Bassingbourn, United Kingdom

After the Norman invasion in 1066, Comte Alan of Brittany was given the desirable manor of Bassingbourn, which was mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086. His descendant Warin de Bassingbourn, a supporter of King John in the baronial rebellion of 1212. He built a fortified manor house one mile west-southwest of the present barracks, now known as the John O'Gaunt Castle.

In 1511 a grand miracle play was held in the village, which throughout that century was also the site of an annual great fair. The Royston-Hitchin Railway line opened in 1851, just crossing the very southern end of the parish.

An airfield in the north of the parish opened in 1938 and was used for three years for bomber training. Between 1942 and 1945 it was home to a USAAF 91st Bombardment Group heavy bomber squadron, followed by an RAF air transport squadron, and between 1951 and 1969 by two RAF training squadrons. After 1969 it was a training depot for the Queen's Division. It subsequently served as a base for the Army Training Regiment Bassingbourn. In 2014 the site was closed, before being used to train Libyan soldiers as part of an agreement following the overthrow of Colonel Gaddafi in 2011. This arrangement was cancelled following incidents in Cambridge involving some Libyan trainees.As of 2015, the site was mothballed. The USAAF base features significantly in Sam Halpert's 1997 novel based on his experiences as a navigator in B-17s, A Real Good War.

In December 2018, Bassingbourn Barracks was reopened as home to Mission Training Mobilisation Centre (MTMC), a unit responsible for training troops for operations abroad. MTMC had re-located from Risborough Barracks, Shorncliffe Army Camp and Lydd Ranges in Kent. Construction work is underway to allow other elements of MTMC to relocate from Chetwynd Barracks in Chilwell to Bassingbourn Barracks.

Originally a separate parish of 997 acres (403 ha), Kneesworth grew on the Roman Ermine Street (now known as the Old North Road) where the Bassingbourn to Meldreth road crossed it, and its parish covered land to the east of the road. Recorded as Cnesworth in around 1218, the name Kneesworth possibly means "enclosure of a man called Cyneheah", and suggests that the settlement formed as an Anglo-Saxon farmstead.

The former manor house, Kneesworth Hall, was home to the Nightingale family, a member of the landed aristocracy, between 1610 and 1831. In 1904, it was rebuilt as an Edwardian mansion by Sydney Holland, 2nd Viscount Knutsford. In 1947, it opened as a residential boys' school and after being sold to the council in 1968 was known as Kneesworth House Approved School until its closure in 1986. The hall is now Kneesworth House Hospital.