Ihe 1861 census shows William as a Brewer and Spirit merchant.  

In 1868 the brewery was advertising pale, and bitter ales, mild, and brown stout. By the 1869 Cox directory of Southampton the reference is to Aldridge William & Son up until entries in 1876, the year of his death.  In March 1871 William and Francis Aldridge are mentioned In newspapers as brewers. In the 1871 census William is ‘Merchant’, an indication perhaps that he was taking a back seat in the brewery at that time).

In the Hampshire Advertiser of 28th June 1873 there is an advert, or a report; “Southampton Versus Dublin stout. William Aldridge and Son having made considerable improvements in their brewery” had produced a stout that was “in excellent condition and carries a beautiful creamy head possessing all the best properties of stout produced by the most eminent Dublin firms. Offered in imperial measure, and delivered free. it is particularly recommended by the medical profession being brewed entirely from malts and hops and subjected to the most minute analysis”. They also claimed it possessed “many of the properties and all of the advantages of Charcoal so largely used and so justly esteemed as a blood purifier”. (I will leave you to make up your own minds!).

In newspapers of 29th July 1874, there is a report on the “Mayor’s Sunday school treat”. The tent was said to be the largest in England and could accommodate up to 2,500 people. The tea was brewed at the brewery in 2 large coppers holding 27 barrels each. They were filled with water from the brewery well which was boiled with the tea being placed in it in large bags for seething, milk and sugar being added later to taste. “The tea was drawn off in to brandy hogsheads and delivered by the brewery, all entirely gratuitous.” (again, I will leave you to make up your own minds!)

William Aldridge died on the 8th March 1876, aged 61 years, after a short illness. His obituary states that he was a liberal for the Ward of All Saints. He was elected in 1847 but he retired and was elected  Alderman in 1874, an office he held until his death. He left a widow and 4 children. His sons were Edwin, Elliott and Francis. Francis is described as a brewer and a wine and spirit merchant in MArch 1871, at the same adderss as his father. Francis and William applied for licences for a beer house so I am failry sure that Francis was the '"and Son" in the trading name. Sadly, Francis died before his father on 5th February 1874, aged just 28 years.  

In August 1876 there was a presentation to Edwin Elliott Aldridge in honour of his approaching marriage. In a speech he referred to the deaths of his father and brother. He was young when he took over the business. Mr Coles, manager of the brewery presented him with a salver. 

In June 1877, there was a dinner arranged by Edwin Aldridge for one hundred brewery tenants. Mr G Coles was still manager of the firm, and Edwin is described as proprietor of the business, so he clearly took over after his father’s death.  Some tenants had been with the firm for a good many years, serving Edwin’s father and all the men who now worked for him had worked for his father.

In April 1878 there was another dinner arranged for local builders hosted by Mr E E Aldridge, to celebrate the enlargement and alteration to the recently established Soda Water business in Bannister Street. Later that year the brewery bought the Bold Forester in Twiggs Lane being a beer house, farm and 21 acres of land, for £900 (about £93,800 today according to the Bank of England Inflation Calculator).

The 1878 Cox directory refers to Aldridge & Son Bedford Place (sometimes at No 24). The same entry appears in 1880, 1883, 1884 and 1886. By 1887 we also see additional entries such as Aldridge E & Co mineral water Lower Bannister Street and Bedford Place. Similar entries appear, with and without mention of the mineral water business, until the 1912-13 Kelly’s Directory which lists Aldridge & Son brewers wine & Spirit merchants & Mineral Water manufacturers Bedford Brewery Bedford Place. 

Edwin died in 1881, and there were changes following his death. We will see later that Edward and Charles Aldridge took over the business. In newspapers of 2nd July 1881 there is an auction notice on behalf of the trustees of the late E E Aldridge. This was for the sale of a number of pubs/beerhouses, namely the Firs Inn Bitterne, the Ship Inn Woolston, the Royal Albert Oxford Street Shirley, Bold Forester Twigg Lane Marchwood (and 20 acres of land), the Pilot Boat French Street, the Oak House Bedford Place (with off premises licence) and shop adjoining, the Dukes Head Wharf Road Winchester. All were freehold properties save for the Ship Inn, held on a 999 year lease. Some houses and a cottage were also sold.

