Trojans

In last month’s coverage of the VSCC Jubilee it may not have been clear that the ear Miss Pat Stocken was driving was a Trojan. I described it as a “Chummy” model, because it has a rather shorter body than the other four-seater Trojans competing, although I believe Trojan themselves called this their “Utility” model. Incidentally, the term “Chummy” applied to a car with a two-door, close-coupled body able to seat either four adults with not overmuch foot-room, or two adults and two small children, but is often thought to apply strictly only to the Austin 7 tourer.

This is not the case, because in contemporary times the ohc Rhode tourer was so-called, and I have seen the name used for bodies on Calcott, ABC and 10/15 hp Fiat chassis, and I rather think it was also when describing the three-seater Gwynne Eight, although I do not think any of the manufacturers used this “Chummy” appellation, preferring tourer or four-seater. But the term was even used in the Press to describe the 1923 £185 Durant, one of the first of the smaller-engined (2.1-litre) American cars to arrive here, some years in advance of the Overland Whippet, although, here again, the makers preferred to call this Durant a five-seater tourer . . . The term “Chummy” (today’s 2+2) must also have been used, I expect, for the Stoneleigh small-car, from Armstrong Siddeley Motors, although this one was odd, inasmuch as the early examples had a side-by-side rear seat for the passengers but a single front one for the isolated driver! The term “Chummy” obviously derived from a more friendly seating position than with two of a car’s occupants out in a dickey-seat, and children were safer in a Chummy than in the back of a four-door tourer or saloon.

All this is really a preliminary to saying that at the British Motor Heritage Trust’s Sync Park Museum (near Isleworth, Middlesex) on September 8th the Trojan OC is having a rally at which it hopes to have not only all the surviving older unorthodox two-stroke Trojans running, but some of the later petrol and diesel Trojan commercials also and even a safari-bed invented by Mr Hounsfield, the Trojan designer, an autojumble, and perhaps rides in Trojans for those who can catch the eye of an owner. Sounds fun! W.B.