11 S. VII. June 21, 1913.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 495 Wilderness Row (11 S. vii. 428).— Wilderness Row was built upon ground which once belonged to the Knights Hos- pitallers of St. John of Jerusalem in the parish of Clerkenwell. By an order of the Metropolitan Board of Works dated 22 Jan- uary, 1864, it was renumbered continu- •ously, commencing at the end nearest Goswell Street, from 1 to 36. In 1878 the road was widened by the setting back •of the Charterhouse wall, and was incor- porated with the new road from Oxford Street to Old Street known as Clerken- well Road. In 1505, according to a lease from the prior and brethren of St. John of Jerusalem, it was " a close called Whytewellbeche " -(see MSS. Cott. Claud. E. v. fol. 19, cited in Tomlins's ' Yseldon.' p. 21). The name Wilderness Row was given to the row of houses because they faced the
- " Wilderness," a plantation on the north
side of the Charterhouse grounds. This "Wilderness" was described in a pam- phlet entitled ' A Trip to the Charterhouse ; or. The Wilderness Intrigue,' published in 1707, as " a small yet complete little flower garden' formed of shady walks and complete parterres> and adorned with some very rare trees and shrubs, which we must confess have but a dingy hue, notwithstanding there are not many such gardens in London." When the Row was built the land was partly open fields, whilst " The Cherry Tree Tavern," with its noted tea-gardens, existed here as late as 1820. A good historical account of Wilderness Row appears in ' The History of Clerkenwell,' by the late William J. Pinks, edited by Edward J. Wood, 2nd ed., 1880, pp. 368-73. Thomas W. Htjck. Saffron Walden. There were two streets called Wilderness How in the suburbs of London in the ■eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, one being in Clerkenwell and the other in ■Chelsea. Wilderness Row, Clerkenwell, was oppo- site to Old Street, and connected Goswell Street with St. John Street. In 1677 the street was evidently in process of forma- tion, as in Ogilby & Morgan's map of Lon- don of that date it is unnamed, and did not then extend so far west as to connect directly with St. John Street. The southern side is represented as laid out in the walks and gardens belonging to and within the Charterhouse precincts, known as " The Wilderness," from which the street appears to have subsequently derived its name. These gardens are shown in the map of " St. Sepulcher's Parish Without the Charter- house Liberty," engraved inStrype's' Stow,' ed. 1755, vol. ii. p. 61. In Rocque's map of London, 1746, the central portion of the street seems to have been called the Rope Walk, but the number of houses does not seem to have appre- ciably increased since 1677, and it is not until 1799 that we see in Horwood's map a continuous row of houses on the northern side, named Wilderness Row, and directly connected With No. 163, St. John Street. The southern side, meanwhile, still main- tained its original charm and openness, and although one or two buildings were erected in course of time, yet it was not until after the passing of the Metropolitan Improvement Act of 1872 that the cha- racter of the street was materially changed. By this Act it was decided to widen the thoroughfare, and to incorporate it in the new road to be formed from Old Street to Oxford Street; and so when this new road was opened for traffic in 1878, the old name had disappeared, and had become merged in the new Clerkenwell Road. Wheatley in his ' London Past and Pre- sent,' 1891, says that the Row covered the site of the Old Pardon Churchyard of the Charterhouse, the chapel attached to which stood near its western end, where Zion Chapel now stands. Wilderness Row, Chelsea, lay to the north of the Royal Hospital, and is shown in Rocque's map of London, 1746, turning east out of the northern end of Jews' Row (afterwards Royal Hospital Row), between the Ranelagh Gardens and the King's Road. It is represented as a country lane, having two or three houses on each side, and standing in the midst of the open fields. But it was of sufficient importance even then to be included in the lists of streets contained in the guide-books and direc- tories of London published in the second half of the eighteenth century, and in Hor- wood's map of 1799 it is shown with an almost continuous row of buildings on both sides. The street was in existence in 1855, but was removed not long afterwards to make room for Chelsea Barracks. The Committee for the Survey of the Memorials of Greater London in their ' Monograph on Chelsea,' part ii., recently published, have reproduced a plan of Chelsea of 1664. which shows the site of Wilderness Row covered by the Earl of Ranelagh's house and garden. I. I. Greaves.