In September 1887 there is a report of a fire at the soda water manufactory of Messrs Aldridge Brewers. The premises were in Bannister Street. Mr C Garcia was manager. There was a Ginger beer business as well, and the fire damaged hundreds of boxes and ginger beer bottles as well as the roof. 

In October 1894 there is a notice that Messrs Aldridge & Son had taken on Mr E K Sykes, a Fellow of the Chemistry Society as a brewer “and in consequence of the splendid ale he produces the business of the firm has very largely increased”.

By January 1896 the brewery was advertising Kops Ale (non-alcoholic). ‘The Kop that cheers’ E Aldridge & Co Bedford Place. (The Kops brewery, founded by Henry Lowenfeld in 1890 was the first brewer of non-alcoholic beer in the United Kingdom, located in Fulham. In December 2014, the renovated building received a blue plaque from the Hammersmith & Fulham Historic Buildings Group, "Kops brewed non-alcoholic ales and stouts on an eight-acre site and exported its products throughout the British Empire".)

In 1897 there appears an advert for E Aldridge & Co’s Southampton mineral waters, and in 1902 there is mention of them having a mineral water factory as well as a brewery.  This was at the time J H Sanders, manager, was emigrating to New Zealand. He was presented with “a valuable walking stick, by the brewery and a solid silver match box by the mineral water factory. “Also a gold watch”. I believe (but have no direct evidence) that Edward Aldridge ran the mineral water side of the business. 

By 1905, Mr Ernest George Townsend Rose was the proprietor of the brewery, trading as W Aldridge & Son, but may have been involved a few years previously. In 1906 they were advertising bottles of Bass & Co Special Stout, and in 1908 they were advertising their Dinner Ale in 4 quart bottles at 1s 1d. In 1909 they advertised their Nourishing Stout which had been awarded a prize medal and diploma at the Brewers Exhibition 1909, which was brewed and bottled at the Bedford brewery.

In 1912 the brewery bought land in Swift Road Woolston to build a pub, but permission was refused as there were too many local pubs already (The Ship, Obelisk, and Victoria). Brickwoods applied again in 1936 and permission was granted, and the House became the Grove Tavern, 70 Swift Road. 

The Hampshire Advertiser of 23rd December 1916 reported a serious fire at the Bedford Brewery. The fire brigade attended quickly and put the fire out, and damage was mainly in the bottling stores where bottles and corks were kept. The building was ‘practically demolished’ with walls coming down, and the whole brewery was inundated with water. The brewery was described as  comprising one building from Bedford Place to a small courtyard at the rear, and offices at the front. There were bottling stores and the vat rooms and boiler house with extensive storage vaults underneath. The fire was confined to the upper stores in the central part of the building. The building contained a great deal of timber. “There was a constant maxim like noise caused by the falling fragments of glass from the windows; the beams of the roof fell with louder crashes while rising above was the rumbling fall of the masonry”. The next day the scene was described as being one of desolation, and the structural destruction was great.

Major rebuilding followed and the business became a limited company in 1925 with a capital of £40,000 (over £2 million now according to the Bank of England Inflation Calculator) raised to acquire the business carried on by Mr Ernest George Townsend Rose who became a director of the Company. He died in 1929 and his obituary describes him as being the owner of the brewery at one time.

The Hampshire County Council Archives hold a draft and copy abstracts of title and conveyances of the 'Bedford Brewery and 'Bedford Hotel', Bedford Place, together with freehold and leasehold public houses and other premises as described in the abstracts of title. In 1927 the brewery was leased by Aldridge & Son Ltd to Brickwood & Co Ltd (Brewers of Portsmouth) and then in the same year the premises were conveyed to Blake Properties Ltd (formerly S & T N Blake & Co Ltd of Gosport, who had been acquired by Brickwood & Co Ltd in 1926, but remained as a brewing subsidiary). The premises were then conveyed by Blake Properties Ltd to Brickwood & Co Ltd, subject to a mortgage securing debenture stock in 1942.

It looks as if this was not a tidy acquisition. Brickwoods had been granted the leasehold interest of the brewery in 1927, before the freehold was sold to Blake and Co also in 1927, and they remained leaseholders until Blake’s sold the freehold to Brickwoods in 1942. Had the lease been for 15 years?