Nicky Embiricos was prominent within motor sport immediately prior to the Second World War, with ERA and Bentley for example. He did not survive the conflict. I have seen and heard conflicting accounts of his death - which I won't recount here until I hear - hopefully - what others' researches have revealed.... Would anyone care to take the stage; what was the fate of Nicky Embiricos? Aerial, maritime, or terrestrial?????
DCN
Greek tragedy...the death of Nicky Embiricos
Started by
Doug Nye
, Aug 20 2002 21:04
28 replies to this topic
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#2
WGD706
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Posted 20 August 2002 - 22:29
Mr Nye
Do you know if Nicky Embiricos was the son of a Greek shipping family who was separated from his wife and young child. at the time of his accident?
Had he bought an ex works ERA-A, painted it grey and raced it quite successfully in Voiturette races during the 1936 season and decided to retire from racing after surviving an crash in the Florence GP 1937 ?
If this is the same person, then this article in the Providence Rhode Island Gazette might be about this person....
'A photograph of Eleanor Young walking into Bailey's appeared in the society pages of The Providence Sunday Journal of June 29, 1941, and an article trumpeted Newport's plans for the Fourth of July: "Following a series of dinners and lunches, the day will be rounded out with another dance, a subscription affair to be given in the ballroom at Bailey's Beach for which a New York orchestra is being brought to furnish the music." The orchestra was the same that played Hungarian Gypsy music at Eleanor's $75,000 debut.
War consumed the front page of The Providence Journal two days later, on the morning of July 1. Nazi tanks were advancing toward Moscow, and America was considering sending U.S. ships to aid the British in the battle of the North Atlantic. Soon, America would be engulfed in global conflict.
History does not record whether Eleanor read these headlines, or cared; she was crazy for her new beau Nicky Embiricos and believed they were destined to marry, just as soon as his divorce from the wife he'd left with his young child in Palm Beach was final. On the morning of July 1, Eleanor left her parents' summer estate and drove with Nicky, a weekend houseguest, to the Newport airport. Nicky kept his Fairchild Model 24 monoplane there.
I have seen this plane -- a photograph of it with Nicky, Eleanor and her beloved Yorkshire terrier posed in front is preserved in the Robert R. Young papers at the Yale University archives. Sharp-nosed and sleek, with a dark fuselage and light-colored wings, the plane sold for more than $6,000 new, a sum no ordinary person could have afforded.
I have found additional photos of Eleanor in those dusty boxes at Yale, too -- glossy 8-by-10 shots that surpass any newspaper microfilm. With her long black hair, dark eyes, and creamy skin, Cookie was stunning -- truly the most alluring Glamour Girl of all. Except for the color of her hair, she brings to mind the early Marilyn Monroe.
Heavy fog rolled in off the ocean that long-ago morning for the second day in a row.
Eleanor and her beau intended to visit friends in New York, and unlike yesterday, when they'd canceled their flight due to the weather, today they would not be deterred. With Nicky at the controls, they lifted off shortly before noon. A new pilot, Nicky had just 136 hours in the air, and his plane was equipped with only basic instrumentation.
Jane Ridgway was at Bailey's Beach when she heard the engine.
"The plane came over," she says, "and we were sitting in the cabana and it dipped its wings -- we gathered it must be Eleanor. He dipped his wings and off he went into the horizon."
Moments later, when the ceiling had dropped to 100 feet or less, Nicky became disoriented. They were off Matunuck now, and people on the beach below heard -- but could not see -- the plane madly circling.
Suddenly, the Fairchild burst through the fog.
It plummeted, zoomed back up, flipped, then hurtled down again, hitting the ocean with enough force to knock both wings off.
Eleanor and her dog were thrown from the plane. Lifeguards pulled Nicky from the wreckage; they detected a faint pulse, but he died there on the beach. Unconscious but breathing, Eleanor died an hour later at South County Hospital of a fractured skull, broken bones, and multiple internal injuries. The body of her dog was later found washed up on shore.
It was July 1, 1941, three days before the official start of the summer season. '
http://www.projo.com...er/chapter5.htm
Eleanor wrote the morning of March 3, 1941. "He got me just at the right moment when I was getting ready to settle for almost anything. Now I am again holding out for something sensational."
That very evening, a young man named Nicky Embiricos arrived at Sun Valley Lodge. "He is very nice and amusing," Eleanor wrote. "He was gambling last night and when I went up to the table he asked me what number I wanted to play. I said '31' and up it came. Not bad."
