Monte Carlo dans le luxe: conquering snow and ice in a Grégoire double berline

• 
• 

January is Monte Carlo Rally month, as it has been since 1911, when people had a very different notion of what constituted a rally car. Well, the concept of a purpose-built 'rally car' probably hadn't even been thought about at the time, but still the double berline in this great picture looks like it must have been pretty arduous work on the icy mid-winter rally. It is a Grégoire 14/24hp, which participated in the 1912 rally with a double berline body made by the carrossier Alin-Liautard of Courbevoie, no less. This coachbuilder also built a rather amazing ‘triple berline’ Grégoire on a longer wheelbase chassis, plus a similarly styled ‘double’ on a Hispano-Suiza chassis for King Alfonso XIII of Spain.

We found a second picture of what has to be the same car, now on display at the 1911 Paris Motor Show. It was on the Grégoire stand there, but proudly shows the Alin-Liautard sign on the running board, plus a sign hanging on the door. The picture is just sharp enough to zoom in on it, revealing the name of the man who commissioned it: M. Martinet. He is listed in the 1912 Monte Carlo Rally entry list, finishing 26th overall out of 35 cars, which seems like an achievement for the big berline to us. Most of these were flagged off in Paris and we expect to be M. Martinet among these, but there were several other starting locations, too.

One of them was Saint Petersburg! Monsieur André Nagel started there in an open Russo-Balt, clocking up well over 2,000 miles on the way to Monaco in the middle of winter. Compared to that, Paris to Monte Carlo in Martinet’s luxury motor looks simple! Nagel wrote down his memories later, from which we learn that he had to drive the first leg of his journey towed behind a tractor, followed by another 55 miles during which he was unable to change up to second gear. From one report: “He stopped every two hours to eat and sleep, changed oil every 500 kilometres [310 miles] after thawing it over the fire, and slept with the dynamo in his clothes to prevent it from freezing. He sent two telegrams to the organization during the trip: the first from the city of Pskov, 280kms [174 miles] from Saint Petersburg, which said: “I will arrive if the wolves don't eat us on the way and we don't freeze alive.” Different times…

Words: Jeroen Booij; pictures: Bibliothèque Nationale de France
 

Kommentar abgeben...