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{{Short description|Village and civil parish in Bedfordshire, England}}{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2016}}{{Use British English|date=July 2016}}

factoids

|static_image_name = The five bells - geograph.org.uk - 191401.jpg|static_image_caption = The Five Bells public house| population = 700Population Estimates and Forecasts {{webarchive>url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090105071917weblink ACCESSDATE=7 NOVEMBER 2016WORK=NEIGHBOURHOOD STATISTICS, North East Bedfordshire (UK Parliament constituency)>North East Bedfordshire|post_town= BEDFORD|postcode_district = MK44 dial_code= 01234|os_grid_reference= TL1048}}Cople is a village and civil parish in the English county of Bedfordshire. The name Cople is derived from the phrase Cock Pool, a place where chickens were kept, that was mentioned in the Domesday Book.

History

(File:All Saints, Cople, Beds - geograph.org.uk - 330009.jpg|thumb|left|All Saints Church, Cople, Bedfordshire)Cople is part of the ancient hundred of Wixamtree.The centre of Cople is dominated by All Saints Church, originally built soon after 1087 by the de Beauchamp family and which later became part of Chicksands Priory. The list of Vicars maintained by the church dates back to 1237. All Saints Church was rebuilt in the 15th century, some parts of it a little earlier, by the families who owned the local manors. The church was extended in the first part of the 16th century. It is Grade I listed.{{NHLE|grade=I|desc=Parish Church of All Saints|num=1114154|date=13 July 1964}}A toll house stands at the junction with the A603 (Bedford to Sandy road); the house dates from around 1770 and was used to collect tolls from the road users. It is one of only two toll houses that still exist in Bedfordshire.Cople House, a large manor house, was at southern end of the village, but it was destroyed in a fire in 1971. In 1976 twenty four large homes were built on the site, renamed Woodlands Close, but the original coach house survived the fire and has been restored and converted into three houses.

Rowlands Manor and the Spencers

One of the manors within the parish of Cople was Rowlands, acquired by the Spencer family in 1531 and held by them for several centuries.Cople, Manor of Nicholas Spencer, Esq., Bedford Estate (Russell) Archives, The National Archives, nationalarchives.gov.uk The Spencer family were a branch of the Northamptonshire Spencers (with whom they shared a coat-of-arms).The Visitations of Bedfordshire, William Harvey, Robert Cooke, College of Arms, 1884Robert Spencer had a daughter, Ann Spencer in 1575.She was known as Ann of Cople and Married Hugh Albon(e) in 1591.The sons of Nicolas Spencer Sr. and the former Mary Gostwick,Gostwick/Spencer, The Visitations of Bedfordshire, William Harvey, Robert Cooke, George Owen, Richard Saint-George, College of Arms, London, 1884 Nicholas Spencer and his brother Robert both emigrated to America in the 1650s, to Virginia and Maryland respectively.The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, Vol. XLV, Boston, 1891Nicholas served as an agent for his cousin, John Colepeper, 1st Baron Colepeper.Spencer family members continued to reside in Cople and its environs for many years afterward. "The Spencers’ Cople estates," according to the Bedfordshire County Council, "were bought by Francis Brace for the Dowager Duchess of Marlborough, and the manor still was known as Rowlands when part of the Duke of Bedford’s estate at the start of the 19th century."Manors, Bedfordshire County Council, bedfordshire.gov.uk {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615111555weblink |date=15 June 2011 }}WEB,weblink Rowlands Manor Cople, 1 May 2016,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20160604092731weblink">weblink 4 June 2016, dead,

References

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External links

{{Commons category|Cople}}

• weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20100213174435weblink">Cople website
• weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20080725005817weblink">Cople pages at the Bedfordshire and Luton Archives and Records Service
• Cople, A History of the County of Bedford, Vol. 3, William Page (ed.), Victoria County History, British History Online, british-history.ac.uk

{{Places in Bedford Borough}}{{authority control}}