Mayfair, Belgravia, and Bayswater | Page 5

Gate)
Benjamin Disraeli lived 1839-73. No. 24, Lord Brassey. No. 21, for
many years the Marquis of Breadalbane, and afterwards Lady
Palmerston, when left a widow in 1850; Earl of Scarborough. Sir
Edward Bulwer Lytton at a house then numbered 1. In 23, Richard
Sharp, 1822-24; Mrs. Fitzherbert, 1785; Warren Hastings, 1790-97;
Marquis Wellesley, 1796.
Grosvenor Square and the surrounding streets have always been the
centre of the aristocratic world; the Square, which includes about six
acres, was built in 1695. The garden was laid out by Kent, and in the
centre stood formerly an equestrian statue of George I., by Van Nost,
placed there in 1726. On the site, in 1642, was erected a fort named
Oliver's Mount, which stood as one of the defences against the
Royalists until 1647. Owing to the prejudices of the inhabitants,

Grosvenor Square was not lit by gas until 1842.
Inhabitants: Duchess of Kendal, d. 1743; Earl of Chesterfield, 1733-50;
Bishop Warburton, 1757; Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, 1758-64; Lord
Rockingham, d. 1782; Henry Thrale, d. 1781; Lord North, d. 1792;
Thomas Raikes, 1832; Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles; 10, Lord Canning
and Lord Granville, 1841; 22, William Beckford, 1800; 23, the Earl of
Derby here married Miss Farren, actress, in 1797; his successors
resided here until 1832; Lord Stratford de Redclyffe, d. 1880; 24, the
Earl of Shaftesbury; 29, Sir John Beaumont; 30, John Wilkes, d. 1797;
39 (now 44), the Earl of Harrowby, 1820 (here the Cato Street
conspirators proposed to murder the Ministry); 44, Countess of
Pembroke. The houses have since been renumbered. To give a list of
the present inhabitants of note would be impossible; it would be like
copying a page out of the Red Book. Suffice to say there are living in
the Square two Dukes, one Marquess, three Earls, six Barons, and five
Baronets, beside many other persons of distinction.
At the corner end of Park Street, and in South Street and Aldford Street,
the old houses have been pulled down and have been replaced by large,
red-brick, ornamented structures, such as have also been erected in
Mount Street, Grosvenor Street, and North and South Audley Street.
The spaces behind the houses are occupied by mews. Great
improvements have also been effected since 1887 in the housing of the
working classes, particularly in the neighbourhood of Oxford Street,
and in Bourdon Street and Mount Row, by the erection of blocks of
industrial dwellings by the St. George's and Improved Industrial
Dwellings Companies, under the auspices of the Duke of Westminster.
In Park Street, formerly called Hyde Park Street, lived Miss Nelly
O'Brien, 1768; 7, Sir William Stirling Maxwell, M.P.; 26, Sir Humphry
Davy, 1825, till his death; 113, Miss Lydia White, d. 1827; 123,
Richard Ford, author of "The Handbook for Spain." In North Audley
Street, opposite Green Street, is St. Mark's Church, built from designs
by J. P. Deering in 1825-28, and reconstructed in Romanesque style in
1878. Adjoining is the Vicarage, built in 1887, and at the back the St.
Mark's Institute, containing a church-room, mission-room, gymnasium,

and a working men's club. Attached to the institute are the parish
schools, built soon after 1830, and enlarged and repaired in 1894.
Near the church lived the Countess of Suffolk, mistress of George II.;
at 1, Maria Edgeworth; 26, the Misses Berry.
South Audley Street takes its name from Hugh Audley (d. 1662), the
owner of some land in the neighbourhood. It has several interesting
houses. No. 8, Alington House (Lord Alington), was, in 1826,
Cambridge House, the residence of the Duke of York, and afterwards,
until 1876, belonged to the Curzons, Earls Howe. In 73, Bute House,
lived, in 1769, the great Earl of Bute, and near him his friend Home,
author of "Douglas." Chesterfield House, a large mansion standing in a
courtyard at the corner of Curzon Street, was built by Ware in 1749 for
the fourth Earl of Chesterfield, d. 1773, who wrote the "Letters" in the
library. The portico and marble staircase, with bronze balustrade, were
brought from Canons, the seat of the Duke of Chandos. In 1869 the
house was sold to Mr. Magniac for £175,000, and he built over the
gardens. It is now the town house of Lord Burton.
Opposite Aldford Street is Grosvenor Chapel, erected in 1730; an ugly
building, with sittings for 1,200. It is now a chapel of ease to St.
George's. Here were buried Lord Chesterfield, 1773; Ambrose Phillips,
poet, 1749; Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, 1762; David Mallet, poet,
1765; William Whitehead, poet, 1785; John Wilkes, 1797; Elizabeth
Carter, 1806. The churchyard at the back was, in 1889, converted into a
public garden. Just outside the gate is the Public Free Library, erected
in 1894 under the Free Libraries Act.
Other inhabitants: General Paoli; Holcroft, dramatist, 1761; Sir William
Jones;