Bedfont is a district within the London Borough of Hounslow in West London. It is 21 km west-southwest of Charing Cross and two miles from Heathrow Airport. It consists of the area which is informally called North Feltham plus the neighbourhood of Hatton.
Bedfont is referenced inside the Domesday Book as ‘Bedefunde’, which is believed to come from the Anglo-Saxon word ‘Bedfunta’, which means ‘bed’s spring’. It states that the manors of Bedfont, Hatton and Stanmore were all held by William Fitz Other. Before Heathrow’s Terminal 5 was constructed, just a few miles north of Bedfont, archaeologists discovered Bronze Age, Iron Age and Roman artefacts, suggesting that people were residing in and around Bedfont in these periods.
The population of Bedfont stood at 12,701 at the 2011 census. The amount of inhabitants started to rise when Heathrow Airport was opened in 1946. This triggered escalating demand for neighbourhood housing, specifically as the village of Heathrow was lost together with part of the Hamlet of Hatton.
Bedfont has two surviving manor houses: Pates Manor, once owned by the Page family, and Fawns Manor. Pates Manor is behind the Church of St Mary the Virgin and dates from the late fifteenth century. Fawns Manor is around the south side of the Green and dates back to the sixteenth century, now belonging to the British Airways Housing Association.