Cars in books 2, February 1978

Sir,

In “A Solitary War” by Henry Williamson (Macdonalds, 1966), a book which is the last in a series of thirteen, there is an Alvis Silver Eagle which is mentioned so frequently that it is almost one of the major characters. It may feature similarly in some of the earlier books.

“The self-starter would not work, although by now six local garages had ‘put it right’. The drain plug was not at the lowest point. Water remained in the phosphor-bronze pipe leading to the water-pump below the radiator base. It was solid with ice. There was a plug in this pipe, a hexagonal nut. It had been made round by some mechanic who had not bothered to find a box spanner to fit it, using instead what Luke called a screw hammer. The thread of the plug being stiff, to prevent it working loose during the motion of the engine, the ham-handed use of the monkey-wrench had rounded and ruined the nut. It was burred, immovable.

“The only thing to do was to lie under the engine on one’s back and melt the ice on the bronze pipe with the blow lamp. But he could not light the blow lamp, for since the attempts to unfreeze the water pipes in the cowhouse, Luke had tried to clear the jet by the use of some sharp spike, which had gashed the jet so that it would not function.”

Incidentally I found the book most readable. It is dedicated to Oswald Mosley and his wife!

Canterbury R. G. ROBINSON