A family has sold its huge collection of microcars for £300,000.

The Hammond family, from Hawkenbury, near Staplehurst, auctioned off 47 vehicles earlier this month – with one selling for £97,000.

All the vehicles were part of the Hammond Microcar Collection Museum, in Boarden Lane, and were sold in Dorset.

Among them was a blue Peel P50, which was identical to one driven on Top Gear by Jeremey Clarkson in 2007.

Richard Bromell, from Charthouse auctioneers, helped the family sell the collection.

He said: “The collection is the result of one family’s 40-year interest and obsession with these diminutive cars.

“It has not been an easy decision for the family to disperse the collection but with the mother now in residential care they have taken the difficult decision to sell the collection and instructed Charterhouse to put them all under the auction gavel.”

The family, which is made up of Jean, Edwin and Andrew Hammond, began collecting the novelty cars in the 1970s after buying their son Andrew a Heinkel three-wheeled Bubble Car instead of a motorbike he asked for.

The collection grew into a small museum of 47 vehicles which were housed in Hawkenbury.

The money raised from the auction will go to Andrew's mother Jean, who now lives at a care home in Staplehurst.