The Manor of Milton Bryant

Volume III of The Victoria County History for Bedfordshire was published in 1912. It contains histories of the various manors in Milton Bryan. A manor called Milton Bryant is first mentioned in 1592. It may have originated in lands and buildings known as Auncells, part of the Manor of Milton Bryan and leased for twenty one years to George Bredyman in 1554 and, two years later, granted to him and his wife Edith Brocas, a woman of the Queen’s Bedchamber.

George died in 1581 and was succeeded by his son Edmund. Four years later he conveyed the manor to Thomas Southwell as trustee. Edmund also held the Manor of Podington and seems to have annexed this manor to it so that the two became merged. In 1594 Podington was conveyed to Thomas and William Payne. The manor became vested in the Orlebar family in 1647 remaining in that family into the 20th century. A succession of Law of Property Acts in the 1920s extinguished all manorial incidents, courts and copyhold tenure of land. This effectively abolished manors in all but name.