Church of Saint John

St. John's Church about 1920 [Z209/95/84]

Until the middle of the 19th century the growing urban population of Kempston has to walk to All Saints' Church at Church |End| , in what is now Kempston Rural|, to attend divine service, or walk to St. Leonard's church just over the parish boundary in Bedford. The Church of England set about rectifying this situation in 1855 when the National School at Up End| was adapted to serve as a chapel of ease.

In 1866 a fund was begun to erect a purpose-built church in Up End. A site was given by H.Littledale of Kempston Grange, in what would become St. John's Road, and the foundation stone was laid in Mar 1867. The church comprised a nave and a chapel built as an apse at the end of the nave; there were also a vestry, organ chamber, a porch to the south and a bell turret at the south-west corner of the building. The architecture aped 13th century Gothic. The church was consecrated on 27 May 1868.

Interior of St. John's Church about 1910 [X414/126]

By the early 1890s it was realised that the foundations were badly laid since there were cracks in the walls. By 1904 things were serious enough for the nave to need underpinning and the chancel and vestry to need rebuilding, which was done three years later. The opportunity was taken to also rebuild the chancel and strengthen the roof; however, this led to a lack of funds which meant that the underpinning work in the nave could not be carried out. The church reopened on 27 Feb 1908.

By the 1920s it was decided to replace both St. John's and St. Stephen's| in Spring Road with a single, and better, building. This eventually led to the construction of the Church of the Transfiguration| which opened in 1940, at which point St. John's was closed. Perhaps surprisingly, given the nature of the foundations, the building survived until 1966, being used for light industry and storage. The church was never licensed for baptisms or marriages and no burials were ever undertaken there.

Most of the notes on the structural history of the church can be found in greater detail in Bedfordshire Historical Record Society Volume number 80 of 2001 Bedfordshire Churches in the Nineteenth Century: Part IV: Appendices and Index, put together by former County Archivist Chris Pickford from numerous sources some held by Bedfordshire & Luton Archives & Records Service and some held elsewhere or published.