STANBRIDGE is a small village and parish, 1 mile north from Stanbridge Ford station, 3 miles east-by-south from Leighton Buzzard and about 4 north-west from Dunstable, in the Southern division of the county, hundred of Manshead, petty sessional division, union and county court district of Leighton Buzzard, rural deanery of Dunstable, archdeaconry of Bedford and diocese of Ely. The church of St. John the Baptist is an ancient building in the Gothic style, consisting of chancel, nave of four bays, aisles, south porch and an embattled western tower containing 5 bells: the chancel and aisles are Perpendicular: there is an ancient stone font, of very early, possibly Saxon, date. The register dates from the year 1560. The living is a vicarage, tithe rent-charge £13, net yearly value £260, including 16 acres of glebe, with residence, in the gift of the vicar of Leighton Buzzard, and held since 1871 by the Rev. Thomas Green M.A. of St. John’s College, Cambridge, who is also vicar of Tilsworth. Here are Wesleyan and Primitive Methodists chapels.

Sir Edward Henry Hanmer bart. is lord of the manor. The principal landowners are Capt. Peter Purcell Gilpin, Miss Lawford, Mrs. Twidell and Mr. Littleboy. The soil is of a kind of clay; sub soil, clay. The chief crops are wheat, barley, beans and peas. The area is 1,400 acres; rateable value, £2,412; the population in 1881 was 512.

Parish Clerk, William Goodman.

POST OFFICE- Levi Stevens, receiver. Letters through Leighton Buzzard, delivered at 7.30 a.m. Box cleared at 6.10 p.m. weekdays only. Hockliffe is the nearest money order & telegraph office.

A School Board of 5 members was formed in 1874, for this parish, Tilsworth & the hamlet of Eggington; T.D. Willis, Leighton Buzzard, clerk to the board; S.N. Middleton, Leighton Buzzard, attendance officer.

Board School [mixed], built in 1881, for 150 children; average attendance, 120; Samuel Delamont, master; Mrs. Mary Jane Delamont, mistress.

Green Rev Thomas M.A. Vicarage
Horn Thomas E. Bleak house
Johnson John
Sirett Edward
Commercial
Abrahams William, cattle dealer
Blake William, shopkeeper
Bunker Arthur, cattle dealer
Costin William, carpenter
Eames David, cattle dealer
Eames David, sen. farmer
Eames Joseph, Five Bells P.H.
Flint John, shoe maker
Gadsden David, farmer
Gadsden Thomas, farmer
Gadsden Thomas, sen. farmer
Goodman Moses, straw plait dealer
Goodyear Mark, Wheat Sheaf P.H.
Groom John, farmer
Hudson George, duck breeder & farmer, Mead farm
Horn William, shoe maker
Labrum Joseph Rd. farmer & coal mercht.
Lord Edward, farmer
Olney David, dealer
Olney George Wm. butcher & beer retlr.
Olney Warwick, George & Dragon P.H.
Pickering Charles, farmer
Stevens William, blacksmith
Tims David [Mrs.}, wheelwright
Wilks Josiah, plait dealer & shopkeeper