Burghley Houses on Ryhall Road, built in 1901, were so-called presumably because the land was bought from the Burghley estate at the end of the 19th century when the 5th Marquess of Exeter was paying off the debts of his extravagant father, the 4th Marquess. They were popularly supposed to have been built for the workers at Blackstone’s engineering works just on the other side of Ryhall Road. There is no evidence of this, although some of Blackstone’s employees did move into them.

They each had 5 rooms and would have been very new in 1911 making them desirable. Known locally as Bread-and-Jam terrace the assumption was that the tenants paid such a high rent compared with the rents for the property in the centre of Stamford, that they could afford no better food.

At some time between 1911 and 1916 the row was renumbered so that No 1 became No 39. All the houses were given odd numbers ending with the last house, No 40 in 1911, becoming No 117.