Bedfordshire

“ BEDFORD, a municipal and parliamentary borough, and the county town of Bedfordshire, England, 50 m. north-north-west of London by the Midland railway; served also by a branch of the London & North-Western. Pop. (1901) 35,144. It lies in the fertile valley of the Ouse, on both banks, but mainly on the north, on which stands the mound which marks the site of the ancient castle. The church of St Paul is Decorated and Perpendicular, but its central tower and spire are modern ”

“ Then, as now, the Great Ouse took its winding, sluggish course from southwest to north-east across the county, twisting strangely, and in many places turning back upon itself as though loath to leave Bedfordshire. Some fifteen miles from point to point would have taken it straight through the heart of the little county, whereas its total course therein is more like fifty. One poetic fancy likens the wandering stream to a lover lingering with his mistress, but old Drayton compares it to one of the softer sex:-- ”

“ Potton (2033) , Shefford (874) , and Woburn (1129) are lesser towns, and local centres of the agricultural trade. The county is the midland circuit, and assizes are held at Bedford. It has one court of quarter-sessions, and is divided into eight petty sessional divisions. The boroughs of Bedford, Dunstable and Luton have separate commissions of the peace, and Bedford has a separate court of quarter-sessions. There are 133 civil parishes. Bedfordshire forms an archdeaconry in the diocese of Ely, with 125 ecclesiastical parishes and parts of 6 others. ”

“ There is an extensive manufactory of agricultural implements; lace is also made, and there is a good trade. John Bunyan was born at Elstow, a village near the town, and it was at Bedford that he lived, preached, and was imprisoned. Bedford gives its name to a parliamentary division of the county. Pop. 40,247.—Bedfordshire or Beds, the county, is bounded by Northampton, Bucks, Herts, Cambridge, and Huntingdon; area, 302,942 acres, of which 260,000 are under tillage or in permanent pasture. ”

“ As in the case of Bedfordshire, when we allow for marshes along the Humber, and hill country on the Wolds, which never passed through the common-field system, for the indubitable non-Parliamentary enclosure proceeding side by side with Parliamentary enclosure, and particularly for the active enclosure spoken of by Arthur Young in the middle of the eighteenth 225century, there remains but little enclosure of common fields to be attributed to earlier centuries. ”

“ As she is more apt to notice the presence than the absence of hedges, this, so far as it goes, confirms our conclusions with regard to Bedfordshire; and, with regard to Northamptonshire, this small piece of negative evidence tends to the conclusion that that county also was almost entirely open in the beginning of the eighteenth century.
“Leicestershire,” she says, 201“is a very Rich Country—Red land, good corn of all sorts and grass, both fields and inclosures. You see a great way upon their hills the bottoms full of Enclosures, woods, and different sorts of manureing and herbage” (p. 133) . ”

“ The Barony, also called the Honour, of Bedford, was conferred by William Rufus upon Payn, second son, but eventual heir of Hugh Beauchamp, a companion of the Conqueror, and possibly allied to the greater family of that name, who afterwards held the earldom of Warwick. Hugh was the recipient of many manors in Buckingham, and about twenty in Bedfordshire. Payn is the reputed builder of the Norman castle, described as of great strength, with ditches and ramparts of earth, and which descended to his son Simon, steward to King Stephen. ”

“ So utterly transformed, however, has the whole Fen country become in modern times—the vast plain of the Bedford level contains some 2000 square miles of the richest corn-land in England—that it is very difficult to restore in the imagination the original scenery of the days before the drainage, when the rivers which take the rainfall of the central counties of England—the Nene, the Welland, the Witham, the Glen, and the Bedfordshire Ouse—spread out into one vast delta or wilderness of shallow waters. ”

“ As a shire Hertfordshire is of purely military origin, being the district assigned to the fortress which Edward the Elder erected at Hertford. It is first mentioned in the Saxon Chronicle in 1011. At the time of the Domesday Survey the boundaries were approximately those of the present day, but part of Meppershall in Bedfordshire formed a detached portion of the shire and is still assessed for land and income tax in Hertfordshire. ”

