Publication timed to coincide with the 50th Anniversary of the two models’ introduction
Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud I and Bentley S1
by Davide Bassoli and Bernard L. King
ISBN 0-9530451-8-8
416 pages, 130+ photographs
Complete Classics CC8 was published in April 2005 to coincide with the 50th Anniversary of first deliveries to customers. The book details all 2,361 Silver Cloud I and all 3,108 Bentley S1 cars produced from 1955 to 1959 and includes all the facets that have made this series famous throughout the world. Signed copies available from the joint author/publisher at:-
CC8 is now out of print but copies do appear on EBay and elsewhere from time to time.
Front cover photograph: Chassis SGE392 delivered September 1958 to Bertram John Pearson, a chartered accountant and Justice of the Peace of Broadstairs in Kent. On his death in 1965, the car passed to his chauffeur and in turn to the current keeper in 1977. Presently with Clifton Spencer, he reports that at the time of purchase, the mileometer reading was just 54,000 miles – a large proportion of these probably as a result of travelling to and from the Pearson’s second home in Portugal where they resided each winter. Photographed in front of Dutton Homestall in Ashurst Wood, occupied now by Stoke Brunswick Preparatory School, the building itself deserves more than a passing mention. Originally known as Dutton Hall and located in Cheshire, the building was dismantled and moved south to Ashurst Wood aboard 17 lorries and joined on to the more modest and somewhat decrepit 15th century home of John Arthur Dewar and his bride Kathleen during 1932. John Dewar, known as ‘Lucky’ Dewar having won the Epsom Derby race with his horse “Cameronian” in 1931 and the only owner also to have won the Greyhound Derby, had become Chairman of the family owned whisky distillers John Dewar & Sons Ltd. and took over the home known as Homestall of his batchelor uncle Baron Dewar on his death in April 1930. (Bernard King)