Blue Mist - How Lawrence of Arabia Nicked Granny's Roller
The car, built in 1909, was a dark blue “Edwardian” Rolls Royce, Chassis number 60985, with coachwork by Maythorne. It was built for a Mr. Fletcher F. Lambert-Williams, a Director of the Mono Service Company, manufacturer of paper cups. At the time this car was made, it was Rolls Royce practice to give individual names to each car they made. They are now referred to as “the Names”, but at some point in recent history a number of records were lost. These cars have become known as The Missing Names. Some of the information was later reconstructed but much of it was gone forever. “Blue Mist” was the name given to car number 985. In April 1912 Lambert-Williams embarked for America, on the Titanic, and was never seen again.
A Maythorne Limousin of the same era - how Blue Mist might have originally looked
The only records of 985 that still exist – neither mention the name Blue Mist.
On his death, the car was acquired by the Rt. Honorable Earl of Clonmell, an Irish horse breeder and Captain in the Royal Artillery. In 1914, at the start of the first world war, Lord Clonmell went off to Europe to fight and the car was put into storage and maintained by his Chauffeur, Mr. Burge, presumably to be used only when his Lordship was back from leave. The story goes that sometime in July 1916, Clonmell met my Grandmother, Aileen Lloyd-Thomas (nee Bellew), in a nightclub in Berkley Square. She was about to leave for Cairo, where my Grandfather was posted at the British Embassy. He was looking to find a buyer for his Rolls and she jumped at the opportunity. It has been said that she won it from him in a card game, but whilst not entirely out of character, that is clearly not what happened. In the first letter, dated July 17th 1916, he was concerned that she know it did not have cantilevered springs – although why this would have been of any interest to her is not clear. He says: “I am informed that such a type, in good condition, with spare tyres …. is worth £500”.
One of the letters from Clonmell to my Grandmother, regarding the sale.
He goes on to say that the car had been overhauled by Rolls Royce the previous year (1915) and that she is welcome to have it examined if she wishes. Clearly she wasn’t going to take anything to chance. There is another letter, dated September 15th, from a Mr. A.J. Bray, a self proclaimed “Rolls Royce Expert” of Gloucester Mews. He pronounced the car to be in good order with the exception of some paintwork and woodwork that needed touching-up. He notes that the tires are in good condition and respectfully bills her for 2 gallons of petrol. There is a subsequent letter from Clonmell’s secretary regarding details of how and where to collect the car and then a final letter from Clonmell himself (below), acknowledging receipt of £400. Good old Granny always drove a hard bargain.
From there, in late 1916, the car was shipped to Cairo. She didn’t have much time to enjoy it, as it was commandeered from the Embassy after about six months by Colonel T. E. Lawrence - Lawrence of Arabia. This likely happened in July 1917, when Lawrence returned to Cairo after the capture of Aqaba to meet with General Allenby. It was the first time he had been in Cairo in many months. The story goes that he saw Blue Mist parked outside a nightclub, and swept in, in full Arab dress, demanding to know who owned the car. On being introduced to my Grandmother, a very civil exchange ensued, in which he said he was commandeering the car the name of His Majesty’s Government and (with no choice) she politely agreed. A short time later his driver had the courtesy to return the enameled name plate and Spirit of Ecstasy to the Embassy.
Lawrence was known to be a fanatical devotee of the marque and once said “A Rolls in the desert was above rubies …. Great was Rolls and great was Royce! They were worth hundreds of men to us in these deserts.”
In his experience they were the only cars that could withstand both the punishing terrain and the weight of the armor and guns he often mounted on them. He exploited their versatility and reliability to the full and used them almost exclusively in his raids, many of which are well documented in the book “Steel Chariots in The Desert”, written by S.C. Rolls (coincidentally named), Lawrence’s long time driver. More relevant to this specific car, there are several instances in “Seven Pillars of Wisdom” in which Blue Mist is specifically mentioned: Firstly, in chapter CVIII he says: “ Affairs with Nuri and Faisal had held me the whole day in Azrak: but Joyce had left me a tender, the Blue Mist, by which on the following morning I overtook the army and found them breakfasting in Giaan el Khunna”.
A photograph of Blue Mist at Lawrence’s camp at Abu al Lissan at the head of Wadi Itm valley, which leads down to Akaba. The cars are lined up - two armoured Rolls-Royces, one un-armoured Rolls-Royce tender (all three of which are later 1914+ models), two Ford Model Ts, and Blue Mist. She is slightly smaller than the other R-Rs but much larger than the Fords.. Photo courtesy of Leofric Gilman family.
