Because of its defensible position on a fording place over the river Ouse, the site Bedford occupied was in continuous use from the Romano-British period. It assumed particular importance as a fortified burgh during the 9th and 10th centuries, and a market soon grew up within its walls for the sale of surplus produce from the surrounding farmland.
A Saxon foundation sited at one of the main crossing points on the upper Ouse, Bedford was sufficiently wealthy to build a stone bridge in the twelfth century, paid the surprisingly large sum of £40 for its fee-farm from 1190, and returned two Members to Parliament from 1295. The fee-farm was reduced in 1440 on the ground that a new bridge five miles down river at Great Barford had affected its road traffic, but the town revived under the Tudors, and had a population of about 1,500 by 1603.J. Godber, Hist. Beds. 52-6; VCH Beds. iii. 1-3; W.M.
Bedford was a thriving and expanding market town and social centre, with a steady trade in corn, timber and coals by the River Ouse, and small manufactures of lace and straw plat.Pigot’s Commercial Dir. (1830), 11; PP (1831-2), xxxviii. 25; (1835), xxvi. 2123. The corporation consisted of a mayor, two bailiffs, an indefinite number of aldermen (that is, burgesses who had served as mayor, and totalling about 13 in this period) and 13 common councilmen.