipment included front and rear bumpers, wheels discs, horns, a Marchal foglamp (instead of the standard Lucas), and a rear-mounted spare wheel.

The car was completed and tested by Rolls-Royce on 12^th January 1937 after which the company issued its guarantee effective from 15^th January 1937 (see entry below). The car was registered DUC-314 by the County Council of London in January 1937.

According to Rolls-Royce records the chassis had been ordered by RSM Motors for sale to Mr A Markham of the Mayfair Hotel, London and that he had the car on 30^th January 1937. Freestone and Webb records indicate that the first owner was “Cook, Esq.”, and indeed Rolls-Royce records show Francis Cook (later Sir Francis), of 28 Mallord Street, Church Street, Chelsea, London SW and Cothay Manor, Greenham, near Wellington in Somerset, as the owner on 28^th May 1937; he put his chauffeur of one month, W Moon, through the Rolls-Royce School of Instruction in June 1938. His main residence was Doughty House, Richmond Hill, Richmond upon Thames.

Sir Francis Ferdinand Maurice Cook, 4^th Baronet and 4^th Viscount of Montserrat (1907-1978) inherited his titles on the death of his father in 1939. His father had effects valued at £671,634 for probate purposes and Francis was the main heir. Francis was an artist, musician and art historian, exhibiting at the Royal Academy. Paintings by Cook appear in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, Manchester, Northampton and Bournemouth. He was also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (1940–78) and an Associate of the Royal Society of British Artists (1938–48). Cook was a founding member of the Jersey Society of Artists, and the Jersey Artists Group. Forty Dutch pictures from the family art collection were sold to Katz of Dieren in 1939, with more being sold off after the family home of Doughty House (pictured top below) was bomb damaged in 1944 – fortunately much of the collection had been transferred to Cothay Manor (pictured bottom below) in Somerset, which he also owned.

Cook moved to Jersey in 1948 with the remaining 30 paintings from his collection. He was married seven times and was divorced six times. He is seen above at the wedding reception on 12^th December 1956 with his seventh wife, the 29-year old Mrs Bridget Pollard (née Lynch).

In June 1958 Cook sold a painting through Sotheby’s for £45 that later became known as Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi which was later sold for $450 million by Christie’s to Saudi Prince Badr bin Abdullah bin Mohammed Al Farhan. The Cook family was of the belief that the artist of the piece was Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio, a contemporary and studio mate of da Vinci.

The car was probably laid up during the War years. Then, in May 1945, major London dealer Jack Barclay Limited had the car for sale, showing its original registration number (DUC-314) and a speedometer readings of 38,001 miles. See below:

Miss Nora Hardy MacCaw of Trebah, Mawnam Smith, Falmouth, Cornwall ordered the car from Jack Barclay on 25^th May 1945 for £2,900 and traded in her Bentley 4¼-litre Park Ward Coupé B30MR for £3,900 as can be seen from the final account in the second document below, which also shows 3AZ174’s original registration number DUC-314.

Nora Hardy MacCaw (1893-1971) was a lover of both speed and style – her cars included five Derby Bentleys, two Phantom IIIs, a Wraith and two Silver Clouds. Nora was born in India where her father, William MacCaw, a qualified solicitor, was a partner in Kettlewell, Bullen & Co, managing agents for jute & cotton mills, tea estates and railways. Nora was a keen motorist and during WWI she joined the Red Cross and was stationed at Salonika in Greece as a chauffeur. After the War she remained in Europe and spent her summers in Biarritz with her companion Mrs Lillian A Jupp; Nora later became a resident of Monte Carlo and in the 1950s she owned Villa Sauber – now part of the Monaco Museum complex – in Boulevard des Bas-Moulins. She is recorded in Rolls-Royce records as still owning 3AZ174 in August 1954, when she was living in Monaco, where she died in 1971.

On 29^th October 1954 the car was sold by Jack Barclay Limited to HC Paul Limited, a used car dealer in London, for £1,050. In November 1954 William D Edwards of the Fabricated Metal Products Co, 1601-11 Mullanphy Street, St Louis, Missouri, began correspondence with the Rolls-Royce Service Centre in London about buying a Phantom III, and in December he indicated that he was interested in buying 3AZ174, which at that stage was for sale by Knightsbridge Motors Limited and is shown below. This photo was acquired by Steve Stuckey, researcher and author of The Spectre Arises, The Story of the Phantom III, Pre War Rolls-Royce as part of a collection of photos he acquired in London of cars sold by Knightsbridge Motors in Kensington. The photo was taken by Rodney Todd-White (negative no 1913, dated January 1955).

Rolls-Royce had examined the car and advised William Edwards of its condition and that the fact that it had been updated mechanically (including the fitting of solid tappets to replace the hydraulic ones fitted when new). Edwards acquired the car in March 1955.

William Edwards is recorded by the RROC’s The Flying Lady (issue 58-5 of October 1958) as having taken 3AZ174 to the RROC’s Montreal Meet where the car won first prize in the Phantom III category. Photos of 3AZ174 and its engine appeared in this issue of the magazine, with the car still bearing its UK registration plate numbered DUC-314. See below, with the full page overleaf:

In 1962 the car was owned by Chase W Phelps of Governor’s Island, New Hampshire and the car was photographed in The Flying Lady (issue 62-1, February 1962), reproduced below:

In the Rolls-Royce The Flying Lady Bazaar in issue 62-6, December 1962, Phelps advertised 3AZ174 for  sale for US$6,000. It was acquired in 1963 by Ralph A McIninch also of New Hampshire.  The McIninch family owned 3AZ174 for almost 40 years and Dick & Joyce McIninch, of Nellysford, Virginia, are recorded as attending RROC events, including:

·       2012 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance where the car won the Amelia Award – European Classic (1936–1938) – see photo below of the winning moment

·       2013 Boca Raton Concours d’Elegance where the car won Spirit of the Road Award for Phantom III motor cars

Other photos taken during the ownership of 3AZ174 by the McIninch family in the United States are reproduced below (note all three on this page still show the original UK registration number):

Then, in 2020 in The Flying Lady (issue no 20-3, 2020), Dick McIninch advertised the car for sale as shown below, with the original UK registration plate attached from which the original registration number (DUC-314) is still just discernible:

In April 2024, Joyce McIninch arranged for a local Lynchburg Virginian auction house, The Counts Realty & Auction Group, to offer 3AZ174 for sale via an online auction(see above). The online auction house, Hemmings, also advertised the car for sale. George Howitt heard about this and made a successful offer for the car before bidding had ended. 3AZ174 was shipped to the United Kingdom in early May.

This description of the history of 3AZ174 has been compiled from an examination of source documents (Rolls-Royce chassis cards, Jack Barclay records etc. provided by the RREC), Rolls-Royce car club magazines (mainly the RROC’s The Flying Lady) and information and photographs provided by the well-known researchers and authors, Steve Stuckey and Tom Clarke, together with the present owner of 3AZ174, George Howitt.