Around 1962 a mate told me that a friend of his in the investment industry was moving to New York to work. (i suppose he's a multi millionaire now
) He was broke but full of hope and he had a 1953 346 which he still owed 150 quid on. "Do you want to buy it"? I had a look and found it an attractive enough car.....on the surface. Well i went to the bank and borrowed the money and the deal was done. Trouble was when i took delivery and drove off the front seat fell backward as it had no fittings. I was in the interesting position of being arse over head in the rear along with my natural blond, green eyed and slim Salvation Army with uniform girl friend named Mirium.She wasn't wearing the uniform at the time. We both and car ended up in a bush. Strangely people then considored a car 8 years old as a bit past it. Mind you people used to lay up their car at 20K miles as to preserve value. I had the 346 resprayed all over BRG(?) green (same colour) had the chrome fixed with the seat and generally tidied up. She seemed to have plenty of grunt for the day and at night at the up market pub in Chigwell looked like a Bentley! But the blond high heel, black stocking wearing blond wanted a more modern look so i traded to a Vauxhall Cresta 1961dripping in chrome and white walls to keep her. That Vauxhall was a good car and was by the day's standards a fast one. Being black on black it suited my bouncer, Essex boy persona. I worked at night for a club owned by the Krays. As an after thought my "Sallie' who looked VERY exotic on Sunday nights at her bedsit, went off with a bingo caller who "owned"a crappy brown colour Etype. She said," he has better prospects" but regrettably he was found in the river at Putney and it was ruled as "accidental".I never saw Mirium again. I still have awfully good memories of that Dagenham walkup bedsit with a red table lamp and Mirium in full uniform, high heels etc. when i see an Etype/Armstrong 346. Just good memories, though now seen through the famous rose glass'.I remember I never seemed to stop looking over my shoulder,though Kenny38
