'Huntingdon and Peterborough' was a short-lived
administrative county in
East Anglia.
It was formed in 1965 by the merger of the administrations of the
Soke of Peterborough (geographically in Northamptonshire) and
Huntingdonshire, both very small counties, in an attempt to make a more viable administrative unit. To these were attached the
Thorney Rural District from the
Isle of Ely. As a consequence, the
Soke of Peterborough was absorbed by the
custos rotulorum and
Lord Lieutenant of Huntingdonshire, who became
Lord Lieutenant of Huntingdon and Peterborough.
[1]
The county's population, as recorded at the ten-yearly census, was 202,622 in 1971.
[2]
The attempt was deemed a failure, so under the
Local Government Act 1972 — which replaced the administrative counties and
county boroughs of the
Local Government Act 1888 with
metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties — Huntingdon and Peterborough merged with neighbouring
Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely (itself formed in 1965, following the traditional division of the county into the area around
Cambridge and the liberty of the
Isle of Ely), to form the new enlarged
non-metropolitan county (and
lieutenancy) of
Cambridgeshire.
Peterborough and
Huntingdon became two of the county's six districts and in 1984, following a resolution of the council, the latter district was renamed Huntingdonshire.
[3]
Cambridgeshire Constabulary was also formed with its present boundaries, under the
Police Act 1964, from the merger of the Cambridge City Police, the previous Cambridgeshire County Constabulary, Isle of Ely Constabulary, Huntingdonshire Constabulary, and the Peterborough Combined Police Force (created in 1947 from the Liberty of Peterborough Constabulary and the City of Peterborough Constabulary). The new force was named the Mid-Anglia Constabulary until 1974, when non-metropolitan Cambridgeshire was created with identical boundaries.
References
1. The Huntingdon and Peterborough Order 1964 (SI 1964/367), see Local Government Commission for England (1958 - 1967), ''East Midlands General Review Area (Report No.3)'', July 1961 and ''Lincolnshire and East Anglia General Review Area (Report No.9)'', May 1965
2. A vision of Huntingdon and Peterborough ''A vision of Britain through time'' Great Britain Historical GIS Project, University of Portsmouth, Department of Geography (retrieved 08 May 2007)
3. ''The Times'' London, 27 April 1984
See also
★
City of Peterborough
★
Soke of Peterborough
★
Huntingdonshire
★
Lord Lieutenant of Huntingdon and Peterborough
★
Cambridgeshire