Arthur Talbot Johnstone

Director of H.J. Mulliner by 1959, while the Chiswick firm bodied the Bentley S1 Continental, including the four-door Flying Spur of 1957. Official Bentley copy later credited him with the name; his own letter assigned it to HT Johnstone.

He was born in London on 13 July 1922 and educated at Shrewsbury School. From 1941 to 1946 he served as a captain in the 12th Royal Lancers, an armoured-car regiment that fought in North Africa and, from mid-1944, as a reconnaissance unit in Italy. Who's Who records his rank and dates, not his postings.

In 1947–48 he took a commercial training course with Rolls-Royce at Derby, then joined H.J. Mulliner at the Bedford Park Works in Chiswick in 1948. By 1959 Who's Who in the Motor Industry listed him as a director. Harry Talbot Johnstone, born in Australia in 1894, educated at Geelong College and earlier with Albion Motors, held the managing directorship. In 1956 Arthur was appointed to the executive council of the National Federation of Vehicle Trades.

The SMMT council for 1957–58 named H. T. Johnstone for the firm, not Arthur. Official Bentley copy later collapsed the two men and gave Arthur both the managing-director title and the Flying Spur name. Independent specialist accounts keep Harry as the managing director who named the car. Geelong College records Harry's 1918 London marriage to Dorothy Josephine Beryl Upjohn and his death in England in 1979; it names no children.

H.J. Mulliner remained independent through the S1 Continental years and built 217 of 432 S1 Continental bodies. In 1957 the firm put a four-door sports saloon on the Continental chassis; the first was on the road in May. Bentley says Arthur named it Flying Spur after the Clan Johnstone device. A letter attributed to Arthur says HT Johnstone persuaded Dr F. Llewellyn Smith, Rolls-Royce's postwar managing director, to allow the four-door and chose the name. Herbert Nye drew the body.

He was a director by 1959, the year Rolls-Royce bought the company, in July. The S2 Continental arrived that autumn with the aluminium V8; Mulliner carried the Flying Spur onto the new chassis. Rolls-Royce merged H.J. Mulliner with Park Ward in 1961. A later account says Arthur remained at the works into the mid-1960s.