Marston Moretaine
General History
Kelly's Directory of Bedfordshire 1894 (Extract)

Places > Marston Moretaine > General History

Marston Morteyne (or Marston Moretaine) is a village, parish and railway station, and was formerly a market town, 4 miles north-west from Ampthill and 7 miles south-west from Bedford in the Northern division of the county, hundred of Redbornestoke, petty sessional division, union and county court district of Ampthill, rural deanery of Fleete, archdeaconry of Bedford and diocese of Ely. The station here, on the Bedford and Bletchley branch of the London and North western railway, is usually called the Millbrook station. The church of St Mary is a large and ancient edifice, in the Early English and Perpendicular styles, consisting of chancel, nave, aisles, and a massive Perpendicular tower, standing about 50 feet from the church, and containing 5 bells: in the chancel are brasses to the Snagge family; there is a fine marble monument in the south aisle chancel chapel to Sir Thomas Snagge, Speaker of the House of Commons in the reign of Queen Elizabeth; the interior has been restored and will seat 600 persons. The register dates from the year 1703. The living is a rectory, average tithe rent-charge 853, net yearly value 600 , including 68 acres of glebe, with residence in the gift of St John's College, Cambridge, and held since 1893 by the Rev. Alfred Freer Torry M.A. formerly fellow and dean of that college. Here are Wesleyan and Primitive Methodist chapels. The charities, amounting  to about 80 yearly, are appropriated  to the apprenticing of boys and clothing and distributing of food to the poor. The Duke of Bedford, who is lord of the manor, and Alexander Gordon esq. are the chief landowners. The soil is clay; subsoil, clay. The chief crops are wheat, barley and beans. the area is 4,079 acres; rateable value, 6,607; the population in 1891 was 1,047.

Marston Pillinge, Upper and Lower Shelton, Wood End, Wroxhill and Wootton Green are parts of this parish.

Parish Clerk, John Two.

Post Office - John Two, sub-postmaster. Letters arrive from Ampthill at 7.45am & leave at 5.40pm; letters also arrive from Bedford for Upper & Lower Shelton at 10.30am; despatched at 4pm. Lidlington is the nearest money order & Cranfield the nearest telegraph office. Postal orders are issued here, but not paid.

Police Station, Alfred Baldwin, constable.

A School Board of 5 members was formed Feb 16th 1880; Charles Stimson, 26 Mill Street, Bedford, clerk to the board; Esau Denton, attendance officer.

 Schools:-Board (formerly National), Church End, built in 1847, for 140 children; average attendance 90; Goldthorpe Squire, master; Mrs Squire, assistant mistress.

 Board, Shelton (mixed), erected in 1880, and enlarged in 1893, for 90 children; average attendance in excess of present space; Miss Ellen Higgs, mistress.

Railway Station, Cornelius Theobald, station master.   

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Page last updated: 3rd February 2014