Godmanchester is an ancient borough and parish in the hundred of Toseland, situated on the southern bank of the Ouse, which is crossed by a bridge and short causeway, forming a communication with Huntingdon, to which town it may be considered a suburb. This place was formerly the residence, of numbers of yeomen and farmers, who are stated to have been possessed of extraordinary teams of horses; they were wont to receive the sovereigns who visited this district with a display of their agricultural implements—exhibiting to James I, when he at one time passed through it, no less than nine score of ploughs, adorned with trappings, &c.: in this respect, however, a great alteration has taken place. Godmanchester was incorporated in 1605, and its government vested in two bailiffs and twelve assistants, with a recorder, &c. The new municipal act recognizes it as a borough, and adds four aldermen to the corporate body, which it styles ‘the bailiffs, assistants and commonalty of the borough of Godmanchester.’ A court of pleas, for the recovery of debts under forty shillings, is held every three weeks. The church, dedicated to St. Mary, is a commodious light edifice, comprising a nave, chancel and aisles, with an embattled tower, surmounted by a spire, at the western extremity, the living is a vicarage, in the patronage of the dean and chapter of Westminster. A free school, founded in the reign of Elizabeth, a school of industry and an apprenticeship fund, are the principal charities. An annual chartered fair, chiefly for horses, is held on Tuesday and Wednesday in Easter week. The parish contained, by the last returns, 2,146 inhabitants.About two miles s. from Huntingdon, in the hundred of Leightonstone, is Brampton parish and village, the latter scattered over a considerable extent of ground. The church, dedicated to St. Mary, is deserving notice for its beautiful south porch, decorated with elegant tracery; the benefice is a discharged vicarage, in the presentation of the prebendary of Brampton in Lincoln cathedral. The parish contained, in 1831, 1,064 inhabitants—being precisely the same number as was returned at the census ten years previously. Rather more than one mile e. by n. from Huntingdon, and in the same hundred as that town, is the neat little village of Hartford, containing a very pretty church, the architecture of which is an admixture of the Norman and Saxon styles; it is dedicated to All Saints, and the living is a discharged vicarage, in the patronage of the crown. In 1831 the population of the parish amounted to 452 persons.
