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The Bridge

Can you date this motorcycle made by The Bridge Cycle Company of Chelsea? And would you have any information about this or its sister company The Stanley Bridge Cycle Company?

The Bridge Cycle Company was founded in the 1880s or 1890s by the eldest daughter of the Godfrey family, from my mother’s side. She had returned home from nursing at St Thomas’s Hospital, central London, after her mother died. Family history informs they taught Victorian ladies to cycle in the 1890s on a track in Battersea Park, on the south side of the River Thames to their Chelsea premises. Another sideline was storing cycles, for a small fee, when Chelsea football club were playing home matches at their nearby ground.

In the photograph, my great-grandfather, wearing a flat hat, is standing behind The Bridge motorcycle, Miss Godfrey is sitting in the passenger trailer and her younger sisters and brothers, including great-uncle Frederick on the machine, are also featured. They were all involved in the business – the three smaller boys were her nephews. Frederick was a great character who was listed in the 1901 and 1911 census as a cycle maker; by the 1920s, he drove a 110hp Belsize motor (pictured with my mother