Yours to drive off for £150k...Jeep war hero Ike was given as gift by UK
A JEEP used by Second World War commander Dwight D Eisenhower in Britain could sell for £150,000.
The vehicle comes complete with its personalised number plate ESF 43, in reference to Eisenhower’s special forces unit.
The Willys-Overland Military Jeep was gifted by the National Trust for Scotland in 1946 to honour the wartime heroics of Eisenhower, nicknamed Ike, who became US president seven years later.
He was also given an apartment in Culzean Castle in Ayrshire and used the vehicle as his personal transport.
Eisenhower helped mastermind the D-Day landings and other major Allied Forces’ war operations. He used the Scottish retreat as
“a second White House”, it is said.
He would often drive around the estate and into the village of Maybole in the leather-seated Jeep.
The general was known to play golf at nearby Turnberry – now owned by President Donald Trump – and is believed to have driven there in the 1944 Jeep. It has 33,000 miles on the clock and said to be in full working order. After his death in 1969, the vehicle remained on the estate before being sold in 1975 and was fully restored in 2014.
A 1944 silver quarter dollar was discovered in the Jeep, which may have been Eisenhower’s, and has been attached to the dashboard. There is also a bronze plaque giving details of the present to Ike.
Jeremy Curzon, from auctioneers Cheffins of Cambridge, said: “This is a rare opportunity to purchase a fantastical vehicle with provenance to such a significant man in history.”
The sale is scheduled for July 18.