Lancia Motor Club Forum

General => General Chat => Topic started by: frankxhv773t on 16 July, 2025, 11:46:59 AM

Title: Bently Boy's Lancia
Post by: frankxhv773t on 16 July, 2025, 11:46:59 AM
I'm reading the autobiography of Diana Barnato Walker at the moment. Her father was Wolf Barnato, Bentley Boy, multiple Le Mans winner and director of Bentley Motors. She comments that during the war he used his big Bently sparingly and instead, for everyday motoring, drove a "small pre war Lancia". That has me wondering whether he had an Aprilia or followed Tazio Nuvolari in running an Augusta.
Title: Re: Bently Boy's Lancia
Post by: donw on 16 July, 2025, 04:14:02 PM
Almost certainly an Augusta as many UK racing drivers had them. The earl of March who had worked for Bentley Motors had a team of fiends with Augustas
Title: Re: Bently Boy's Lancia
Post by: frankxhv773t on 17 July, 2025, 09:30:52 AM
Thank you Don. Diana Barnato Walker commented on it because her father used to collect surplus fish from a fishmonger on his way home one day a week and used the Bentley on that day so the smell was behind him rather than beside him. That could be consistent with the Lancia being a two seater suggesting it might even have been a March Augusta.
Title: Re: Bently Boy's Lancia
Post by: DavidLaver on 24 July, 2025, 05:34:24 AM
March Augusta has a back seat, but its a small car vs a Bentley.  I saw them described as "like polo ponies".