Feeling luck was with her this time, Eleanor fell for Nicky, son of a Greek shipping family who was separated from his wife and young child. Handsome and rich, Nicky owned a spiffy three-seat monoplane that became the talk of the town when he showed up in Newport with his beautiful new sweetheart in the spring of 1941. Nicky was clearly the adventurous type, but he'd logged precious few hours in the air.
http://www.projo.com...er/chapter4.htm
Hopefully, this has helped your search...or at least provided you with some interesting reading about the life Styles of the Rich and Famous in America!
Warren Davis
Do you know if Nicky Embiricos was the son of a Greek shipping family who was separated from his wife and young child. at the time of his accident?
Had he bought an ex works ERA-A, painted it grey and raced it quite successfully in Voiturette races during the 1936 season and decided to retire from racing after surviving an crash in the Florence GP 1937 ?
If this is the same person, then this article in the Providence Rhode Island Gazette might be about this person....
'A photograph of Eleanor Young walking into Bailey's appeared in the society pages of The Providence Sunday Journal of June 29, 1941, and an article trumpeted Newport's plans for the Fourth of July: "Following a series of dinners and lunches, the day will be rounded out with another dance, a subscription affair to be given in the ballroom at Bailey's Beach for which a New York orchestra is being brought to furnish the music." The orchestra was the same that played Hungarian Gypsy music at Eleanor's $75,000 debut.
War consumed the front page of The Providence Journal two days later, on the morning of July 1. Nazi tanks were advancing toward Moscow, and America was considering sending U.S. ships to aid the British in the battle of the North Atlantic. Soon, America would be engulfed in global conflict.
History does not record whether Eleanor read these headlines, or cared; she was crazy for her new beau Nicky Embiricos and believed they were destined to marry, just as soon as his divorce from the wife he'd left with his young child in Palm Beach was final. On the morning of July 1, Eleanor left her parents' summer estate and drove with Nicky, a weekend houseguest, to the Newport airport. Nicky kept his Fairchild Model 24 monoplane there.
I have seen this plane -- a photograph of it with Nicky, Eleanor and her beloved Yorkshire terrier posed in front is preserved in the Robert R. Young papers at the Yale University archives. Sharp-nosed and sleek, with a dark fuselage and light-colored wings, the plane sold for more than $6,000 new, a sum no ordinary person could have afforded.
I have found additional photos of Eleanor in those dusty boxes at Yale, too -- glossy 8-by-10 shots that surpass any newspaper microfilm. With her long black hair, dark eyes, and creamy skin, Cookie was stunning -- truly the most alluring Glamour Girl of all. Except for the color of her hair, she brings to mind the early Marilyn Monroe.
Heavy fog rolled in off the ocean that long-ago morning for the second day in a row.
Eleanor and her beau intended to visit friends in New York, and unlike yesterday, when they'd canceled their flight due to the weather, today they would not be deterred. With Nicky at the controls, they lifted off shortly before noon. A new pilot, Nicky had just 136 hours in the air, and his plane was equipped with only basic instrumentation.
Jane Ridgway was at Bailey's Beach when she heard the engine.
"The plane came over," she says, "and we were sitting in the cabana and it dipped its wings -- we gathered it must be Eleanor. He dipped his wings and off he went into the horizon."
Moments later, when the ceiling had dropped to 100 feet or less, Nicky became disoriented. They were off Matunuck now, and people on the beach below heard -- but could not see -- the plane madly circling.
Suddenly, the Fairchild burst through the fog.
It plummeted, zoomed back up, flipped, then hurtled down again, hitting the ocean with enough force to knock both wings off.
Eleanor and her dog were thrown from the plane. Lifeguards pulled Nicky from the wreckage; they detected a faint pulse, but he died there on the beach. Unconscious but breathing, Eleanor died an hour later at South County Hospital of a fractured skull, broken bones, and multiple internal injuries. The body of her dog was later found washed up on shore.
It was July 1, 1941, three days before the official start of the summer season. '
http://www.projo.com...er/chapter5.htm
Eleanor wrote the morning of March 3, 1941. "He got me just at the right moment when I was getting ready to settle for almost anything. Now I am again holding out for something sensational."
That very evening, a young man named Nicky Embiricos arrived at Sun Valley Lodge. "He is very nice and amusing," Eleanor wrote. "He was gambling last night and when I went up to the table he asked me what number I wanted to play. I said '31' and up it came. Not bad."
Feeling luck was with her this time, Eleanor fell for Nicky, son of a Greek shipping family who was separated from his wife and young child. Handsome and rich, Nicky owned a spiffy three-seat monoplane that became the talk of the town when he showed up in Newport with his beautiful new sweetheart in the spring of 1941. Nicky was clearly the adventurous type, but he'd logged precious few hours in the air.
http://www.projo.com...er/chapter4.htm
Hopefully, this has helped your search...or at least provided you with some interesting reading about the life Styles of the Rich and Famous in America!
