Cardington Village at Cardington

Cardington is three miles Southeast of Bedford. Estate cottages cluster around the village green, many of them bearing plaques with the initials 'JH' or 'SW'. These were built by John Howard, the famous prison reformer who lived in the large white-washed Georgian house north of the church, and Samuel Whitbread, founder of the famous brewing firm, who was born at Maltings Farm, a red brick house with distinctive windows to the west of the green.

In the cemetery of this rural village are buried the men who lost their lives in the R101 airship disaster in 1930 together with a memorial. A mile away the two vast airship sheds still dominate the landscape.