Owned by one careful family for 106 years and only 2,000 miles on the clock... and it’s just passed its first MOT

Now this one-family-owned Peugeot 5HP has proved she has staying power too by cruising through her first MOT test – 106 years since taking to the road.

The car is being sold for £100,000 and needed the certificate as she was taken off the road just before the MOT test was introduced in 1960.

Yet she needed only a quick clean of her fuel line and an infusion of petrol to pass. "She started as soon as I swung the handle," said car broker Gavin McGuire, who took her for the MOT.

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Heirloom: Glenys Donald, mother of fifth owner Malcolm, showing the car to Leah, her grandaughter, last year

The dark blue two-seater, with just 2,000 miles on the clock, was shipped to England from France in 1902, the year the Boer War ended.

The registration plate, A01, reveals she was the first registered in Cumbria.

Until recently, she had left the county only once, for a car rally in Yorkshire. She has a single-cylinder engine and all her original features, and comes with spare lamps that can be pinned to the outside to prevent anyone smashing into her in the dark.

Wealthy landowner William Parkin-Moore was the first proud owner. Spying her in Peugeot's new English showroom on London's Brompton Road in the summer of 1902, he was drawn to her compact, sleek design.

He forked out £185 – £15,650 at today's prices – and she was delivered to his Whitehall estate near Mealsgate, Cumbria.

He put the 9ft by 4ft car in his garage and in December 1903 she became the first motor vehicle to be registered in Cumbria. A local blacksmith made the number plate.

But a year later, Mr Parkin-Moore upgraded to a Daimler after deciding the Peugeot's top speed of 28mph was not enough – after all, a galloping horse could go faster.

The A01 spent the next 34 years in the garage until Mr Parkin-Moore's death in 1937, when his nephew Henry Donald inherited her.

Henry never drove her and in 1944 gave her to his brother George, who kept her in his garage until 1956.

Then George passed her on to his 18-year-old son Dennis, who drove her around the village of Raughton Head.

Dennis, now 69, said: "My father may never have driven her but, being a typical 18-year-old, I wanted to. With just a turn of the handle she started with a steady chug, chug, chug.

"She was quite easy to handle but it was tricky to remember to double-declutch when moving up, rather than down, through the gears."

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Now Dennis's son Malcolm, 36, the fifth and present owner, is selling the car. And keeping up the family tradition, he has barely driven her.

"We feel that considering her age and condition she deserves an owner who can now take her out and about, so that other people can see and enjoy her for years to come," he said.

Car broker Mr McGuire, who has the car at his Surrey home, said she was being sold as a fully roadworthy vehicle, ready to be driven.

She is not the oldest car to take the MOT but is one of the oldest to be put through the test for the first time.

"This is a most remarkable car – not just because of her age but her condition," said Mr McGuire.

"Many veteran cars have had parts replaced but not this one. Anyone behind the wheel can experience what it was really like to drive an Edwardian car when it was new."

But he added: "It could not be described as a smooth ride. The whole thing comes to life when you start her, almost as if there is an animal inside.

"The speed she achieves might be likened to a good pony at a very fast canter.

"But she is utterly charming. In her day, it was like having a brand-new BMW."