Biddenham
General History
Lysons' Magna Britannia (Extract)

Biddenham > General History

A small village on the Ouse, about two miles west of Bedford, is in the hundred of Willey. The manor, at the time of the Norman survey, belonged to William Spec, ancestor of Walter de Espec, founder of Warden Abbey. It was afterwards in the Earls of Gloucester and Stafford; under whom, as lords of the fee, it seems to have been held by several generations by the St. johns, who were in possession of it till 1582, and perhaps later. It is now the property of the right Hon. Lord Hampden, in whose family it has been for nearly a century. In the church are several memorials for the family of Boteler, who were settled at Biddenham for ten generations. Sir William Boteler, of this family, was Lord mayor of London in 1515. There was a chantry dedicated to St.William; and the chantry of Biddenham bridge, which had a considerable endowment in lands, charged probably with the repairs of the bridge which leads from Bedford to the North of Buckinghamshire, and is now known by the name of Bromham Bridge. The great tithes, which were appropriated to the priory of Denny in Cambridgeshire, are now the property of Lord Hampden. He is patron also of the vicarage, which is in the denary of Bedford.

Lyson's Magna Britannia being a concise topographical account of several counties of Great Britain by the Rev. Daniel Lysons, A.M., F.R.S. F.A. and L.S. Rector of Rodmarton in Gloucestershire and Samuel Lysons, Esq., F.R.S. and F.A.S. Keeper of His Majesty's Records in the Tower of London, 1806

Page last updated: 23rd January 2014