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Bletsoe

Bedfordshire geography stubsBorough of BedfordCivil parishes in BedfordshireUse British English from July 2016Villages in Bedfordshire
St Mary's church, Bletsoe
St Mary's church, Bletsoe

Bletsoe is a village and civil parish in Bedfordshire, England. It is on the A6, and about eight miles north of Bedford. The village has a small park, the former site of Bletsoe Castle and a church. Nearby places are Sharnbrook, Milton Ernest, Riseley, Thurleigh, Odell, Souldrop, and Swineshead. The nearest town to Bletsoe is Bedford. The small hamlet of Bourne End borders Bletsoe and is part of the civil parish. In 1086, Bletsoe parish was within the ancient hundred of Buckelowe. The parish was added to the Hundred of Willey when the ancient hundred was parceled out. Bletsoe Castle was the birthplace of Margaret Beaufort. She was the mother of Henry VII and grandmother of Henry VIII.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Bletsoe (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 52.213 ° E -0.5052 °
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Address

The Avenue

The Avenue
MK44 1QF , Bletsoe
England, United Kingdom
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St Mary's church, Bletsoe
St Mary's church, Bletsoe
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Nearby Places

Milton Ernest Hall
Milton Ernest Hall

Milton Ernest Hall is a large grade I listed country house in the village of Milton Ernest, Bedfordshire, England. It now serves as a nursing home. It was built in 1853–58 for Benjamin Helps Starey on the site of a decaying earlier house by church architect William Butterfield, whose sister Ann was married to Starey. Constructed in limestone in a Gothic Revival style, the main block is L-shaped with projecting gables and a high, steep roof containing several dormer windows. The property passed then through several hands before being sold in 1906 to Lord Ampthill. During the First World War the hall became the home of two of the sons of King George V. After the war it was restored to the Starey family. During the Second World War the hall was used as a base for Special Operations Executive, a small grass landing strip being laid in the grounds. In 1944 it became the United States Eighth Air Force's support command headquarters. A plaque at the Hall honours the members of the United States Eighth Air Force (including Major Glenn Miller) who were stationed there. The plaque reads: IN MEMORY OF ALL THE PERSONNEL WHO SERVED IN WORLD WAR II AT MILTON ERNEST HALL HEADQUARTERS USAAF EIGHTH AIR FORCE SERVICE COMMAND STATION 608 1943-1946, ALSO MAJOR GLENN MILLER & THE BAND OF THE ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE WHO WERE STATIONED HERE FROM JULY TO DECEMBER 1944 After the US Air Force vacated the Hall, it remained empty until 1968, when Ludwik Dobrzański (he died in 1940) purchased the property along with the surrounding grounds for £15,000. The family lived at the Hall until it was sold in 1971. In 1984 the hall was converted to a nursing home. In the fields adjoining is a grade II listed brick and tile hexagonal dove-cote.

Radwell, Bedfordshire

Radwell is a hamlet in the Hundred of Willey in North Bedfordshire, England, on the River Great Ouse, about 7 miles (11 km) north west of Bedford. Administratively, it is often included with the neighbouring village of Felmersham, and the civil parish is sometimes known as Felmersham with Radwell. Excavations of the gravel pits to the north of the settlement showed evidence of occupation during the Roman period, with a field and ditch system and the remains of two timber buildings, probably a farmstead.The hamlet was mentioned in Domesday as Radeuuelle, listed with a population of 18 households, under two landowners.The hamlet has no church, but is part of the parish of St. Mary's, Felmersham. A chapel dedicated to St James was first recorded in 1204, but had fallen out of use by the 17th century. A Methodist chapel in Moor End Road, built in 1807, has been converted to a residence. A public house, the Swan Inn, was first recorded as an ale house in 1728, but it has recently closed due to economic problems. To the south, there is a stone bridge across the river. Built in 1766 by Thomas Morris, it originally cost £292-10s-0d. As it was not maintained by the county, by 1775 it was "ruinous and in great decay", but was taken over by the county in 1805. The bridge was Grade II listed by English Heritage in August 1987. The road leading into Radwell from the south is Radwell Road and frequently floods after heavy rain. Between the two world wars, there was a privately run miniature railway, the Radwell Manor Railway, to the north of the settlement, which was occasionally open to the public. It was abandoned around 1940, and dismantled later, possibly in the 1960s. At the end of Moor End Road is a riding stable, and further on are Radwell lakes, a popular fishing spot with many swans.