“ In 1847 he entered parliament as member for Bedfordshire, and represented the county until 1872, when (26 May) he succeeded to the dukedom of Bedford on the death of his first cousin, William, the eighth duke, son of Francis and grandson of John, the sixth duke [see under Russell, John, first Earl Russell] . In 1879 he succeeded the Prince of Wales as president of the Royal Agricultural Society, and he carried out some costly experiments on his Woburn estate in connection with the fertilising properties of manures. ”

“ Bedfordshire is very inadequately supplied with cottages. They are few and small, and their condition is often a mere precarious holding together of rotten materials; the stitch in time has not been applied, and there are hundreds on which no repairs can now be bestowed with advantage. ”

“ These hills never exceed 300 ft. in height, but form a pleasantly undulating surface. The north-eastern part of the county, comprising 50,000 acres, belongs to that division of the great Fen district called the Bedford Levels. The principal rivers are the Ouse and Nene. The Ouse from Bedfordshire skirts the borders of the county near St Neots, and after flowing north to Huntingdon takes an easterly direction past St Ives into Cambridgeshire on its way to the Wash. ”

“ He was High Sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, Member of Parliament for Northumberland, and Lord Lieutenant for Bucks.
Lord Bedford served as Ambassador to France on two occasions, and in 1564 he was made a Knight of the Garter. He also served as Chief Justice in Eyre south of Trent, and Lord Lieutenant of Dorset, Devon, and Cornwall. He was known as the "Good Earl of Bedford," and entertained Queen Elizabeth both at Chenies and at Woburn.
[Pg 327]
RUSSELL, WRIOTHESLEY, SECOND DUKE OF BEDFORD
Arms.—Arg., a lion rampant gu., on a chief sa., 3 escallops of the first. ”

“ Approaching it from the south, one gradually ascends the long slope from Hertford, and suddenly at the summit has before one a far-stretching view over the flat country of Bedfordshire and adjoining counties. The road descends steeply and passes through the Clothall common fields. At the time of my visit the harvest (of barley) was being gathered in; the arrangement of the field was clearly visible. The long, narrow strips of stubble, never quite straight, and never quite of uniform width, were divided by “balks” of grass, grown tall and gone to seed. ”

“ He served as sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1428–9 and again in 1432–3. He was elected member for that county on 17 March 1431–2 for the last time, but was present at a council in April 1434, and was asked for a loan for the French war on 15 Feb. 1435–6. He probably died soon afterwards. By his wife Alana, daughter of one Barrey of Wales, who survived him till 1456 (Cal. Inq. post mortem, iv. 276) , he had two sons and two daughters (Harl. MS. 381, f. 168; Visit. Bedfordshire, p. 198; Visit. Norfolk, p. 304) . ”

“ Bedford has a large wholesale grocery trade, manufactures flour, dressed lumber, kegs and handles, and is situated in a fine fruit-growing district, especially known for its apples and plums. The borough owns and operates the water works. A temporary settlement was made on or near the site of the present borough about 1750 by an Indian trader named Ray, and for a few years the place was known as Raystown ”

“ Maltese lace is made not only in Malta, but in Auvergne and Lepuy in France; in Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire, in England, and also in the Irish lace schools. Ceylon and Madras lace also resembles Maltese. Formerly shawls and veils of much beauty and value were made of this lace, but the manufacture is now confined chiefly to narrow trimmings.
Mechlin.—A pillow lace originally made at Mechlin, Belgium, and whose special characteristics are the narrow, flat thread, band or cord, which outlines the pattern, and the net ground of hexagonal mesh. Sometimes the mesh is circular. ”

“ The faireste men that evere come here.”
(“Hengist and Horsa,” Cottonian MS., Brit. Mus., “Otho,” c. xiii.)
(“Morris’s Specimens of early English,” p. 65.)
In Bedfordshire there is a village named Kempston, which, like Campton in the same county, is supposed to be derived from the Saxon “Kemp,” meaning “battle.” Taylor’s Words and Places, p. 206.
[175] One of these Marshalls began life as the owner of property, hunting in “pink,” &c., but ended his days as the clerk of a neighbouring parish. Another had a public-house and farm in another near parish ”