Warren Davis
#3
Vitesse2
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Posted 20 August 2002 - 23:44
Another excellent example of the power of TNF! Up to now the only reference I had to the death of Nicky Embiricos was the brief footnote in "Racing 1500s", which says it was in 1939, not 1941.
Got it in one I think, Doug!
Got it in one I think, Doug!
#4
Doug Nye
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Posted 21 August 2002 - 13:20
Blimey! Thank you VERY much Warren, pleased indeed to hear from you.... the alternative was a Naval disaster off Greece during the Crete campaign.
DCN
DCN
#5
Don Capps
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Posted 21 August 2002 - 17:44
WOW! I am impressed!! Thanks, Warren, for keeping our reputation and batting average on the plus side!
#6
Doug Nye
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Posted 21 August 2002 - 18:58
There are remarkable resonances here with the unhappy demise of John F. Kennedy Jr with his wife and sister-in-law in 1999...
In motor racing terms Embiricos was regarded in period as strong-headed, impulsive and an accident going somewhere to happen. Unfortunately for him, and for the poor girl too, it seems he took this approach into the air...never a bright notion.
Incidentally the alternative notion amongst chaps who recall Embiricos from immediately pre-war was as follows - Embiricos was called-up (drafted) into the Greek Navy as a reserve officer when Mussolini invaded Albania at Easter 1939 and was lost at sea off Crete in the same action as Lord Louis Mountbatten's , famously much-risked/much-batteredf destroyer HMS Kelly.
Tony Rudd's contemporary bosses at Rolls-Royce had been involved with Paulin, Van Vouren, Pourtout and the Embiricos Bentley, chassis 'B-27-LE' (known within R-R as the Paulin Bentley). The works Derby Bentley for which young Tony Rudd care ran on the special wheels from it, with dural hubs as well as rims, for most of the war and he and his young colleagues had to wait for written permission from Embiricos to arrive. There was much pain because his letter arrived after news of his "loss at sea" from Walter Sleator, who was the R-R Man in Paris, maintaining difficult contact even after the occupation.
I passed on the air crash story to Tony who read it with considerable surprise and great interest - "Hmm - seems reliable enough...sounds like draft-dodging". I think he's right, and the story that he and his superiors at Rolls-Royce were told sounds like myth-building, a suitable death in action, to cover same... It would not be the only example - where a fit, healthy, wealthy, young man was concerned - in those traumatic times...
DCN
In motor racing terms Embiricos was regarded in period as strong-headed, impulsive and an accident going somewhere to happen. Unfortunately for him, and for the poor girl too, it seems he took this approach into the air...never a bright notion.
Incidentally the alternative notion amongst chaps who recall Embiricos from immediately pre-war was as follows - Embiricos was called-up (drafted) into the Greek Navy as a reserve officer when Mussolini invaded Albania at Easter 1939 and was lost at sea off Crete in the same action as Lord Louis Mountbatten's , famously much-risked/much-batteredf destroyer HMS Kelly.
Tony Rudd's contemporary bosses at Rolls-Royce had been involved with Paulin, Van Vouren, Pourtout and the Embiricos Bentley, chassis 'B-27-LE' (known within R-R as the Paulin Bentley). The works Derby Bentley for which young Tony Rudd care ran on the special wheels from it, with dural hubs as well as rims, for most of the war and he and his young colleagues had to wait for written permission from Embiricos to arrive. There was much pain because his letter arrived after news of his "loss at sea" from Walter Sleator, who was the R-R Man in Paris, maintaining difficult contact even after the occupation.
I passed on the air crash story to Tony who read it with considerable surprise and great interest - "Hmm - seems reliable enough...sounds like draft-dodging". I think he's right, and the story that he and his superiors at Rolls-Royce were told sounds like myth-building, a suitable death in action, to cover same... It would not be the only example - where a fit, healthy, wealthy, young man was concerned - in those traumatic times...
DCN
#7
WGD706
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Posted 21 August 2002 - 19:28
Mr Nye and Mr Capps
You are both very welcome; I've been an avid reader of this BB for some time but only recently decided to take the plunge. I wasn't sure how many Nicky Embiricos' were around pre-WWII. I did find quite a few references to a current-day horse owner/trainer of the same name. Wonder if he is the son that was left behind? The age and occupation sounds about right...Born on January 29, 1937, Brave Highlander's owner Nick Embiricos, a shipbroker, has owned horses for many years. Other than Aldaniti, the best of them would be French Colonist (a winner 11 times under National Hunt Rules) and on the Flat, Evening Venture, who won the Listed Galtres Stakes at York. He is also a successful breeder, running a stud at his Barkfold Manor home at Kirdford in Sussex. His wife, Valda, was elected to the Jockey Club in 1987 and is a steward at several courses including Ascot and Goodwood. Daughter Alex trains at Newmarket and she is married to top racecourse commentator, Mark Johnson. Nick Embiricos is one of the trustees of Bob Champion and Aldaniti's cancer charity.
