The car was an original Auburn 852 Boat tail Speedster Supercharged 1936 RHD only 300 ever built, and imported into South Africa by Roy Evans, who it is believed was a car dealer. In the late 30's it was raced in the SA GP in East London and had it's mudguards removed for better handling etc. Unfortunately during the race a woman ran across the track and was hit by the Auburn, damaging the front extensively. The car was then sold on. Someone (it's not known who) rebuilt the car with Cord front mudguards as well as Cord bonnet, grille and instruments - everything else on the car was all Auburn. Leo DuBois in Natal, who had a few Cords over the years bought the car.
Henry Bessinger purchased the car from Leo DuBois in the early 70's and set about getting it all back to original with the help of Rudi Exner who re-built a few Cords. Rudi found an Auburn bonnet from someone in Rhodesia who was also restoring an Auburn. Henry also tracked down mudguards which were made of fibreglass from a guy in Canada, but wanted the real thing. So when he flew over to UK one year, he managed to come to some agreement with Lord Montague at Beaulieu, which would allow Henry to take measurements of the Auburn there in exchange for a spare Headlight glass for the Auburn at Beaulieu.
These measurements were then used by a very skilled Portuguese craftsman in South Africa, who Rudi used for sheet metal work, who fabricated the mudguards to original spec. Henry held onto the car for around 25 years and sold it to a guy in the UK who now has it kept in France.
No point for this one please, as I've copied and pasted information that I had posted here four years ago, in the vintage section.
Thank you for bringing this interesting car into the limelight again.
