The cheap and good education attainable as a matter of right in this borough, have rendered it a favourite resort of half-pay officers and unbeneficed clergymen, blessed with large families.
The church of St. Paul is large, with a nave and a south aisle, divided by early English piers and arches. A stone pulpit, ornamented with gilt tracery, on a blue ground, has been removed in favour of an oak one, with the chancel. The church of St. Peter has an old Norman door, a fine antique front, and some curious stained glass in the windows.
John Bunyan, author of the “Pilgrim’s Progress,” was co-pastor in a Baptist Meeting House, in Mill-lane, from 1671 until his death in 1688. The chair in which he used to sit is still preserved in the vestry as a relic.
A few miles from Bletchley, is a forgotten, but once celebrated spot, Denbigh Hall, over which the traveller whirls without notice, yet worthy of remembrance, because it affords a name and date for tracing the march of railway enterprise.
In 1838, a gap in the intended railway from London to Birmingham extended from an obscure public-house, called Denbigh Hall, to Rugby. At either point travellers had to exchange the rail for the coach or chaise.
On June 28, 1838, when Queen Victoria was crowned, for days before the coronation, the coaches for the intermediate space were crammed; the chaises and post horses were monopolised, and at length, to cover thirty odd miles, every gig, standing waggon, cart, and donkey cart that could be obtained in the district, was engaged, and yet many were disappointed of their journey to London.
On this London and Birmingham line, in addition to, and without disturbing the ordinary traffic, 2,000 souls have been conveyed in one train, at the rate of thirty miles an hour.
Truly Queen Victoria can set the railway conquests of her reign against the glories of the war victories of Queen Anne and her grandfather, King George.