Wonder if he'd be receptive to questions regarding his long,lost father; his wife is a steward at Goodwood!
Warren Davis
You are both very welcome; I've been an avid reader of this BB for some time but only recently decided to take the plunge. I wasn't sure how many Nicky Embiricos' were around pre-WWII. I did find quite a few references to a current-day horse owner/trainer of the same name. Wonder if he is the son that was left behind? The age and occupation sounds about right...Born on January 29, 1937, Brave Highlander's owner Nick Embiricos, a shipbroker, has owned horses for many years. Other than Aldaniti, the best of them would be French Colonist (a winner 11 times under National Hunt Rules) and on the Flat, Evening Venture, who won the Listed Galtres Stakes at York. He is also a successful breeder, running a stud at his Barkfold Manor home at Kirdford in Sussex. His wife, Valda, was elected to the Jockey Club in 1987 and is a steward at several courses including Ascot and Goodwood. Daughter Alex trains at Newmarket and she is married to top racecourse commentator, Mark Johnson. Nick Embiricos is one of the trustees of Bob Champion and Aldaniti's cancer charity.
Wonder if he'd be receptive to questions regarding his long,lost father; his wife is a steward at Goodwood!
Warren Davis
#8
Doug Nye
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Posted 21 August 2002 - 19:34
Ye Gods it gets better! Well done and a very warm welcome...oh and please, not Mr.... me Doug, he Don...
DCN
DCN
#9
Don Capps
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Posted 21 August 2002 - 20:24
Originally posted by Doug Nye
Ye Gods it gets better! Well done and a very warm welcome...oh and please, not Mr.... me Doug, he Don...
DCN
He Doug, me Don.... 
#10
dmj
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Posted 22 August 2002 - 07:38
Embiricos Bentley has to be one of most beautiful cars ever built (as well as a not too unsimilar looking Delage design, also by Paulin). Now, an idea: Georges Paulin was a dentist who in off-time designed cars. Wouldn't it be nice to put Tony Brooks in one of his creation, preferably Bentley, and let him blast up Goodwood in it... The fastest dentist in the world in the most beautiful car designed by one of his colleagues. Doug?
Hmmmm... somebody obviously put something in my coffee this morning...
Hmmmm... somebody obviously put something in my coffee this morning...
#11
WGD706
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Posted 22 August 2002 - 18:39
Doug
What is the connection between Nicky Embiricos and the Embiricos Bentley, other than the name?
I thought that Andre M Embiricos,a French banker. comissioned the lightweight pre-war Derby Bentley (1939 4¼ litre chassis fitted with a streamlined body designed by Georges Paulin and built in Paris) that provided much inspiration for the Continental and it became known as the Embiricos Bentley.
Do you know if Andre and Nicky were related?
Warren
What is the connection between Nicky Embiricos and the Embiricos Bentley, other than the name?
I thought that Andre M Embiricos,a French banker. comissioned the lightweight pre-war Derby Bentley (1939 4¼ litre chassis fitted with a streamlined body designed by Georges Paulin and built in Paris) that provided much inspiration for the Continental and it became known as the Embiricos Bentley.
Do you know if Andre and Nicky were related?
Warren
#12
Leif Snellman
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Posted 22 August 2002 - 20:09
22 May 1941. That day cruisers Gloucester and Fiji and destroyes Greyhound, Kelly and Kashmir were sunk by German dive bombers,Originally posted by Doug Nye
Incidentally the alternative notion amongst chaps who recall Embiricos from immediately pre-war was as follows - Embiricos was called-up (drafted) into the Greek Navy as a reserve officer when Mussolini invaded Albania at Easter 1939 and was lost at sea off Crete in the same action as Lord Louis Mountbatten's , famously much-risked/much-battered destroyer HMS Kelly.
#13
Felix Muelas
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Posted 22 August 2002 - 20:19
Originally posted by dmj
Embiricos Bentley has to be one of most beautiful cars ever built (as well as a not too unsimilar looking Delage design, also by Paulin).
picture borrowed from the Bentley Drivers Club
fm
#14
Doug Nye
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Posted 22 August 2002 - 21:37
(I started to write this before Leif and Felix posted, but this is in direct response to Warren's intriguing last...)
This is VERY interesting indeed...to me at least!
