For about 90 seconds, around six Islanders battled to outbid each other for the registration J111.
When offers reached £45,000, only two people were left vying for the lot before the price climbed by £9,000.
The number plate, which was assigned to a Vespa scooter of ‘insignificant value’, was initially expected to fetch between £30,000 to £35,000. An unidentified woman eventually placed the winning bid. Other bidders included a man phoning in from the French Alps.
The plate was originally owned by the uncle of St Ouen resident Peter Judge when the registration was affixed to an Allard – a car.
Photos provided by Mr Judge show the vehicle, owned by his uncle Bob Le Breton, pictured above with his friends in 1948 on the beach at the eastern end of St Brelade’s Bay.
Mr Judge said: ‘My grandfather bought the car for him[Bob]. He was very spoilt and it would have been like owning a Ferrari back then.
‘It had an aluminium body and probably had a big Ford V8 engine, so it was very fast.
‘I think the plate came with the car.’
Mr Judge added that his uncle, who died around five years ago, was a jeweller in the Central Market and sold the plate with the car after the engine failed.
Meanwhile, James Herbert, auctioneer at Simon Drieu and Co Auctioneers and Valuers, said that the plate had attracted some very strong bids.
‘It is the most I have ever seen a three-digit plate go for. I think it is because it is a special number,’ he said.
‘We probably had about half a dozen serious bidders.
‘A lady bought it, but I do not know any more than that.’
The winning bid for J111 was still some way off beating the record for the most expensive registration plate sold in Jersey.
In July 2017, J27 sold for £73,000 to an unknown buyer.
And in 2015, someone in Guernsey paid £240,000 for the registration 007.
