Photographic memory

Sir,
Recently in your correspondence pages Dr Pinkerton was commenting on the Alvin Special of Basil Chevell and, later, Tony Charnock, which prompted me to search through my photographs taken in the late Fifties and early Sixties for a picture of the car. I found one which I think is the car in question.

I was covering an Alvis Owners Club Day on Coventry City Airport for Charley Ballard of the Alvis Service Depot in Finchley, and the enclosed photograph was taken there. I remember the car being used in early club events at Silverstone and at Prescott Hill, but I can’t put an exact date on these events.

On another matter, have you any record in your race coverage of the Sixties of a sports racing car known as the Wilson, or Wilson Lotus, which was basically a shortened-chassis version of a Lotus 23B with twin-cam engine and Mk 5 Hewland transmission? I am rebuilding this car to its original form for historic-class hill-climbing and sprints, and I would welcome any additional information or photographs which could help fill in the background and history. I think it was once used in Coupe GT form, with perspex windows and gullwing doors, but is now an open car. One partly-legible scrutineer’s label indicates it was still in competition use in 1970, but I can’t read any details of the location of the event. The only clue I have is that the owner/builder, Mr Wilson, was a Scottish garage owner who drove the car in northern events.

Peter Asquith, Coventry, West Midlands