Since I have never, ever, had anything to do with 'Embiricos' or his cars I think I have plainly presumed - or been imprinted at some time in the past - that the ERA Embiricos and the Paulin-bodied Bentley Embiricos were one and the same person.
While I am very familiar with ERAs and W.O.-period Bentleys the Rolls-Royce Bentley pool in which I have very seldom had to swim...
Only today I received the following from a pal interested in Embiricos:
"My former fellow Apprentice and room mate (now aged 80, retired and living in Vancouver) was Service Director of Rolls-Royce in the 1960s....I recalled lunch time conversation with him and senior service dept people over difficulties selling French registered Embiricos (Paulin) Bentley chassis no B-27-LE reg no 2RL-9 to a chap called Hay in 1946. Its new British reg was HSF6, somehow, it had acquired an improved engine better than Eddie Hall's in between March and August 1939 when GET Eyston averaged 117 mph (tyre limited) for an hour with it at Brooklands.
I faxed this friend to see if he had more info. He ... believes there were two of them - probably cousins, not brothers who shared a flat in Paris.
"Both killed overseas in first half of War.
"The Bentley owner (the older and more responsible of the two) wanted to buy a Mark V having been allowed to drive one by Sleator the R-R man in Paris during summer 1939 when R-R were romancing him to borrow his Paulin for publicity stunt at Brooklands. Mark Vs did not go down the line until Aug/Sept 1939, R-R were going to build and sell their own Paulin as a Continental and said "No or not yet" He took the hump and either sold them the car or asked them to sell it for him as he was no longer interested. "
SO, after receiving this - with tummy muscles tightening in that 'Ah, I suspect I've made a right twit of myself again" sensation, I did what I should have done all along, and checked upon what might have persuaded me that Nicky Embiricos was the customer for Walter Sleator's slippery-bodied Paulin-styled Rolls-Bentley.... In the 1930s, incidentally, Walter Sleator ran Franco-Britannic Autos in Paris, Bentley's Continental agency.
Andre M. Embiricos was racing partner of 'Raph' de las Casas, and in 1937 he owned the ex-Helde Talbot T150C which 'Raph' drove in the Tunis GP. In early 1938 Andre Embiricos ran a Bugatti 57S in the Monte Carlo Rally, as the sole starter from a projected three-car team which his erstwhile partners Wimille and 'Raph' had evidently thought better of joining!
Meanwhile Nicky had made his name in the rakishly wonderful Bugatti Type 57S, bodied by Corsica, which would be owned for many years postwar in the UK by Ronnie Symondson, and which Anthony Blight recalled as being easily capable of "eating Jaguar XK120s for breakfast". Nicky drove this very fast car tail-out nearly all the way in the 1936 RAC TT at Ards, at least until he collided with a Delahaye and it all came to a steaming halt.
During practice for the Florence Voiturette race in 1937 marshals decided to move straw bales lining the circuit while a session was still in progress. Nicky driving his freshly acquired ERA committed himself to the corner as it had been configured on his last time round - and he crashed heavily. I don't think he was very badly hurt, but he decided there and then that motor racing was too risky to be healthy for him...
And now I have rediscovered the formative references which fixed Nicky in my mind for the Paulin Bentley: 'Automobile Quarterly' Vol 6 No 4, page 379: "Sleator...had been involved, pre-World War II in the clandestine and unauthorised construction of a very special Bentley to the order of Grek racing driver Nicky Embiricos...".
Also 'AQ' Vol 12 No 2, page 120: "...a wealthy young Greek racing driver who lived in Paris was finding his own sensational solution...Nikky (sic) Embiricos had engaged Louis Paulin, a young Frenchman famous for his experiments in "Le Streamline" to design for him a lightweight 2+2 coupe with very low drag characteristics...".
Andre or Nicky - we have a right to know?
The Naval catastrophe in which my correspondent understood 'his' Embiricos, presumably Andre, had been lost was, he wrote, that in which Mountbatten lost HMS Kelly to air attack, off Crete on May 23, 1941.
Embiricos was reputedly on a cruiser which was sunk. HMS Gloucester and HMS Fiji were both lost to air attack, the latter being caught defenceless by a single bomber just as night fell, having shot off all her AA ammunition in resisting incessant attacks while attempting to rescue survivors from the sunken destroyer HMS Greyhound. Soon after, HMS Calcutta was also sunk by air attack. In all, three cruisers and six destroyers were lost over those few frenzied days, and six more cruisers were severely damaged - all suffered heavy casualties....
It must have seemed a terribly long time indeed since the comfortable cafe life of 'Gay Paree'....
If Andre died then, Nicky followed him to the great saloon bar in the sky only some six weeks later.
