As the unexpectedly rusty members of the Formula 1 travelling circus assemble in Monte-Carlo, having envisaged being battle-weary from Imola but instead having not raced for three weeks, I find myself pondering the history of the Monaco Grand Prix, and particularly the 1958 race, a captivating event from a number of perspectives.

Heading the drivers’ world championship table as the then much smaller Formula 1 travelling circus arrived in Monte-Carlo, having won the previous round in Buenos Aires four long months before, was Stirling Moss, who had driven Rob Walker’s privateer Cooper brilliantly in Argentina to beat the Ferraris of Luigi Musso and Mike Hawthorn. In so doing, he had scored the first Formula 1 victory for a rear-engined car, but that aspect of his success had not been widely regarded as portentous for three principal reasons: no championship grand prix had ever attracted so few entries as had the 1958 Argentine Grand Prix (just 10, a record that stands to this day and hopefully always will); Moss had managed to drive the whole race on one set of tyres, whereas the Ferraris had required tyre stops, which in those days were seriously time-consuming; and ‘the Boy’, still only 28, was rightly regarded as a genius behind the wheel.

Cliff Allison had been welding Graham Hill’s car. Things really were different in those days

Next time out, at Monaco, Moss was back in his regular works Vanwall, Tony Vandervell’s not-quite-eponymous team having skipped Argentina. Moss’s team-mate Tony Brooks stuck his works Vanwall on the Monte-Carlo pole, while Jean Behra qualified his BRM second. Both cars were front-engined, and the Formula 1 cognoscenti appeared to agree that normal service had been resumed. However, Jack Brabham and Roy Salvadori qualified their works Coopers third and fourth. Alongside Salvadori on the second row of the three-two-three grid, fifth, was 40-year-old Maurice Trintignant – a previous winner on the tricky streets of the Principality, in 1955, in a works Ferrari – but now in a privateer Rob Walker-entered Cooper.

Ecclestone later became a Formula 1 deity, albeit for achievements outside the cockpit. Hill, too, is widely regarded as a racing god – a two-time F1 world champion, a five-time Monaco Grand Prix winner, and still the only driver to have achieved the Triple Crown of victories at Monaco, Indianapolis and Le Mans. And Allison? He is but a footnote to motor sport history now. He raced 16 championship grands prix, his best result second for Ferrari in Buenos Aires in 1960, but he crashed that Ferrari heavily in practice next time out in Monte-Carlo, only regaining consciousness after 16 comatose days in hospital, and he was out for the rest of the year while he recovered from his injuries: a broken left arm, a number of shattered ribs, and cuts and bruises everywhere, including on his head and face. He raced a UDT Laystall Lotus 18 at Monaco the following year, 1961, finishing a distant eighth, then had another huge shunt next time out, at Spa, breaking his pelvis and both knees. He called it a day after that.

I met him 40-odd years later, at Monaco, I cannot remember the exact year. I was the editor-in-chief of F1 Racing, now GP Racing, and he was a guest of, I think, Ford. He was in his late 60s, looked a bit older, and unsurprisingly walked with a limp. He was chummy and funny, and he told me that his business, Allison’s Garage in the small and windswept village of Brough, Cumbria, had not done very well, and that lately he had been earning a few bob by driving the village bus. He gave me his card, and when I got back to the F1 Racing offices I added him to the ‘free list’ so that he would automatically receive a complimentary copy of the magazine in the post every month.

He died, aged 73, on 7 April 2005. The next day I awoke, strolled downstairs to gather up the post, and, among the bills and junk mail, I found a hand-written envelope, postmarked ‘Brough, Cumbria’. I opened it and, unfolding with trembling hands a sheet of old-style headed paper, I read a neatly typed letter of one paragraph, dated the day before. It was signed ‘Kindest regards, yours sincerely, Cliff’, and, yes, he had written it on the day he died. Even now, years later, I find it very poignant. The paragraph was as follows: “The last copy of your F1 magazine I received was the end of 2004. As I am now seventy three your wonderful mag was the only way of keeping in touch. I do hope you can resume sending me copies as times are hard for a poor old pensioner.”

I had no words then. I have these few words now. RIP Cliff Allison.