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Westoning Market and Fair

Inge family coat of arms
Inge family coat of arms

William Inge was granted a market and fair in his Manor of Weston Tregoz and Westoning in 1303. At that date he owned two thirds of the manor, buying the final third from Juliana de Weylondon in 1308. The market was held on a Monday and a fair was held annually for three days at the Feast of Saint Thomas the Martyr (29th December). Perhaps this saint's day was chosen because, less than a hundred years before, a local man, Eilward of Westoning, was believed to have undergone a miraculous cure at the hands of the martyred Thomas Becket.

Isolda, widow of William Inge was called upon to substantiate her claim to the rights to hold a market and fair in 1331. When Daniel and Samuel Lysons published the Bedfordshire section of their Magna Britannia in 1806 both the market and fair had fallen into abeyance.