To his Excellency, Benning Wentworth, Esq., Governor and Commander-in-Chief of his Majesty's Province of New Hampshire, and to the Honorable, his Majesty's Council, assembled at Portsmouth, May 10, 1750. The humble Petition of the subscribers, inhabitants of Souhegan-East, so-called, sheweth, That your Petitioners are major part of said Souhegan; that your petitioners, as to our particular persuasion in Christianity, are generally of the Presbyterian denomination; that your petitioners, through a variety of causes, having long been destitute of the gospel, are now desirous of taking proper steps in order to have it settled among us in that way of discipline which we judge to tend most to our edification; that your petitioners, not being incorporated by civil authority, are in no capacity to raise those sums of money, which may be needful in order to our proceeding in the above important affair. May it therefore please your Excellency, and Honors, to take the case of your petitioners under consideration, and to incorporate us into a town or district, or in case any part of our inhabitants should be taken off by any neighboring district, to grant that those of our persuasion, who are desirous of adhering to us, may be excused from supporting any other parish charge, than where they conscientiously adhere, we desiring the same liberty to those within our bounds, if any there be, and your petitioners shall ever pray, &c. This petition was presented on May 18, 1750, to the Council, which unanimously advised the granting of a charter, and this the Governor did upon the following day. The name of the town was changed by Governor Wentworth from Souhegan-East to Bedford, it is said in honor of the fourth Duke of Bedford, then Secretary of State in the ministry of George II. This was the formal organization of the present town, which has a territorial extent of about twenty thousand acres of land. Of the early population of this and neighboring towns "The Centennial History of Bedford" (published in 1851) says: With few exceptions the early inhabitants of the town were from the North of Ireland or from the then infant settlement of Londonderry, N. H., to which they had recently emigrated from Ireland. Their ancestors were of Scotch origin. About the middle of the seventeenth century they went in considerable numbers from Argylshire, in the West of Scotland, to the counties of Londonderry and Antrim, in the North of Ireland, from which in 1718 a great emigration took place to this country. Some arrived at Boston, and some at Casco Bay near Portland, which last were the settlers of Londonderry. Many towns in this vicinity were settled from this colony. Windham, Chester, Litchfield, Manchester, Bedford, Goffstown, New Boston, Antrim, Peterborough and Acworth derived from Londonderry a considerable proportion of their first inhabitants.