“ In January 1550 he was created earl of Bedford, and was one of the commissioners appointed to make peace with France in this year. He opposed the proposal to seat Lady Jane Grey on the throne; supported Queen Mary, who reappointed him lord privy seal; and assisted to prevent Sir Thomas Wyat’s rising from spreading to Devonshire. In 1554 he went to Spain to conclude the marriage treaty between Mary and Philip II., and soon after his return died in London on the 14th of March 1555. By extensive acquisitions of land Bedford was the founder of the wealth and greatness of the house of Russell. ”

“ In the civil war of Stephen’s reign the county suffered severely; the great Roll of the Exchequer of 1165 proves the shire receipts had depreciated in value to two-thirds of the assessment for the Danegeld. Again the county was thrown into the barons’ war when Bedford Castle, seized from the Beauchamps by Falkes de Breaute, one of the royal partisans, was the scene of three sieges before it was demolished by the king’s orders in 1224. The peasants’ revolt (1377-1381) was marked by less violence here than in neighbouring counties ”

“ But notwithstanding Bedford’s vigour the English lost ground steadily; and the death of Anne and this marriage destroyed the friendly relations between England and Burgundy. Negotiations for peace had no result, and when the duke returned to England in June 1433 he told parliament that he had come home to defend himself against the charge that the losses in France were caused by his neglect, and demanded that his detractors should make their accusations public. The chancellor replied that no such charges were known to the king or the council, and the duke was thanked for his great services. ”

“ There are statues of John Bunyan (1874) and John Howard (1894) the philanthropist (1726-1790) , who founded the Congregational chapel which bears his name, and resided at Cardington in the vicinity. There are two parks. Bedford has a large trade as a market town for agricultural produce, and extensive engineering works and manufactures of agricultural implements. The parliamentary borough returns one member. The municipal borough is under a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 2223 acres. ”

“ I can see him still! But all is changed: the castle is no more; we are not what we were; only the old river runs the same. But come, Sir Knight; the reverend mother waits me."
"Lady, it grieveth me sore that the way 'twixt Bedford and Elstow is so short. See how near loometh the abbey tower."
"To me it riseth like the beacon of a port to the weary, wind-driven mariner. Would I could find rest within its walls for aye!"
"Say not so, lady; it sounds to my heart like a funeral knell."
"No fear, Sir Knight; as long as Sir Fulke draws breath no cloister may receive me. ”

“ Bedford Level, a large tract of marshy land in England, of about 400,000 acres total area, comprising 63,000 in Norfolk, 30,000 in Suffolk, 50,000 in Huntingdon, the Peterborough fen in Northampton, the Holland district in Lincolnshire, and most of the Isle of Ely in Cambridge. It derives its name from Francis, Earl of Bedford, who in 1634 made an agreement with Charles I for the drainage of the Level, in consideration of receiving 95,000 acres of the reclaimed land. A great part of the Level is under cultivation, and produces grain, flax, and cole-seed ”

“ Bedford (160) , a midland agricultural county of England, generally level, with some flat fen-land; also the county town (28) , on the Great Ouse, clean and well paved, with excellent educational institutions, famous in connection with the life of John Bunyan, where relics of him are preserved, and where a bronze statue of him by Boehm has been erected to his memory by the Duke of Bedford in 1871; manufactures agricultural implements, lace, and straw plaiting; Elstow, Bunyan's birthplace, is not far off. ”

“ He prospered greatly, rising high in office; and in the next reign, when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries, Russel came in for a handsome share of the spoils, including Woburn Abbey; he was created a peer, and so founded the great house of Bedford, made a dukedom in 1694 by William III. One of his descendants, the third son of the sixth Duke of Bedford, was Lord John Russell (the name being then able to afford an extra letter) , who brought the Great Reform Bill into Parliament in the year 1832. ”