Husbourne Crawley
General History
Kelly's Directory of Bedfordshire 1894 (Extract)

Places > Husbourne Crawley > General History

Husborne Crawley is a parish about a mile and a half from Woburn, on the road to Bedford, 1 mile south-west from the Ridgmont station of the Bletchley and Bedford section of the London and North Western railway, 12 miles south-west from Bedford and 54 from London by rail, in the Southern division of the county, hundred of Redbornestoke, petty sessional division and union of Woburn, county court district of Leighton Buzzard, rural deanery of Fleete, archdeaconry of Bedford and diocese of Ely. The church of St Mary, situated on an eminence, is an edifice of the Decorated and Perpendicular periods, consisting of chancel, nave of three bays, aisles and a fine and lofty embattled western tower containing a good peal of 6 bells and a clock: in the church is a monument, with the effigies of a knight in armour and his lady, under a canopy, supported by Doric columns, and appears, from the shield of arms thereon, to commemorate some members of the Thomson family, by whom the manor was held in the 17th century; in the church is a curious iron-bound parish chest; there are sittings for 200 persons. The register dates from the year 1558. The living is a vicarage, gross yearly value 163, net 150, including 5 acres of glebe, with residence, in the gift of the Duke of Bedford, and held since 1892 by the Rev. Charles Falkland Bickmore M.A. of Cambridge University. There is a Primitive Methodist chapel, built in 1867. The charity estate produces 96 yearly, which is appropriated to the repairs of the church, and for apprenticing and distributing to the poor: the fuel land produces 35 yearly. Crawley House, the residence of Mrs Orlebar, is pleasantly seated in park-like grounds, and the view from the garden front is very picturesque. The Duke of Bedford, who is lord of the manor, Mrs Orlebar and Mr Morris are the principal landowners. The soil is light sandy; subsoil, gravel. The chief crops are wheat, barley and beans. The area is 1,565 acres; rateable value, 2,440; the population in 1891 was 410.

Parish Clerk, John Alley

Letters received from Bletchley station about 7 am. Box cleared at 9.4 & 7.15 pm & on Sundays at 9.45 am. The nearest money order & telegraph office is at Aspley Guise

A School Board of 5 members was formed in 1878; William Henry Smith, Woburn, clerk to the board.

Board (formerly Church of England) School (mixed) erected in 1867, with mistress's house, by the late Duke of Bedford, for 90 children; average attendance, 55; Miss E. A. Sharpe, mistress.

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