Welcome to the website for the Bradwell Parish Heritage Group.
This website is very much a work in progress as the Group has only recently been formed so do call back from time to time to see what we’ve been able to add to the site.
The Parish covers the area of Milton Keynes enclosed by the Portway, Saxon Street and Monks Way grid roads with the western boundary being the area to the west of the railway line known as Bradwell Abbey.
There are three housing areas – the old village of Bradwell surrounded by modern development, plus Heelands and Bradwell Common – plus Bradwell Abbey and the industrial area of Rooksley .
As Milton Keynes passes its 50th birthday in 2017 it is important we record the development and heritage of the modern areas as well as those like the old village that has history going back a very long time.
Bradwell Common – named because Common Lane, which ran from Bradwell village across the common to the 10th Century Secklow Mound meeting place at the rear of Milton Keynes Central Library building, crosses it – is home to the first of the Development Corporation’s three innovative housing exhibitions Homeworld, in 1981, Energy World and Future World.
Heelands was the location of a Roman farmstead, a Neolithic settlement and in Medieval times was worked using the ridge and furrow system.
The ancient track from Stanton Low to Loughton crosses both Heelands and Bradwell Common grid squares.
Buildings at Bradwell Abbey are home to Milton Keynes City Discovery Centre who hold a wealth of material about the development of the New City of Milton Keynes.
Our Parish contains a number of Listed Buildings and The Memorial Hall commemorates the men connected to the village who gave their lives in the Great War.
New Bradwell and Stantonbury were historically associated with what we now know as Bradwell Village and you might like to visit our friends the New Bradwell Heritage Group’s site.
If you’d like to get involved with making the heritage of our parish more widely available please get in touch.