Milton Ernest
Milton Ernest

Milton Ernest is a village and civil parish in Bedfordshire, England, about 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Bedford itself. It had a population of 754 in 2001. This had risen to 761 according to the 2011 census. The village is situated on the east bank of the River Great Ouse, and is the site of Milton Ernest Hall, which was used as the United States Eighth Air Force's support command headquarters in the Second World War.The village is named in the Domesday Book in the hundred of Stodden. The entry reads: "Middletone / Mildentone: Miles Crispin and William Basset from Hugh de Beauchamp; Thorgils from Nigel d'Aubigny; Reginald from Walter of Flanders; Ivo, Hugh de Grandmesnil's steward from Adelaide, Hugh de Grandmesnil's wife; a beadle from the king. Mill."All Saints' Church was built between the 12th and 15th centuries.Possible variations in spelling may include "Milton Harneys", in 1396, & "Midelton Erneys", in 1430. The first half of the name means "Middle Farm". The second half of the name is derived from the name of the main manor of the village and was added in the 13th century to distinguish it from Bedfordshire's other Milton (Bryant). Milton Ernest has a small voluntary controlled village school, closely linked to the church, that has between 60 and 65 pupils drawn from this and surrounding villages. The secondary school for the area is Sharnbrook Academy, in the village of Sharnbrook, located around 3 miles (4.8 km) away. On 15 December 1944, Glenn Miller took off from RAF Twinwood Farm, in neighbouring Clapham, on his last, ill-fated flight, and was last seen in public in the Queen's Head Hotel in Milton Ernest before he disappeared. A plaque at Milton Ernest Hall honours Major Glenn Miller and members of the United States Eighth Air Force, it reads "In memory of all the personnel who served in World War II at Milton Ernest Hall headquarters USAAF Eight Air Force Service Command Station 608 1943-1946, also Major Glenn Miller & the band of the Allied Expeditionary Force who were stationed here from July to December 1944". The controversial Yarl's Wood Immigration Removal Centre is located in the parish. Milton Ernest is also home to the UK's first indoor skydiving and indoor surfing facilities. However both have now ceased operations. A book entitled "The Importance of Milton Ernest" was published by David Newman and details the above and much more of Milton Ernest history and prominence

RAE Bedford
RAE Bedford

RAE Bedford was a research site of the Royal Aircraft Establishment between 1946 and 1994. It was located near the village of Thurleigh, north of the town of Bedford in England and was the site of aircraft experimental development work. In the book "A Short Illustrated History of the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Bedford", author Arthur Pearcy writes: "(RAE Bedford is) the finest research and development establishment outside the U.S.A." Starting in 1946, construction work began to turn the wartime RAF airfield into what became known as the Royal Aeronautical Establishment, Bedford. The runway was extended in the post-war period to accommodate the Bristol Brabazon aircraft, which required a very long runway but which never went into production. A lot of the development for what became the Harrier was done here, one early version became known as the 'Flying Bedstead'. Also Thurleigh had a catapult runway and it was here that the 'ski jump' later fitted to some aircraft carriers was also developed. One local road was put in a cutting for a runway to be put above it, linking the Airfield site to the wind-tunnel site about a mile and a half away, although ultimately this was never carried out. The runway is some 10,500 ft long, and some 300 ft wide and as of June 2011 is used by a number of car storage companies. Naval Air Department and the BEA Helicopters Experimental Unit was here at some point.The airfield was decommissioned in February 1994 after a lengthy study determined that flight operations should be centralised at Boscombe Down in Wiltshire. Due to the cost and impracticality of relocating the Advanced Flight Simulator system the site retains some of its development work (under the banner of QinetiQ from mid-2001 onwards). As of early 2007, QinetiQ have sold their remaining stake in the Bedford Airfield site (as well as the nearby 'Wind Tunnel' site) and are planning to relocate the remaining staff to Farnborough in early 2008, finally ending the site's long association with military aviation.The airfield was closed officially in March 1994 and sold in 1996 with the RAE having become the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency (DERA). DERA consolidated its experimental flying operations at Boscombe Down, moving aircraft from Farnborough as well as Bedford. The wind tunnel site is now the Twinwoods Business Park and some of the buildings are in commercial use. Red Bull Racing use the remaining horizontal wind tunnel and Twinwoods Adventure use the vertical wind tunnel, previously the Vertical Spinning Tunnel (VST) for indoor skydiving. The VST was converted in 2005 by Bodyflight to be the first indoor skydiving wind tunnel in the UK, and at 16.4 ft in diameter remains the largest. On 1 March 2019, Historic England listed the VST as Grade 2 due to its historic and architectural interest. The rest of the building was converted in 2007 and is used by Twinwoods Adventure as a multi-activity centre. Another building on the site is the Yarl's Wood Immigration Removal Centre.