This is the Umbrella Project Page for Bedfordshire, England.

Bedfordshire

• Administrative centre Bedford
• County Flower - Bee Orchid
• People from Bedfordshire are called - "Bedfordshire Bulldogs" or "Clangers" (derived from a local dish comprising a suet crust dumpling filled with meat and jam).
• South Bedfordshire County Motto "By Truth and Diligence"

Bedfordshire County Council Motto -"Constant be"

Bedfordshire (abbreviated Beds.) is a ceremonial county of historic origin in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It borders the non-metropolitan counties of Cambridgeshire to the northeast, Northamptonshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the west and Hertfordshire to the southeast.

The first recorded use of the name was in 1011 as "Bedanfordscir," meaning the shire or county of Bedford, which itself means "Beda's ford" (river crossing).

Bedfordshire was historically divided into the nine hundreds:

• Barford,
• Biggleswade,
• Clifton,
• Flitt,
• Manshead,
• Redbournestoke,
• Stodden,
• Willey,
• Wixamtree, along with the liberty and borough of Bedford.

There have been several minor changes to the county boundary; for example, in 1897 Kensworth and part of Caddington were transferred from Hertfordshire to Bedfordshire.

For Information about research in the County, including lists of people of renown connected to Bedfordshire and Families Researched on Geni go to Bedfordshire - Family Heads

For Historical information about Bedfordshire visit Historic Bedfordshire - including connections to Historical figures, Gentry and political people connected with Bedfordshire.

The following people on Geni offer assistance -

• C. June Barnes Curator

If you have Bedfordshire connections please join the project and if you live in Bedfordshire and are prepared to offer advice or help of any kind please add yourself to the list above.

To participate in any project

- you do need to first be a collaborator - so join the project. See the discussion Project Help: How to add Text to a Project - Starter Kit to get you going!

How to Participate

• If you have any queries please start a discussion linked to this project. (See the menu top right).
• Please add related projects to the menu on the right.
• If you have links to related web pages that would be of interest to others please add them in the relevant section at the bottom of the page. In order to do this use the drop down menu at the top left of the screen and Join the Project. If this option is not available to you then contact a collaborator and ask to be added to the project. As a collaborator you will be able to edit this page.
• Add any documents of interest using the menu at the top right of the page, and then add a link to the document in the text under the heading below. If you do not know how to do this please contact one of the other collaborators to assist you.

Please do not add the profiles off all your Bedfordshire born ancestors to this project or the People connected to Bedfordshire project. Rather add the earliest known person of a Bedfordshire family to the Bedfordshire' - Family Heads project.

Parish Map

from The Phillimore Atlas and Index of Parish Registers 1984.

See http://www.geni.com/photo/view/4560155096930045739?photo_id=6000000019087321014 - open full view.

Resources

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedfordshire