Despite the rapid development of the motor car before and during World War I, a journey of just over 200 miles in October 1919 was still considered an achievement worth printing in a major motoring magazine. And this Snapshot is taken from just such a report in The Autocar of 1 November 1919.
F.W. Beckworth and his wife set off from an unreported location at 8.40 am on 10 October in this 1914 Mass car. It was heavily loaded: Mr Beckworth stopped early on at a weighbridge and recorded 1 ton 16 cwt, including all luggage and the two people, including the locker (the extension of the body behind the seats) “full of stuff”, the boxes on the step – one each side – full of tool etc., two portmanteaux, an expanding trunk, a holdall, and a spare cover on the top of the locker under a sailcloth. That sailcloth seems to have been a large affair, visible in the picture sitting on top of the locker. Mr Beckworth stated that the car dated from 1913-1914; he mentioned that the engine was a 90 x 150mm (3817cc) four-cylinder Ballot with a Claudel-Hobson carburettor. Georgano asserts that all 1914 Mass cars had Ballot engines of sizes from 1766cc to 5338cc. Mass had used Gnome or Ballot engines as early as 1906.
Mr Beckworth gave quite a few details: the car was run on ‘petrol four parts and benzole one part’. They stopped for 40 minutes in Nailsworth for lunch, and 20 minutes in Wells for fuel. They reached their destination of Broadstone in Dorset at 7 pm after a journey of 203 miles; consumption was 26mpg. The car was not rapid; they achieved “30-35mph when we could.” The last 16 miles were “by lamplight” and therefore even slower.
The Mass car was built in France from 1903 to 1923 but sold mainly in Britain. The name came from the British importer, Mr Masser-Horniman, who was based at the Lancaster Motor Garage in London. The first Mass cars were typical voiturettes with 4½ hp Aster of 6 hp De Dion-Bouton engines and tubular frames; many parts were bought in from Lacoste & Battmann. Masser-Horniman was described as the owner in 1904 but the principal of the company in Courbevoie was Léon Pierron. Cars sold in France were known as Pierrons but had slightly different specifications to those sold in Britain. The manager of the French factory in 1907 was J.R. Richardson, whose company in Saxilby, Lincolnshire also sold Mass cars and from 1903 to 1907 built the Richardson – which may in fact have been a Mass.
It became difficult just before World War I to sell the cars in England, and Mass cars Ltd took on agencies for two American makes, R.C.H. and Paige, selling the latter under the name of Mass-Paige. Only one model survived until after the war, the 2812cc 15.9 hp, offered up to 1923.
Image courtesy of The Richard Roberts Archive: www.richardrobertsarchive.org.uk
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