Huntingdonshire County
(Historic)

Map Reference: (52.362999, -0.293455)

Huntingdonshire is an inland county between the Midlands and East Anglia. One of the smallest of the counties, Huntingdonshire is a rural county of pretty villages and a few small towns. Huntingdon, the county town, stands in the middle of the county on the River Great Ouse. The town has many charming old houses and a well-preserved mediæval bridge. It is the birthplace of Oliver Cromwell. The south of Huntingdonshire is characterised by farming and picturesque villages. The Great River Ouse enters Huntingdonshire at St Neots, named after the Cornish monk whose bones were moved to the Priory here around AD 980. Upstream is Godmanchester, a town with many timber-framed Tudor houses and a mediæval bridge connecting it to Huntingdon. From Huntingdon, the Great Ouse flows east to the pretty market town of St Ives, famous for its mediæval bridge with a chapel in the middle. North of Huntingdon lies the county's share of the Great Fen, long since drained and converted into broad, fertile arable fields. There are many small, pretty hamlets and villages scattered across the fen. The town of Ramsey has a manor house built on the site of an Anglo-Saxon abbey and still known as Ramsey Abbey. The southern suburbs of Peterborough (south of the Nene) including Fletton and the Ortons occupy the far north of Huntingdonshire.