When Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was released in 2002, one of the most memorable sequences was Harry and Ron missing the Hogwarts Express, stealing Mr. Weasley’s Ford Anglia and flying it to Hogwarts. There, it meets a crunchy end thanks to the Whomping Willow and drives away to live out its remaining years wild in the Forbidden Forest. All of this prompts Mrs. Weasley to send Ron a howler – a letter that shouts at him very loudly.
It wasn’t until a decade later – in 2012, that the Ford Anglia used when making the film found a permanent home – at the Warner Bros Studio Tour in London. But after Chamber of Secrets finished filming, it was in a state of limbo – and for a while, it resided at the South West Film Studios in St. Agnes, Cornwall.
And while there, it was stolen. According to a BBC news report from 2005; “The flying Ford Anglia used in the Harry Potter films was stolen from film studios in Cornwall between 26-27 October, 2005. Police said the rusting Ford Anglia [registration 7990 TD] went missing despite the fact that it could not have been driven.”
The report continues; “Police suspect a Harry Potter fan, or a classic car enthusiast, sneaked into the studio site with a trailer to remove the car. The turquoise 1962 Ford Anglia was being stored at the St Agnes studios, which went into receivership last year. A spokesman for official receivers Begbies Traynor said: ‘No other props from the film were left here, just the car. It was being stored while a buyer was found for it. That’s all we know.'”
It’s not known if the car was retrieved, or if the one that you can now visit on the Studio Tour is a replica. It is likely that more than one Ford Anglia was used during the filming. Someone clearly went to a lot of effort to steal it, given the fact that it couldn’t be driven.
Find out where the Harry Potter cast are now.