More about Miller

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Sir,

With great interest I saw T.A.S.O. Mathieson’s letter about the Miller Lea-Francis in the January issue. I remember two more, but original, Miller racing cars. I saw these around 1933-1934 in races. Two Frenchmen and former Salmson drivers, Marcel Boudy and Victor Marret, drove them also in 1933 in the Masaryk Grand Prix in Czechoslovakia, where the enclosed photo was taken. It shows Boucly—according to some sources a professional wrestler—with one of these cars. If my memory is correct, they had been built in 1927 and definitely had 1.5-litre engines. They proved completely unsuitable for the Brno Circuit and had already during practice difficulties failed to complete a lap without trouble. Needless to say, the roadholding of these track cars left much to be desired and on two occasions during practice flames came from under the bonnet. They came to Brno from Nice by train, retired very early—with much smoke! —from the race, and I understood the drivers did not take them for a long period out of the Nice Railway Station, after they returned to France.

An unknown racing driver drove one in 1934 in French hill-climbs; and that is the last thing I heard about these two Millers which were—of course!—definitely not the two Miller cars left by Leon Duray at the Molsheim Bugatti Works in 1929. Already some years ago I told T.A.S.O. Mathieson about these cars but, I think, he too could not find any record about the fate of these two Miller Monopostos. Since then, I got hold of the photo. Interesting too: Boucly and Marret formed a private Ecurie with yet another former Salmson driver, Louis Decaroli. And while they drove these Miller cars, Louis had a monoposto body on his 37A Bugatti which in later years was driven with the original two-seater body by Mme. Yvonne Itier.

Erwin Tragatsch

Bielefeld, Germany