George Pilkington Mills

Infobox Cyclist
ridername = George Pilkington Mills


fullname = George Pilkington Mills
nickname =
dateofbirth = 1867 - 8 November
dateofdeath = 1945
country = ENG
GBR2
height =
weight =
currentteam =
discipline = Road racing & Endurance
role = Rider
ridertype =
amateuryears =
amateurteams = Anfield CC
North Road CC
proyears =
proteams =
majorwins = Land's End-John o' Groats record 6 times 1886-1895
North Road 24-hour time-trial (penny-farthing)
Tandem-tricycle record for 50 miles
updated = October 2008

George Pilkington Mills (1867 - 8 November 1945, London) was the dominant English racing cyclist of his generation, and winner of the inaugural Bordeaux-Paris cycle race. He frequently cycled from Land's End to John o' Groats, holding the world record time on six occasions between 1886 and 1895. He was a member of the Anfield and North Road cycling clubs.

Land's End-John o'Groats

The record from one end of Britain to the other is the longest place-to-place challenge recognised by the Road Records Association. Riders are free to choose their own route but the distance worked out then, before ferries shortened it, at about 900 miles. The first record was set by J. Lennox, first name not known, who took six days and 16 hours in 1885 while being paced by tandems. The following year, Mills, who was 18, broke the record twice, once on a large-wheeled penny-farthing bicycle and once on a tricycle. He rode the bicycle in five days, 10 hours. The record, on a penny-farthing, still stands. [Journal, Fellowship of Cycling Old-Timers, vol 167, p29]

The journalist and official Frederick Thomas Bidlake said:

:The sensation was not that he was merely one of a sequence of record breakers, but that he knocked more than a day off each of the previous bests, in a sort of double event, riding virtually without sleep, certainly no more than a wayside nod. [Woodland, Les (2005), This Island Race, Mousehold Press (UK) p33]

Other timed races

In the summer Mills broke the Land's End-John o'Groats record, he also won the North Road 24-hour time-trial on a penny-farthing, set records on a bicycle for 50 miles and 24 hours (259 miles) and set a tandem-tricycle record for 50 miles. [There is disagreement about the penny-farthing record. Mills insisted he had ridden 273 miles but the record was recorded at 268.5]

Bordeaux-Paris

George Mills won the inaugural Bordeaux-Paris race in 1891. He was invited by the organisers, the newspaper "Véloce-Sport" because of his reputation in an age when long-distance racing was the fashion. A race from Bordeaux in the south-west to the capital in Paris would be the longest annual event in France.

The Bicycle Union - later renamed the National Cyclists Union - had strict views about amateurism and had demanded its French equivalent ensure that all taking part met its own amateur ideals. [The NCU insisted that amateurs won no prizes in money; the Union Vélocipèdique de France was happy for amateurs to win up to 200 francs, or what a manual worker earned in 16 months] Only then would the NCU allow Mills and other British amateurs to take part.

The organisers expected the race to last two days and laid on meals and beds for riders along the way. Mills finished in 26 hours on a diet that included a lot of strawberries and British riders took the first four places. When Mills won, the Bicycle Union realised he was the works manager at a bicycle factory and decided he should be asked "whether he paid the whole of his expenses in the above-mentioned race." [McGurn, James (1987) On Your Bicycle, John Murray (UK) p108] Only when he could prove that he had did the Bicycle Union concede that he was not a professional.

Cycling club life

Mills joined the Anfield Bicycle Club, in Liverpool 1884, five years after it was formed. He was a founding member of the North Road Club in London. At his death on 8 November 1945, he was one of only two founding members still alive. The other was E. P. Moorehouse. [Journal, Fellowship of Cycling Old-Timers, vol 167, p28] With Mills dead and Moorehouse ill, the club cancelled presentations to mark their achievements and their long association.

Military service

Mills joined the army in 1889 and retired in 1906 as a major. He volunteered again in 1914 and in March 1915 was stationed at Colchester. He was a captain in the Bedfordshire regiment. He left for France in December 1915 and by 1917 had been promoted to lieutenant-colonel. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and he was mentioned in dispatches three times.

He became director of the small arms and machine gun department of the Ministry of Munitions after 1918. He joined the Home Guard in the second world war. [North Road Club records, cited Journal, Fellowship of Cycling Old-Timers vol 167, p29]

Civilian life

Mills moved several times for work. He was working at Beeston, home of the Raleigh company, by 1907. He moved in 1910 to west London to join Clement Talbot. It was from there that he joined the army. He worked for the Aster Engineering Company in Wembley after the war, then in 1924 at Belsize Motor Company in Manchester.

In 1929 he lived in Bathampton, near Bath, then in 1932 at Malvern, in 1935 in Bournemouth From 1938 until he died he lived at Shirley, in Surrey.

References

* Along the Great North and Other Roads. A.B. Smith. ISBN 0-904387-73-9