Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for WOBURN

WOBURN, a small town, a parish, a sub-district, and a district, in Beds. The town stands 2¾ miles SE of Woburn-S and s r. station, and 14 SW of Bedford; grew adjacent to a Cistertian abbey, founded in 1145, by Hugh de Bolebec; is now a seat of petty-sessions; carries on lace-making and straw-plait-making; consists of well built streets, intersecting one another at right angles; and has a head post-office,‡ a hotel, a town hall, a market house rebuilt in 1830, a church rebuilt in 1868, Independent and Wesleyan chapels, a literary and scientific institution, endowed schools for boys and for girls, alms houses for 20 persons, a workhouse, a weekly market on Friday, and 4 annual fairs. W.-Abbey was given, at the dissolution of monasteries, to Lord Russell; was visited, in 1572, by Queen Elizabeth,-in 1645, by Charles I.; was rebuilt, in the manner of a noble mansion, in 1774, by the fourth Duke of Bedford; is a quadrangular structure, 200 feet on each side, with an Ionic front; includes a saloon 35½ feet by 25½, a library 50 feet by 24½, and a picture gallery 111½ feet by 17¾; contains a rich collection of paintings, scu1ptures, and other works of art; and stands in a richly ornate park, 12 miles in circumference.

The parish comprises 3,200 acres. Real property, £8,987; of which £100 are in gasworks. Pop. in 1851, 2,049; in 1861, 1,764. Houses, 364. The decrease of pop. was caused mainly by the removal of an extensive iron foundry. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Ely. Value, £251.* Patron, the Duke of Bedford.-- The sub-district contains ten parishes. Acres, 16,791. Pop., 6,771. Houses, 1,475.—The district includes Toddington sub-district, and comprises 29,603 acres. Poor rates in 1863, £8,473. Pop. in 1851, 12,075; in 1861, 11,684. Houses, 2,487. Marriages in 1866, 98; births, 368,-of which 34 were illegitimate; deaths, 237, -of which 86 were at ages under 5 years, and 8 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 785; births, 3,903; deaths, 2,555. The places of worship, in 1851, were 18 of the Church of England , with 4,610 sittings; 3 of Independents, with 788 s.; 4 of Baptists, with 734 s.; 11 of Wesleyans, with 1,800 s.; and 4 of Primitive Methodists, with 410 s. The schools were 12 public day-schools, with 1,076 scholars; 8 private day-schools, with 215 s.; 34 Sunday schools, with 2,800 s.: and 4 evening schools for adults, with 113 s.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a small town, a parish, a sub-district, and a district"   (ADL Feature Type: "cities")
Administrative units: Woburn AP/CP       Woburn SubD       Woburn PLU/RegD       Bedfordshire AncC
Place: Woburn

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