Aston Martin history

Aston Martin Lagonda Ltd comes from humble beginnings. The history of Aston Martin has it, that in 1912, Robert Bamford and Lionel Martin joined forces as Bamford Martin to sell Singer automobiles. They also serviced Calthorpe and GWK cars from their workshop in Callow Street, London. Martin was an avid race fan and driver and was a regular at Aston hill, located at Aston Clinton in Buckinghamshire, England. Natural progression saw the pair design and build their own race going vehicles. The first car made was designed and built by Martin. He took an engine from a Coventry-Simplex, which was a four cylinder motor, and placed in the chassis of an Italian Isotta-Fraschini from 1908.

Subsequently new premises where purchased at Henniker Place in Kensington to build vehicles and they produced there first car in 1915, two years after first joining forces was named the Aston Martin. Mass production did not start though, due to the outbreak of the Great War. All the machinery bought to produce their cars was sold on to Sopwith aviation, creators of the legendary Sopwith Camel.

After the war years, the company was re-founded and a base of operations was set up in Kensington again, however, this time located on Abingdon Road. This is where a completely new car weas designed, which bore the name Aston Martin. For reasons we cannot find, Bamford actually left the company in 1920, but joined forces with Martin in 1922 to prepare cars that could compete in French Grand Prix. In the interim years, Aston Martin was rejuvenated with commercial funding by the Count Louis Zborowski. With this investment, the company built 55 road going cars, however in 1924 the company was declared bankrupt. The car manufacturer was then bought up by Lady Charnwood (can you see a common theme, Counts and Ladies?) who placed her son, John Benson on the board of directors. It went bust roughly a year later with the factory closing 1926 and Lionel Martin leaving his idea of a luxury sports vehicle behind.

Later in the same year, a group of investors, including Lady Charnwood, but headed up by Augustus Bertelli (Bert) and Bill Renwick, relaunched the company as Aston Martin Motors. The two had been in an engineering partnership for a number of years and had developed an overhead 4 cylinder engine, which, initially, was to be sold to other car and vehicle manufacturers, but seized the opportunity to utilise the brand of Aston Martin. Up until 1937, Bertelli was the technical director and responsible for all Aston's up to this date, including the T-type, the Le mans and the MKII. This era saw the cars refered to as Bertelli cars. Financial problems resurfaced in 1932, where L. Prideaux Brune funded production for a full year until passing the reigns to Sir Arthur Sutherland.  Sutherland realised that the company had to concentrate on road going cars, so it could stay solvent, however after production levels reached 700, World War II broke out and all work was stopped. Aston Martin was consigned to produce aeroplane parts during the war years.

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