Origins of The Riley Cars Archive Heritage Trust

In 2014 a long standing, but by then inactive, Riley based trust was about to be disbanded. Concurrently two other independent groups were actively promoting the Riley marque and by good fortune the three came together and gradually morphed into what is now The Riley Cars Archive Heritage Trust.

The original trust as a legal charitable entity dates from December 1973 but a more romantic view of its origins goes back to 1940 and the beaches of Dunkirk!

Lt. Commander Malcolm Guy Morris RN was commanding a small naval vessel at the time of the evacuation of British and allied forces from northern France and was at 'Action Stations' on the bridge of his ship for most of the nine day operation. Although he was not injured by enemy action his long spells on the bridge caused him such suffering in his legs that he later had to be reassigned to shore duties. He became a courier to CIC Nore based in Chatham and for this job he needed a motorcar and petrol coupons!

He purchased a second hand Standard then an Austin, neither of which he thought much of, and was then offered a 1936 Riley Adelphi which he  thought was terrific. It fitted the bill in all respects, classy, comfortable and with a lively performance. He kept it for the rest of his life.

In 1954 the Riley Register was founded, initially from an idea to form a club for Riley 9 owners but very soon this was expanded by popular demand to a club for all pre-war Rileys. A year or two later the Register had organised itself into areas based loosely on counties and one such area was West Sussex. The inaugural meeting was held in Southwick and this is where the Commander met up with the Haviland family. Royal Navy connections on both sides led to an immediate friendship and a pooling of resources to work together in maintaining the Rileys.

The Ministry of Transport's 10 year test scheme was introduced in 1960 forcing more and more older cars off the road. People became more affluent and new cars were now available and affordable. By this time all Rileys produced by the family business were over twenty years old and had suffered wartime neglect. Those still in use as everyday cars were generally well worn while others had started to decay through negligible usage. Consequently they were cheap to buy and many were snapped up, usually by new young motorists or as a spares car by more established enthusiasts of the marque.

The Haviland and Morris collection of Riley cars and spares grew rapidly and space became a major problem. A small barn in Lancing was rented from a local farmer and some twenty of the most vulnerable cars were installed. This was the situation for the next few years and much time was spent towing cars to odd barns anywhere along the south coast to where a friendly farmer could be found.

After several moves the trail reached as far as Chichester where a temporary home in a run down building owned by West Sussex County Council was located. This was earmarked for development as part of a plan to build a new technical college but would not be required immediately. It was while storing a large part of the collection here that a solicitor friend of the Commander paid a visit.

It was his advice, based on remarkable foresight, that one day these rather decrepit motor cars would be worth a lot of money and that serious thought should be given to the implications of joint ownership of a high value collection and death duty liabilities.

His solution was to form a charitable trust which would then assume ownership while the trustees would follow such charitable guidelines as could be agreed with the Charity Commission. It took several months to organise and agree but eventually all was settled and 'The Haviland & Morris Riley Museum Trust' was registered as a charitable trust in 1973.

The trustees, with the exception of Commander Morris who was retired, were relatively young men with careers to build and families to raise and Riley activities were limited and much of the time available was spent in seeking financial help to establish a small museum building where the cars could be displayed. During this early period appeals were made to many motoring celebrities and to Rileys at Longbridge and while there was much interest and encouragement funding was not forthcoming. The trustees continued to rent barns along the south coast where visitors were always welcomed to chat or give a hand with moving cars or sorting spares. The loss of two trustees in the 1980s and a relocation to Bedfordshire over a period of five years resulted in a consolidation of the collection and a new home on land owned by one of the trustees, a permanent home where stock could be taken and the future reviewed.

Now in retirement the two remaining trustees, with wives making up the numbers and helping with the many visitors, continued to rationalise the spares and begin a programme of restoration. Plans for anything more than a private trust had now been abandoned but it was still necessary to observe the public interest and visitors were always welcomed. Progress was being made towards a representation of models produced by Riley when in 2012 Reg Haviland passed away and it became impossible to carry on.

The property in Bedfordshire was to be sold requiring the collection to be urgently disposed of and while the spares were donated to the Riley Register the cars, still largely untouched in four or five decades, were sold off on the best terms obtainable.

However, the trust, on paper, still existed and a chance meeting with Victor Riley (grandson of the founder of the Riley Cycle Co. in 1896) some time later led to discussions on the possibility of The Association of Riley Clubs taking it over. The alternative was to de-register with the Charity Commission and pass on what assets remained to another trust. Victor recognised the potential for its continuing and meetings with the ARC Chairman took place in 2013. The Riley clubs initially supported ARC and also the proposals to take on the charitable trust but before any jointly agreed programme could be decided upon changes of policy at club level brought about a 'mothballing' of the ARC. An official club presence on the board of trustees ceased at this time but by now there were sufficient volunteers from all three clubs to carry on.

Thus the trust survived and as an interim project, while a new way forward was still to be identified, discussed and put into practice, it was agreed to create a replica of the first Riley car of 1898. This had been a long term aim of the ARC and could now be tackled as a starting point in a trust project to promote Riley history.

Victor was also campaigning for the independent Riley Archive Project group at this time and saw the overlap in the proposals to create an archive which could be accessed freely by anyone interested in the products of the Riley family. The trust was committed to this by its governing document and RAP had already progressed considerably further than the trust by its concentrated efforts to establish firstly a physical archive and then a digital archive when funds allowed. It was seen that by joining forces the trust could assist with grant appeals to other trusts and funding organisations and also with banking facilities, all of which were stumbling blocks that had hampered RAP's progress. Consequently as official Riley Club representation reduced, the required trustee numbers were maintained by the addition of new volunteers from RAP.

Throughout 2018 and 2019 RAP, now under the trust 'umbrella', continued as an independent group making great strides in funding appeals and in communications with authoritative bodies which resulted in acquiring the Coventry Basin premises for the physical archive. The management team which was also now in place made rapid progress on the huge task of identifying and setting in motion all the steps to create and maintain the digital archive. To facilitate all these actions it became necessary to fully subsume RAP into the trust and to relaunch with a new name, a new logo and an updated Governing Document, this was all completed in 2020.

A lot has been achieved in recent years after a long period of dogged determination to simply keep going in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Perhaps the spirit of Dunkirk lives on!

The body of trustees has come from the original trust, former ARC and RAP members and volunteers from all three UK Riley clubs. A management committee, originally set up under RAP to concentrate on the archive project, has expanded its work to examine all the elements of the trust's Governing Document and its charitable commitment to provide benefit to the public in general and to Riley enthusiasts and researchers anywhere in the world.