Description
Bonhams are delighted to offer at our forthcoming Collectors' Motor Car Auction on Saturday 2nd September at The Beaulieu Sale, National Motor Museum, Hampshire, 128 collectors motor cars – plus over 300 lots of automobilia and 30 motorcycles. The full online catalogue can be viewed at - details above for further images and information on this lot, please follow the link.
C. 1934 BERTRAM HUTCHINGS 15FT WINCHESTER CARAVAN
£4, 000 - 7, 000
€4, 400 - 7, 700
Bertram Hutchings was one of the most respected names in caravanning circles in pre-war days. The company's Homeric motto - 'always to excel and be superior to others' - and its sales slogan - 'The Rolls-Royce of caravans' - eloquently explain why its products were the first choice for owners of high-quality motor cars between the wars and into the 1940s. Bertram Hutchings started out in 1912 as a maker of horse-drawn caravans, having been enchanted by a holiday spent in one with his new wife the previous summer. Within a few years he had completed a small fleet of horse-drawn vans for hire, only for the business to be curtailed by the outbreak of war. Fortunately, the military needed caravans and Hutchings managed to survive and prosper. In 1930 he introduced an influential new design for the trailer caravan market: the Winchester, some 1, 500 of which would be manufactured over the years. The Winchester popularised the streamlined style that became favoured during the 1930s, superseding the box-like 'cottage' designs of the previous decade.
Restored during the late 1990s and believed to date from circa 1933/ 1934, this particular Winchester, with non-lantern roof, is one of approximately seven of this type known to exist in private hands. We are advised that further restoration is required.
