Is this Aston Martin DB 2/4 the ‘original’ James Bond Aston Martin?

A  1954 Aston Martin DB 2/4, which is claimed to be the inspiration for the Aston Martin James Bond drove in the Goldfinger novel, is heading for action at Coys.

Lovers of James Bond films will be totally familiar with the iconic Aston Martin DB5 Bond drove in a number of films, and in particular the Aston Martin DB5 which was the star of Goldfinger.

Bond anoraks will tell you that the ‘real’ James Bond – the one Fleming wrote about in the Bond series of books – drove a Bentley, but Bond was given an Aston Martin to drive in the Goldfinger book as he chased Auric Goldfinger across Europe.

That was an Aston Marting DB3, but a recent restoration of a Aston Martin DB 2/4 is claimed to be the car that was the inspiration for Fleming to use an Aston Martin DB3 for Bond in Goldfinger.

Classic car owners love to weave a story around their cars in the hope it will be more appealing to buyers, but the story around this Aston Martin DB 2/4 does look to stand up, with too many elements to be mere coincidence.

The DB 2/4 was supplied new to the Honourable Sqdr. Ldr. Phillip Ingram Cunliffe-Lister, the son of Lord Swinton who was head of MI5 during the war and a confident of Winston Churchill.

Ingram Cunliffe-Lister was friends with Fleming’s next door neighbour and the car was frequently parked outside the house, a house it is known was the inspiration for the house of Hugo Drax – Fleming’s villain in Moonraker – and it’s inevitable Fleming was familiar with the Aston.

To add more credibility to the story, it seems that when the DB 2/4 was being restored they found it had most of the features Fleming gave Bond’s Goldfinger car (in the novel) including reinforced steel bumpers, concealed lockers, anti-interference ignition, connections for a two-way radio/homing device and a Halda Speed Pilot device for calculating time and distance.

It all adds up to a very credible story, and won’t harm the potential value of the fully restored DB 2/4 when it heads for auction at Coys Blenheim Auction next month.

In the meantime, if you’d like to see the car that was perhaps single-handedly responsible for making Aston Martin the coolest car on the planet, you can see it at Stratstone of Mayfair Aston Martin showroom on Park Lane until the end of the week, and then in the foyer of the Grange St. Paul’s Hotel on Godliman Street before it heads for the auction block.

Any guesses on what the ‘Bond’ Aston Martin DB 2/4 will make?