THE LAGONDA 3-LITRE – THE CAR OF HRH THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH

Of all the many motor-cars associated with the late HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, perhaps the most famous is his Lagonda 3-Litre Drophead. It was a vehicle renowned for its performance, comfort, and, most notably, an innate sense of gravitas in its heyday. There was no need for extraneous chrome fittings or vulgar tail-fins, as it was a car as suited to the Royal Mews as to Goodwood.

The 3-Litre was the second Lagonda of the marquee’s David Brown era. In 1946 the industrialist famously saw an advertisement offering a ‘High-class motor business, established 25 years, 30,000 pounds, net profit last year 4,000 pounds. Write Box V. 1362, the Times E.C.4.’ In February 1947, Brown purchased Aston Martin for £20,500, and seven months later, he acquired Laguna for £52,500.

John L Lumley wrote in his book, Engines, that Brown bought Aston Martin for his racing car ambitions and Laguna ‘because he wanted Bentley’s engine to put in racing cars’. The 2.6-litre saloon debuted in 1948, and the 3-Litre replaced it in 1953. The initial choices of Tickford’s bodywork were the two-door Coupe and the Drophead, with a four-door saloon in 1954.

In the following year, David Brown acquired Tickford, and by 1956 the Aston Martin Lagonda operations moved to Newport Pagnell. The advertisements promised, with some justification, ‘Beauty of line, power and grace, superlative comfort, and proud dignity’. The 3-Litre Mk. II of 1955 boasted a floor gear-lever, and in 1956, Bill Boddy of Motor Sport described the four-door saloon as an:

Interesting proposition, combining the twin-overhead cam Aston Martin engine in a car of luxurious styling and appointments, and one moreover endowed with that rarity amongst British chassis – independent suspension of the driving wheels.

At £3901 7s, the saloon was costly – about three times the price of a Wolseley 6/90 – but the Lagonda was a vehicle of genuine distinction. The Motor thought ‘It is one of the very few passenger saloons whose primary appeal is to the skilful and appreciative driver’.

The 3-Litre’s list of equipment was so extensive as to include an HMV radio. Meanwhile, the W O Bentley-designed DHOC engine was so flexible that a Lagonda could serve as urban transport or an A27 cruiser with equal flair. Production of the Drophead ended in 1957 and the saloon in 1958 after just 295 examples. The company announced they would build no more Lagondas until the Rapide’s launch, which took place in 1961.

Sales of the 3-Litre were limited by its price in a market increasingly dominated by the Jaguar Mk. VIIM/VIII and the lack of an LHD option. The surviving models are a reminder of a car of understated distinction – from a time when some British motorists still regarded automatic transmission as decadent.

And, of course, the most famous 3-Litre owner was HRH The Duke of Edinburgh. In 1954 an announcement in the motoring press proclaimed, ‘The honour of supplying His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh with a Lagonda drophead coupé has fallen to H. W. Motors Ltd., of Walton - on – Thames’.

The Edinburgh Green Drophead, registration OXR 1, appeared in many newspaper articles and newsreels until it left the Royal Mews in 1961. Special modifications included a power-operated hood, a radio-telephone system, and an additional vanity mirror for HM The Queen. So here, as a small tribute, is some Pathé footage of the late Prince Philip at the wheel of his Lagonda.

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