The above photograph proves conclusively that Blue Mist was actually part of the Hejaz Armoured Car Battery. Lawrence later describes almost losing Blue Mist in the course of a raid, due to a broken spring:
When we had finished, enemy patrols were near enough to give us fair excuse for quitting. The few prisoners, whom we valued for Intelligence reasons, were given place on our loads; and we bumped off. Unfortunately we bumped too carelessly in our satisfaction, and at the first watercourse there was a crash beneath my tender. One side of its box-body tipped downward till the weight came on the tyre at the back wheel, and we stuck.
The front bracket of the near back spring had crystallized through by the chassis, in a sheer break which nothing but a workshop could mend. We gazed in despair, for we were only three hundred yards from the railway, and stood to lose the car, when the enemy came along in ten minutes. A Rolls in the desert was above rubies; and though we had been driving in these for eighteen months, not upon the polished roads of their makers’ intention, but across country of the vilest terrain, at speed, day or night, carrying a ton of goods and four or five men up, yet this was our first structural accident in the team of nine. Rolls, the driver, our strongest and most resourceful man, the ready mechanic, whose skill and advice largely kept our cars in running order, was nearly in tears over the mishap. The knot of us, officers and men, English, Arabs and Turks, crowded round him and watched his face anxiously. As he realized that he, a private, commanded in this emergency, even the stubble on his jaw seemed to harden in sullen determination. At last he said there was just one chance. We might jack up the fallen end of the spring, and wedge it, by baulks upon the running board, in nearly its old position. With the help of ropes the thin angle-irons of the running boards might carry the additional weight.
We had on each car a length of scantling to place between the double tyres if ever the car stuck in sand or mud. Three blocks of this would make the needful height. We had no saw, but drove bullets through it cross-wise till we could snap it off. The Turks heard us firing, and halted cautiously. Joyce heard us and ran back to help. Into his car we piled our load, jacked up the spring and the chassis, lashed in the wooden baulks, let her down on them (they bore splendidly), cranked up, and drove off. Rolls eased her to walking speed at every stone and ditch, while we, prisoners and all, ran beside with cries of encouragement, clearing the track.
In camp we stitched the blocks with captured telegraph wire, and bound them together and to the chassis, and the spring to the chassis; till it looked as strong as possible, and we put back the load. So enduring was the running board that we did the ordinary work with the car for the next three weeks, and took her so into Damascus at the end. Great was Rolls, and great was Royce! They were worth hundreds of men to us in these deserts.
LT Leofric Gilman, OC Hejaz Armoured Car Battery, at the wheel of Blue Mist
On the subject of his imminent arrival in Damascus: “Sleep would not come, so before the light, I woke Stirling and my drivers, and we four climbed into the Blue Mist, our Rolls tender, and set out for Damascus ...”
Then finally, once in Damascus: “We must prove the old days over, a native government in power: for this Shukri would be my best instrument, as acting Governor. So in the Blue Mist, we set off to show ourselves, his enlargement in authority itself a banner of revolution for the citizens.”
These extracts prove beyond doubt that the car in which Lawrence can be seen entering Damascus on October 1st 1918, is in fact Blue Mist. Four days later, on October 4th, with the campaign at an end, he was driven out of Damascus again in Blue Mist, on the start of his long journey back to England.
The car had been his beloved tender for just 15 months, during the height of the “Railway War”.
My Grandmother had returned to England in late 1917 as she was pregnant, and as events unfolded she never returned, my Grandfather being transferred to the British Embassy in Rome in 1919. By this time, the car had been abandoned by Lawrence and some time later - so the story goes - was recovered from a sand dune beside the road, not far from Cairo. Apparently, with some new fuel, it started first time. Delighted at its recovery, my grandmother made enquiries about the cost of shipping it to Rome, along with some cattle. Why she was interested having Egyptian cattle in Rome is not in the least bit clear, but then she always was quite eccentric.
According to the Rolls Royce records at Paulespery in England, after seeing “active service” in the 14-18 war, the car was eventually sold to a certain Mohammed H. Elshafe in Cairo. There is no known record of it since then. Who was this man Elschafe, and what was the ultimate fate of Blue Mist?