Industry Automotive Key people Albert and Peter Vince | Area served Worldwide Founded 1868 | |
Products Trucks, buses,
car-derived vans Headquarters Ely, Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom Type of business Wheeled-transport Specialists | ||
Vince & Son flourished for 120 years in their established profession as wheeled-transport specialists in Ely, Cambridgeshire. Founded there as coachbuilders in 1868 by John Orviss Vince (1846–1923), they carried on a successful local business as constructors of all types of horse-drawn vehicles right through to the inter-war period, when they began to include early motor-buses (‘Vince’s Golden Queen’) in their trade. At this time the business had passed on into the hands of J. O. Vince’s son Albert Edward Vince (1885–1954), and after the Second World War, on again to Albert Edward’s sons Peter (1915–1987) and Albert (aka ‘Bill’, 1920–2004) who fully embraced the motor engineering trade. During this latter period of 40 years, the business became well-known nationally as specialists in ex-government vehicles, and by the time the surviving brother ‘Bill’ Vince ceased trading as Vince & Son in the late 1980s, his reputation for providing know-how and spare parts for Bedford vehicles had extended overseas.
The business of Vince & Son had a strong art and design thread running consistently through it. J. O. Vince, the original ‘Vince’ in the company name, served a teenage apprenticeship which, as well as coach-crafts and blacksmithing with his father in Downham Market, Norfolk, included assistance with the production of Ely Cathedral’s nave ceiling paintings by its Victorian restorers. Each of the three generations of Vince & Son proprietors maintained the craftsman’s side of the coachbuilder’s art: John Orviss had to be able to build a cart from the ground-up and complete its decoration, his son Albert Edward carried on the complex paint-mixing, varnishing, coach-lining and upholstering skills into the motor age, and his sons Peter and Bill retained this knowledge, being able to turn their hands if required to skilled metalwork, woodwork and paint preparation, alongside their more modern calling to the world of the motor engine.
In their final incarnation under Peter and Bill’s direction, Vince & Son justifiably maintained links with their origins in the title ‘Vince & Son Motor Engineers and Coachbuilders’