DCN
This is VERY interesting indeed...to me at least!
Since I have never, ever, had anything to do with 'Embiricos' or his cars I think I have plainly presumed - or been imprinted at some time in the past - that the ERA Embiricos and the Paulin-bodied Bentley Embiricos were one and the same person.
While I am very familiar with ERAs and W.O.-period Bentleys the Rolls-Royce Bentley pool in which I have very seldom had to swim...
Only today I received the following from a pal interested in Embiricos:
"My former fellow Apprentice and room mate (now aged 80, retired and living in Vancouver) was Service Director of Rolls-Royce in the 1960s....I recalled lunch time conversation with him and senior service dept people over difficulties selling French registered Embiricos (Paulin) Bentley chassis no B-27-LE reg no 2RL-9 to a chap called Hay in 1946. Its new British reg was HSF6, somehow, it had acquired an improved engine better than Eddie Hall's in between March and August 1939 when GET Eyston averaged 117 mph (tyre limited) for an hour with it at Brooklands.
I faxed this friend to see if he had more info. He ... believes there were two of them - probably cousins, not brothers who shared a flat in Paris.
"Both killed overseas in first half of War.
"The Bentley owner (the older and more responsible of the two) wanted to buy a Mark V having been allowed to drive one by Sleator the R-R man in Paris during summer 1939 when R-R were romancing him to borrow his Paulin for publicity stunt at Brooklands. Mark Vs did not go down the line until Aug/Sept 1939, R-R were going to build and sell their own Paulin as a Continental and said "No or not yet" He took the hump and either sold them the car or asked them to sell it for him as he was no longer interested. "
SO, after receiving this - with tummy muscles tightening in that 'Ah, I suspect I've made a right twit of myself again" sensation, I did what I should have done all along, and checked upon what might have persuaded me that Nicky Embiricos was the customer for Walter Sleator's slippery-bodied Paulin-styled Rolls-Bentley.... In the 1930s, incidentally, Walter Sleator ran Franco-Britannic Autos in Paris, Bentley's Continental agency.
Andre M. Embiricos was racing partner of 'Raph' de las Casas, and in 1937 he owned the ex-Helde Talbot T150C which 'Raph' drove in the Tunis GP. In early 1938 Andre Embiricos ran a Bugatti 57S in the Monte Carlo Rally, as the sole starter from a projected three-car team which his erstwhile partners Wimille and 'Raph' had evidently thought better of joining!
Meanwhile Nicky had made his name in the rakishly wonderful Bugatti Type 57S, bodied by Corsica, which would be owned for many years postwar in the UK by Ronnie Symondson, and which Anthony Blight recalled as being easily capable of "eating Jaguar XK120s for breakfast". Nicky drove this very fast car tail-out nearly all the way in the 1936 RAC TT at Ards, at least until he collided with a Delahaye and it all came to a steaming halt.
During practice for the Florence Voiturette race in 1937 marshals decided to move straw bales lining the circuit while a session was still in progress. Nicky driving his freshly acquired ERA committed himself to the corner as it had been configured on his last time round - and he crashed heavily. I don't think he was very badly hurt, but he decided there and then that motor racing was too risky to be healthy for him...
And now I have rediscovered the formative references which fixed Nicky in my mind for the Paulin Bentley: 'Automobile Quarterly' Vol 6 No 4, page 379: "Sleator...had been involved, pre-World War II in the clandestine and unauthorised construction of a very special Bentley to the order of Grek racing driver Nicky Embiricos...".
Also 'AQ' Vol 12 No 2, page 120: "...a wealthy young Greek racing driver who lived in Paris was finding his own sensational solution...Nikky (sic) Embiricos had engaged Louis Paulin, a young Frenchman famous for his experiments in "Le Streamline" to design for him a lightweight 2+2 coupe with very low drag characteristics...".
Andre or Nicky - we have a right to know?
The Naval catastrophe in which my correspondent understood 'his' Embiricos, presumably Andre, had been lost was, he wrote, that in which Mountbatten lost HMS Kelly to air attack, off Crete on May 23, 1941.
Embiricos was reputedly on a cruiser which was sunk. HMS Gloucester and HMS Fiji were both lost to air attack, the latter being caught defenceless by a single bomber just as night fell, having shot off all her AA ammunition in resisting incessant attacks while attempting to rescue survivors from the sunken destroyer HMS Greyhound. Soon after, HMS Calcutta was also sunk by air attack. In all, three cruisers and six destroyers were lost over those few frenzied days, and six more cruisers were severely damaged - all suffered heavy casualties....
It must have seemed a terribly long time indeed since the comfortable cafe life of 'Gay Paree'....
