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Survey of London. Vol. IV. Chelsea. Part II
(London County Council.)
MR. WALTER H. GODFREY in his Preface states that this volume completes the records of the parish of Chelsea and all its existing buildings erected before the year 1800, save only the Royal Hospital and the Old Church. These will be described, with the monuments in the various burial-grounds of the parish, in a subsequent volume.
The historical and descriptive letter-press is subservient to the drawings and photographs which constitute the actual Survey, and we should think that there are but few parishes where such large collections have been made. The illustrations in this part are only a selection from those in the hands of the Council. Mr. Randall Davie?, Mr. J. Henry Quinn, and Mr. Philip Norman, who are among those who have valuable collections of materials relating to Chelsea, are thanked for the generous help they have given.
With the exception of Hampstead and St. John's Wood, no district of Greater London is fuller of literary and artistic associations than Chelsea. Sir Thomas More lived at Beaufort House for fourteen years, until his attainder in 1535. " He loved to escape from London and from the Court, and to give himself up to his family and his own literary pursuits in his Chelsea home " ; and here he entertained many friends among whom were Erasmus and Holbein.
At Arch House resided for fifteen years Bishop Fletcher, and one of his younger sons, John the dramatist, must have spent the greater portion of his early life there. He was seventeen when his father died in 1596.
Coming to later years, we must place first of all Thomas Carlyle, who on leaving Craigenputtock found himself, on the 24th of May, 1834, in Lon- don, " with astonishment seeking houses." He walked " till his feet were lamed under him," then discovered 24, Cheyne Row, the house in which he was to live and die.
Whistler, always on the move, lived at 101, Cheyne Walk, in ' 1863. From 1866 to 1878 he wa- .it 96, Cheyne Walk. Thence he moved to the White House in Tite Street, built for him by Godwin. He did not stay there long, but took a new studio at 14, Tite Street. In 1890 he moved to 21, Cheyne Walk, going thence to Paris. He retained his old love for Chelsea, however, and returned there, dying at 72, Cheyne Walk. This house adjoined on the west that occupied for seven years by Thomas Faulkner, author of Memorials of Chelsea.' Faulkner lodged with ( he widow of W. Lewis, the bookbinder and friend ..f Smollett, and tells us that " Lewis was por- trayed in ' Roderick Random ' in the character of Strap the l.arher."
At 93. Cheyne Walk, on the 29th of September, 1S10, Kli/aliet h < 'leghorn Stevenson (afterwards Gaskell) was born. No. 98, Cheyne Walk, was the home of Brunei and his only son from before isll until after 1826. At 10, Upper Cheyne Row, Leigh Hunt lived from 1832 to 1840. Carlyle has described the house, with its litter and dust, ragged carpets and rickety chairs, as excelling "all
you have ever read of a poetical Tinkerdom,
without parallel even in literature." At 215 r
King's Road, Dr. Arne, the composer of ' Rule,.
Britannia,' lived. The house is now occupied
by Miss Ellen Terry (Mrs. James Carew).
At Belle Vue House, 92, Cheyne Walk, Beaver records, lived William Bell Scott, painter and poet, and friend of Rossetti. The house was then a veritable museum, and contained a great number of pictures by contemporary artists- These were sold by auction in December, 1889- To the house further along, No. 119, Turner came, seeking change of air, and when the land- lady, feeling doubtful about the little shabby man who was inquiring for lodgings, asked for references, Turner retorted, " My good woman, I '11 buy the house outright." Thornbury relates that, in order to conceal his identity, he took her name, Booth, " and was known in the streets of Chelsea, aad all along the shore of the Thames, to the stjreet boys as ' Puggy Booth.' and by the small tradesmen he was designated Admiral Booth, for the popular notion was that he was an old admiral in reduced circumstances.'* Up to his very last illness Turner would often rise at daybreak and go on the roof to see the sunrise : it is said that the balustrade still there was erected by him. In Thornbury's Life of him is a picture of the attic in which he* died, with the winter morning sun shining upon his face as he lay in bed : the blind had been drawn up so that the sun's beams might be shed upon the dying artist, who passed away on the 19th of December, 1851.
Of Beaufort House little remains but the garden walls. One relic is now at Chiswick : the stone gateway designed by Inigo Jones, " probably the one shown in Kip's view as opening on to King's Road." It was transferred to its present site on the destruction of Beaufort House, a circumstance commemorated by Pope in the following lines :
Oh gate, how com'st thou here ?
I was brought from Chelsea last year,
Battered with wind and weather ;
Inigo Jones put me together. Sir Hans Sloane Let me alone ;
Burlington brought me hither.
Argyll House and the adjoining houses were- recently threatened with transformation into flats, but, thanks to the public spirit of the Rector,. Archdeacon Bevan, who refused his consent, they have not been included in vanishing Chelsea. Argyll House owes its name to John, fourth Duke of Argyll, who lived there during the last two years of his life (1769-70). It was built by Giacomo Leoni, the Venetian architect.
Lindsey House is of special interest to the Moravians, for it is said to have been renovated by Count Zinzendorf in 1752, having been pur- chased by them in the previous year. " The original staircase to the large house has dis- appeared. The wainscoting, which had been decorated by Haidt, a German artist, with portraits and scenes from Moravian history, was taken away, and has been preserved by the Moravians, with some of the furniture used during their occupation." Particulars are given of the re -erection of Crosby Hall on the site of Danvers House. The work was completed in the summer of 1910.
