Kempston is a town and civil parish in the Borough of Bedford, Bedfordshire, England, situated around south-west of Bedford town centre. It had a population of 19,330 in the 2011 census, and forms part of the wider Bedford built-up area. The River Great Ouse separates it from the Queen's Park area of Bedford. History Until the 19th century Kempston was a mainly rural parish. It was one of the largest in Bedfordshire with an area of 5,025 acres (20 km2) at the time of enclosure in 1804, and was in Redbournestoke Hundred. Historically there was no central village, but instead settlement was divided between a number of hamlets called "Ends", for example, Up End, Bell End, Wood End and Box End. Kempston's parish church, All Saints, was in Church End, which was not the largest end but is fairly central. In the 19th century East End, Bell End and Up End began to coalesce into a larger settlement. In 1870 developers began to attempt to develop land on the road from Kempston to Bedford under the name "Kempston New Town". Construction was slow at first, but the new district soon began to expand steadily and Kempston acquired a more urban feel. A permanent military presence was established in the town with the completion of Kempston Barracks in 1876. On 1 April 1896 the parish was divided into "Kempston" (in Kempston Urban District) and of Kempston Rural . The Urban District was based on East End, Up End and Kempston New Town all of which are in the north eastern part of the parish close to Bedford, and had 86.8% of the total population at the 1901 census. Kempston Rural was three times larger, but remained sparsely populated. Church End, with its original parish church, remains a small hamlet in the rural part of Kempston. A gravel pit was opened at Hill Grounds in the 1860s and the area around Bunyan Road was known as 'Gravel End' in 1877. The growth of the area of Kempston formerly known as 'Up End' is thought to be due largely to the employment opportunities presented by the gravel pits in this area, including that at Hill Grounds. From around 1910 until the early 1930s the Kempston gravel pit railway served the Hill Grounds pit. The growth of Kempston's population levelled off in the early decades of the 20th century, with a rise of just