If Andre died then, Nicky followed him to the great saloon bar in the sky only some six weeks later.
DCN
#15
dmj
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Posted 23 August 2002 - 12:52
...You can't believe even in AQ these days. : "Nikky" Embiricos and "Louis" Paulin in same sentence...
#16
Doug Nye
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Posted 23 August 2002 - 16:38
These are 'old' copies of 'AQ' from the days when young Doug believed it to be reliable....before I realised the awful truth about ALL of us who scribble... 
DCN
DCN
#17
Pete Stowe
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Posted 26 August 2002 - 19:59
A bit more on Nicky's ERA racing, and Ards TT crash, remembered by racing mechanic George Boyle, in a 1956 Autosport feature :
"In 1935, I joined Nicky Embiricos as personal mechanic to his E.R.A., the ex-Humphrey Cook R.A.2. In 1936, with this car, we took a third at Monte Carlo, and a second at Leghorn, breaking the lap record on three occasions against Count Trossi’s Maserati. In this race, R.A.2 crashed five laps from the end, and finished with wobbling wheels and a bent chassis.
As we only had a week before Berne, I took the car to Friedrich’s at Nice, and there, by working all hours of the day and night, was able to get it straight. At Berne we were up against all the works voiturette teams, and Dick Seaman with his fabulous Delage. In the end Seaman walked away with the race, with us second - a very satisfactory day.
From Berne I went to Molsheim, where Nicky had bought a Bugatti. This was the very latest four-seater sports car for the 1936 Tourist Trophy, the last event to be held on the old Ards circuit. After three days and nights work, and one morning’s practice, our race was on. Unfortunately on the Newtonards straight, Nicky touched a French Delahaye at about maximum speed. The Bugatti sailed over a hedge, travelled some hundreds of yards over a field and finished in thick undergrowth. Embiricos was only slightly hurt, and came back to eat a whole chicken washed down with pints of beer!"
"In 1935, I joined Nicky Embiricos as personal mechanic to his E.R.A., the ex-Humphrey Cook R.A.2. In 1936, with this car, we took a third at Monte Carlo, and a second at Leghorn, breaking the lap record on three occasions against Count Trossi’s Maserati. In this race, R.A.2 crashed five laps from the end, and finished with wobbling wheels and a bent chassis.
As we only had a week before Berne, I took the car to Friedrich’s at Nice, and there, by working all hours of the day and night, was able to get it straight. At Berne we were up against all the works voiturette teams, and Dick Seaman with his fabulous Delage. In the end Seaman walked away with the race, with us second - a very satisfactory day.
From Berne I went to Molsheim, where Nicky had bought a Bugatti. This was the very latest four-seater sports car for the 1936 Tourist Trophy, the last event to be held on the old Ards circuit. After three days and nights work, and one morning’s practice, our race was on. Unfortunately on the Newtonards straight, Nicky touched a French Delahaye at about maximum speed. The Bugatti sailed over a hedge, travelled some hundreds of yards over a field and finished in thick undergrowth. Embiricos was only slightly hurt, and came back to eat a whole chicken washed down with pints of beer!"
#18
Pete Stowe
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- 481 posts
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Posted 18 September 2002 - 20:23
Is John Embiricos (b. 1960, based in Geneva, company Levantes Fund Ltd) currently racing in Formula Palmer Audi in the UK any relation I wonder?
#19
Darren Galpin
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Posted 19 September 2002 - 07:08
If I'd thought about it I would have asked him at the weekend, as he was racing at Castle Combe......
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#20
Stefan Ornerdal
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Posted 08 October 2002 - 11:45
Andre M. Embiricos was racing partner of 'Raph' de las Casas, and in 1937 he owned the ex-Helde Talbot T150C which 'Raph' drove in the Tunis GP.
This car was also raced at Le Mans 1937. "Raph" was one of the drivers, but who was the other - Nicky or André?
Stefan
#21
roadmap
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- 94 posts
- Joined: December 05
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Posted 10 March 2009 - 11:27
Was the Embricos Bentley based on a MK V chassis and engine ?
#22
Terry Walker
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Posted 10 March 2009 - 15:32
It was a 4 1/4 litre, still with the beam axle front suspension. Only a very tiny number of Mk Vs were built - 14 or so - in late 1939.
