I did some detective work recently for a story about the Bertone XK150.
The car shown on the first picture is in fact Bertone's second XK150 of three. It was shown on the Turin show in 1958, was right hind driven and originally came in a special metallic maroon shade. The car was built on request of well-known Jaguar-dealer John Coombs, who commissioned it for one of his customers: Anthony Strickland Hubbard - a Woolworths heir who’d wanted something extraordinary. It came with some subtle changes from the first, black, car as it now missed the 'scallops' in the front wings, had thinner bumpers, chrome around its rear wheel arches too, and two instead of three wipers. The car was registered ‘953 HPH’ on 1 January 1959.
Hubbard is said to have driven the car only a few months before selling it to London based architect Michael Lyell who had it painted silver grey and registered '6 APC'. In the 1960’s it could often be seen at British Jaguar club outings with that registration, but it was sold off later to a mister Peter Ralph (a golfing friend of Lyell) and its current whereabouts are unknown.
I got in touch with one of the architect's sons who thinks it may be in France though, but only has that information from a rumour.
He sent me some lovely pictures of the car taken in 1964. Apparantly there were more shots with his sister in it too, but she has refused to let anyone see them as it shows a hair style she's very much annoyed of now!
Of all three cars only the third and last (the only 'S') is known. Or at least, to me.
