Log in / RegisterMany years ago when I was 16 years old, as well as an early passion for classic cars, I also loved classic military vehicles. I suppose over the years old military vehicles have been more accepted into the true classic car world rather being kept at arm’s length at they used to be, which to us is a good thing.
My ‘uncle’, or more so a good friend of the family, Les Bouts owned the Alfa Romeo dealership, Bouts Motors in Wolverhampton and was famed across the UK for their servicing of the Alfa twin cam engines. In so much that some Alfa owners brought their cars to him rather than their local Alfa garage ! Les’s father Ernest Bouts was a famous racing driver in the 1920’s & 1930’s driving his Sunbeam to many victories at Brooklands and had originally started the garage.
Well Les owned a Daimler Dingo scout car, used by the British army in WW2 and afterwards, that he’d rebuilt. So as his son Mike was in the same class at school as me, Les often used to pick Mike up from school in the Dingo just to wind him up ! Especially as he had a siren fitted and would turn it on as he approached the school. So that combined with a love of Airfix model kits, like most boys were back then, meant I had a desire to own a military vehicle myself.
Cut a long story short, after advertising for one, we found one for sale on a farm near Stourbridge and the owner took me for a spin around involving up and down hills and tracks throughout the farm. I was sold, but as it been used for towing boats out of the water in North Wales it was pretty rusty underneath from the sea water, so Les suggested we left it ! But after a few months nothing else came along, so we went back to the farm to buy the rust heap ! Sadly it had been sold. Then the farmer asked how keen I was for an original jeep ? Silly question ! So he then said well you can have the hen house if you want ! And there was our jeep under a lean-to with chicken wire over the back and numerous coatings of chicken shit ! But we settled on £150 including delivery and so I owned a jeep !!!
She was built in January 1944 by the Ford plant in the US and then shipped over pre D-Day. Having served, it was demobbed and sold off at a government auction. Registered in May 1947 in West Bromwich with the registration number CEA 991, it held a magic ‘EA’ number seen on many Jensen cars over the years, which of course were made in West Bromwich.
Les was really great and let me use part of the garage workshops to strip it down and with his help it was rebuilt. We found the original markings on the bonnet under the seven coats of different colour paint.
Then after a few years at shows, my parents moved house so I lost the garaging at home, so she spent a few years in Cosford Aircraft Museum at RAF Cosford in Shropshire, sitting under the wing of a DC-3 Dakota. But a change of museum curator meant all vehicles in the museum were removed so she then went to a lock up garage. As by then I was married and had no room at home.
A number of classic cars came and went and when we decided that maybe the MGB GT we currently own wasn’t getting the use we thought it would have, we sat down as a family and thought what we should buy next. Then my daughter suggested let’s bring the jeep home !
So after 32 years in the lock up we had to clear off all the ivy and cobwebs that had built up.
Here she it above after cleaning her down ready for the journey.
We then needed to find a specialist restoration company who specialised in World War 2 jeeps. After talking to a number of people in the Military Vehicle Trust, of which we’re members, plus our own research, decided on GPW Workshops. So we were all excited in December, when Richard Payne, who ran the business, came and dragged her out of the garage by a winch on the trailer. The front wheels both worked ok, but the back ones were both locked up, so left a trail of dust and rubber on the ground !
Which for 32 years in the garage, it didn’t look in too bad a condition ! By the way the Mazda RX-8 in the background isn’t ours !
She’s now in Richard’s workshop awaiting a full restoration which will take around 6 months so we’re looking forward to Summer 2022 and getting her out on the warm sunny Summer days ! Plus how many of us can say they still own their first car !!!! ……well actually my first real car was actually a battered Ford Escort Mk1 that my dad bought me for my 17th birthday !!!