#23
P. Dron
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- 99 posts
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Posted 11 March 2009 - 10:36
By coincidence, while looking for some detail about a Frenchman named Georges Paulin, I came across an Embiricos connection:
http://www.adattoaut..._excerpts.shtml
Paulin seems to have been an interesting fellow. He was a Jewish Parisian whose day job was dentistry, but he was also an automobile engineer and was the designer of the first automatic hardtop convertible, for Peugeot. He was also, unlike many Frenchmen, an early member of the Resistance during the war, for which he was shot by the Nazis on 21 March, 1942, aged 39. Does anyone know anything else about him (other than what can be found in Wikipeda)?
http://www.adattoaut..._excerpts.shtml
Paulin seems to have been an interesting fellow. He was a Jewish Parisian whose day job was dentistry, but he was also an automobile engineer and was the designer of the first automatic hardtop convertible, for Peugeot. He was also, unlike many Frenchmen, an early member of the Resistance during the war, for which he was shot by the Nazis on 21 March, 1942, aged 39. Does anyone know anything else about him (other than what can be found in Wikipeda)?
#24
bradbury west
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- 6,125 posts
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Posted 09 July 2009 - 14:01
I came across this in a current issue of Octane. I believe the car was exhibited at the Essen show, or so I was told at VSCC Silverstone
http://www.bobpeters...latestcars.html
Roger Lund
http://www.bobpeters...latestcars.html
Roger Lund
#25
bradbury west
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- 6,125 posts
- Joined: June 02
Member
Posted 27 February 2010 - 21:34
More on the Embiricos Bentley lookalike from this month's Octane e-bulletin for those to whom the car is interesting
http://www.classican...NLC-Newsletters
Roger Lund
http://www.classican...NLC-Newsletters
Roger Lund
#26
Vitesse2
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- 42,812 posts
- Joined: April 01
Administrator
Posted 28 February 2010 - 00:00
Some press reports of Embiricos' demise:
Palm Beach Post, July 2nd 1941
Pittburgh Post-Gazette, July 2nd 1941
It looks like he might have arrived in America in May or June 1939 as he could be on a passenger list published in the New York Times on June 5th of that year: however, this may refer to the name of a ship (see below). But he was certainly there in November, as he and his wife appear on the guest list of a party given by one Mrs Brookfield van Rensselaer (NYT Nov 23rd 1939) and by the first week of January 1940 they were in Palm Beach ...
I also think I've solved the "sinking" story too: the SS Nicolaos M Embiricos went down in the English Channel on November 5th 1939. She was a 5295 ton freighter, registered in Andros and bound for Antwerp with a cargo of grain: the captain reported two explosions, one in the No 1 hold, the second amidships five minutes later and powerful enough to break the ship's back and hurl wreckage into the air. She sank quickly, but all the crew of 24 took to the lifeboats and were rescued: one boat reached a lightship and the other was picked up by a Dutch ship, the whole crew eventually being landed "on the South Coast" by lifeboat.
The word "torpedo" does not appear in the report in The Times (Nov 6th 1939), but I don't think any other conclusion is really possible.
Palm Beach Post, July 2nd 1941
Pittburgh Post-Gazette, July 2nd 1941
It looks like he might have arrived in America in May or June 1939 as he could be on a passenger list published in the New York Times on June 5th of that year: however, this may refer to the name of a ship (see below). But he was certainly there in November, as he and his wife appear on the guest list of a party given by one Mrs Brookfield van Rensselaer (NYT Nov 23rd 1939) and by the first week of January 1940 they were in Palm Beach ...
I also think I've solved the "sinking" story too: the SS Nicolaos M Embiricos went down in the English Channel on November 5th 1939. She was a 5295 ton freighter, registered in Andros and bound for Antwerp with a cargo of grain: the captain reported two explosions, one in the No 1 hold, the second amidships five minutes later and powerful enough to break the ship's back and hurl wreckage into the air. She sank quickly, but all the crew of 24 took to the lifeboats and were rescued: one boat reached a lightship and the other was picked up by a Dutch ship, the whole crew eventually being landed "on the South Coast" by lifeboat.
The word "torpedo" does not appear in the report in The Times (Nov 6th 1939), but I don't think any other conclusion is really possible.
Edited by Vitesse2, 28 February 2010 - 00:11.
#27
312f1
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- 106 posts
- Joined: December 08
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Posted 02 March 2010 - 12:11
There is a reason for the non-appearance of the word "torpedo". The boat was actually sunk in a minefield off Dover. Luckily only one crewman was lost.
George
George
#28
Vitesse2
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- 42,812 posts
- Joined: April 01
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Posted 02 March 2010 - 14:07
Thanks. I meant to revisit this subject, but it slipped my mind yesterday. Presumably your source was naval-history.net?
#29
Doug Nye
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- 11,755 posts
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Posted 02 March 2010 - 16:53
...which is a wonderful web site. For the like-minded, but literally upon a lower level, another related tour de force is http://www.uboat.net. Sorry - yet again I digress.
DCN
DCN
Edited by Doug Nye, 02 March 2010 - 16:56.
