The Old Bakery - 15 Radwell Road Milton Ernest

F J Newell and his horse and cart about 1905 [Z50/82/18]

The Old Bakery was listed by English Heritage in August 1987 as Grade II, of special interest. The building dates from the 17th and 18th centuries and is constructed from coursed limestone rubble with a timber-framed east gable. The property comprises two storeys beneath a modern tiled roof and is built in an L-shape.

Newell's bakery about 1910 [Z50/82/18]

The Rating and Valuation Act 1925 stated that every building and piece of land in the country was to be assessed for its rateable value. The valuer visiting the property discovered that it was a bakery [DV1/C1/71]. At that date the property comprised both today's 15 and 17 Radwell Road and was owned and occupied by Miss Jane Newell. It occupied just over half an acre.

The property comprised a parlour, a living room, a kitchen and a pantry downstairs with four bedrooms above. The bakery consisted of an office and a bakehouse with two ovens with a capacity of “about five bushels the two”. The bakehouse measured 11 feet 6 inches by 19 feet. Outside was a washhouse with a loft over, two pigsties, a timber and tiled cart shed, a timber and thatched stable, a barn, a stable for four horses and a fuel barn. The valuer commented: “Water from pump (good)” and “Very bad at rear”.

15 Radwell Road - The Old Bakery February 2011

Directories for Bedfordshire were published every few years from the middle of the 19th century until 1940. The entries for Milton Ernest list the following bakers:

• 1847: William Cook; Edward Nevill [sic Newall];
• 1854, 1862, 1864, 1869: Edward Newall;
• 1871: Mrs. Jane Newall;
• 1877, 1885: George Newall
• 1890, 1894, 1898: George Newall, also registrar of birth and deaths, Sharnbrook District;
• 1903, 1906: George Clayton Newall, also registrar of birth and deaths, Sharnbrook District;
• 1910, 1914, 1920, 2914, 1928, 1931: Miss Jane Newall
• 1936, 1940: George Bull