Scandal over government handling of World War I surplus

“Those who have passed through the station at Sunbury [in Surrey] by train have obtained a glimpse of an immense area literally covered with cars, lorries and motor bicycles exposed to the weather,” we reported in January 1919. “The public naturally asks: why is the nation’s property neglected in this manner?”

The “lamentable waste of public money, owing to neglect due to lack of foresight and organisation” that they had seen at Kempton Park was one of Britain’s many newly redundant armed forces depots.

Around 7000 cars were awaiting their fates there, from the War Office’s total of about 12,000.

There was actually plenty of demand for them, but anyone interested first had to obtain a special permit, travel to Sunbury, “wade through mud and mire” to reach the mostly dilapidated and damaged cars – and then not even be allowed to test if they worked.

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The Motor Cycle magazine was likewise angered by the wastage, even though “the majority will require a great amount of work before they are fit for the road”, many of them having been run over, shelled or even buried for months in Flanders battlefields.

At the same time, we worried that a sudden flooding of the used market would seriously hamper the British car industry’s efforts to transition back from war work.

A re-elected coalition led by David Lloyd George had formed the Surplus Government Property Disposal Board under the Ministry of Munitions to recoup some of the huge costs of the war (which the UK didn’t pay off until 2015!), but clearly things hadn’t started well.

Promising signs on the vehicle side were first seen in March, as Autocar reported on an auction of record size in Islington, London, where 104 cars and 200 motorbikes were trucked in from Sunbury and sold. And in the autumn, we ran ads for weekly vehicle auctions at the Earl’s Court Exhibition Centre.