Description
Cardington, a village and a parish in Bedfordshire. The parish is bounded on the N by the river Ouse, the village being about a mile from the river, and 2 1/2 miles SE from Bedford. It has a station on the M.R., and a post and money order office under Bedford; telegraph office at the railway station. The parish includes the township of Eastcotts, which is noticed separately. Acreage of civil parish, 2523; population, 438; of the ecclesiastical parish of Cardington St Mary with Eastcotts, 1268. Cardington House is known also as Howard's Villa, because a portion of it was at one time the residence of John Howard, the philanthropist. The manor and most of the land belong to the Whitbread family. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Ely; gross yearly value, £250 with residence, in the gift of Trinity College, Cambridge. The church is a building of stone chiefly in the Perpendicular style, but with a central Early English tower. It contains some ancient tombs and brasses, and a mural tablet to John Howard. There is a Wesleyan chapel, and at Cotton End, a hamlet in Eastcotts, there is a Baptist chapel. There is a brewery at Cardington, and some pillow-lace is still made.