Charlecote Park – June 2005

75th Anniversary of the S Type Invicta

The Invicta Car Club celebrated the 75th Anniversary of the S Type Invicta in style on Sunday 12th June 2005, at Charlecote Park, near Stratford upon Avon, Warwickshire.

The event attracted the largest ever gathering of Invicta cars, with 46 Invictas present. This included 30 S Types, which represented almost half of the total production run of S Type Invictas ever made. They were only manufactured between 1930 and 1934. 

Examples of most other models were also there, including 3 litres, high chassis 4 ½ litres, a very rare post war Black Prince, two modern S1’s, and the S1-600.

For such a tiny car club, with only just over 100 members, it was a huge achievement to be able to bring such a large number of the remaining Invicta cars together, and this was helped greatly by the enthusiasm of some of the foreign owners who travelled to England to be part of this historic event.  

Martin Kolnberger had brought a party of 10 S Types from Germany to take part. They had arranged an almost week long trip, meeting up and travelling through France, then taking a scenic tour along the South Coast and up through the Cotswolds, arriving in time for The Invicta Car Club informal dinner at The Glebe Hotel, Barford, on the Saturday evening. This was attended by 70 people, and gave members a chance to socialise in pleasant surroundings prior to the main Sunday meeting.

Charlecote Park offered an excellent back-drop for the stunning array of cars on display, and the line up of 30 S Types was really quite breath taking. A light-hearted Concours D’ Elegance took place during the day, and the Overall Winner was Dean Edmonds, with his beautiful S Type, which had been flown in from the USA especially to take part in the event.

Pamela Gregory, daughter of pre-war Invicta Chief Designer William Watson, presented some of the awards. William Watson was not only responsible for designing the S Type, but also went on to design the revolutionary post war Black Prince.

A truly fitting testimony to Noel Macklin’s dream and William Watson’s design was the fact that people still delighted in using the cars to travel long distances to attend the event, 75 years after the S Type was first launched.