the ratebooks in connection with the house from that date until
1774. On 16th November, in the latter year, the two houses were
sold[361] to Trustees for the Freemasons, who have ever since held
the property.
It is now time to return and trace the history of the other of the
two portions into which Lane had divided the house, viz., that
part which fronted Great Queen Street.
[Illustration:
_Burnet._
]
The ratebook for 1709 gives “the Bishop of Salisbury” as the name
of the occupant at that time. This must refer to the famous
Gilbert Burnet, who held the see of Salisbury from 1689 until his
death in 1715. He was born in Edinburgh on 18th September, 1643,
and having, as a precocious boy, entered the Marischal College of
Aberdeen at the age of ten, he became master of arts by the time
he was fourteen. The next few years were devoted to the study of
divinity and history and to travel. In 1665 he was appointed
minister of Saltoun, but resigned in 1669, when he became
professor of divinity at Glasgow University. He made several
visits to London, and in 1674, having incurred the jealousy of
Lauderdale, he resigned his professorship and settled in London.
In 1675 he was made chaplain to the Rolls Chapel, the lectureship
to St. Clement’s being added shortly afterwards. In 1676 he took a
house in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, next door to Sir Thomas Littleton,
and stayed there apparently for six years.[362] Littleton at some
time between 1675 and 1683 occupied No. 52, Lincoln’s Inn
Fields,[363] and though, in the absence of more definite
information, it cannot be proved that this was the house he was
occupying in 1676, it is extremely probable that this was the
case. If so, Burnet’s house was No. 51, as it is known that Nos.
53–4, the house on the other side, was at the same time in the
occupation of the Countess of Bath. After the Rye House plot in
1683 and the execution of his friend William, Lord Russell, Burnet
withdrew to France, and on his return in 1684 was deprived of his
positions. Upon the accession of James he again withdrew to the
Continent, finally accepting an invitation from William and Mary
to settle at the Hague, where he was instrumental in reconciling
them.[364] He accompanied William to England, was responsible for
the form in which William’s Declaration appeared in English,[365]
and was rewarded for his services with the Bishopric of Salisbury.
Notwithstanding a subsequent decrease in favour with William, he
was offered in 1698 the position of governor to the young Duke of
Gloucester, and accepted it on conditions which allowed him to
attend to the affairs of his diocese.[366] The most lasting
achievement of his later years was the provision for the
augmentation of poor livings, generally known as Queen Anne’s
Bounty, which became law in 1704. He died on 17th March, 1714–15,
and was buried in St. James’, Clerkenwell, having resided at St.
John’s Court in that parish for some years.[367] His chief
characteristic was tolerance, which he continually urged, whether
towards Scotch Presbyterians in his early days, to Roman Catholics
at the time of the “popish plot” in 1678, or to non-jurors and
Presbyterians in his own diocese. His chief literary works
were:—_History of the Reformation_, published between 1679 and
1714; _Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles_, published in 1699;
and a _History of My Own Time_, which was published posthumously
in 1723 and 1734.
The ratebooks for 1715 and 1720 show “Lady Anne Dashwood” at the
house. Apparently this was Anne, daughter of John Smith, of
Tudworth, Hants, widow of Sir Samuel Dashwood, Lord Mayor in
1702–3, who was knighted in July, 1684, and died in 1705.[368] She
died on 16th June, 1721.[369]
In 1723 “Lord Bellomonte” was resident at the house. This was
Richard Coote, fourth Earl Bellamont. He was born in 1683, and
succeeded to the earldom in 1708. He was married twice, his second
marriage (to Lady Oxenden) taking place in 1721 at St.
Giles-in-the-Fields. On his death in 1766 the earldom became
extinct.[370] Lord Bellamont seems to have removed to Nos. 55–56,
Great Queen Street and to have left there in 1729 or 1730.[371]
From 1730 onwards, until the date of acquisition by the
Freemasons, the occupants of the house were as follows:—
1730–33. Thos. Iley.
1737. Earl of Macclesfield.
1740–42. —— Vanblew.
1746. Geo. Hudson.
1747–64. Thos. Hudson.
1765–67. Thos. Worlidge.
1768–75. Jas. Ashley.
George Parker, second Earl of Macclesfield, was born in 1697. He
married in 1722 Mary Lane,[372] and succeeded to the earldom in
1732, at which time he was resident in Soho Square.[373] He had a
great taste for mathematics, in which he had been instructed by
Abraham de Moivre and William Jones, and, aided by James Bradley,
who afterwards, by his influence, became astronomer-royal, erected
about 1739 an astronomical observatory at his residence at
Shirburn Castle, Oxfordshire. From 1740 until near his death, he
carried out a series of personal astronomical observations.
Macclesfield was the principal author of the measure which brought
about the change of style in 1752, and in consequence incurred
great unpopularity among the ignorant, who imagined that they had
been robbed of eleven days. In 1762 he was elected President of
the Royal Society, a position which he held until his death in
1764.
Thomas Hudson was born in Devonshire in 1701. He became a pupil of
Jonathan Richardson, the elder, portrait painter (with whose
daughter he made a runaway match), and on setting up for himself
in the same profession, soon attained to great eminence, though
his prosperity faded with the rise of one of his pupils, Joshua
Reynolds.[374] His residence in Great Queen Street began about
1746,[375] and continued until about 1764,[376] when he retired to
Twickenham[377] where he died in January, 1779.
He was succeeded in his occupation of the house in Great Queen
Street by Thomas Worlidge,[378] painter and etcher. Worlidge was
born at Peterborough in 1700. He came to London about 1740, and
settled in the neighbourhood of Covent Garden, where he remained
for the rest of his life, residing at various times in The Piazza,
Bedford Street, King Street, and, finally, Great Queen Street. He
first made a name by his miniature portraits, but eventually
concentrated his energies on etching in the style of Rembrandt. He
died at Hammersmith in September, 1766. His name appears in the
ratebook also for 1767, and this is explained by the fact that his
widow “carried on the sale of his etchings at his house in Great
Queen Street.”[379] Shortly afterwards Mrs. Worlidge married a
wine and spirit merchant named Ashley,[379] who had been one of
Worlidge’s intimate friends, and in accordance with this is the
fact that in the ratebook for the following year (1768) “James
Ashley” is shown at the house.
In 1774, the premises were occupied for a short time by Mary
Robinson (_née_ Darby), afterwards known as “Perdita,” who had
just got married. Perdita’s own account of the matter is as
follows: “On our return to London after ten days’ absence, a house
was hired in Great Queen Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields. It was a
large, old-fashioned mansion, and stood on the spot where the
Freemasons’ Tavern has since been erected. This house was the
property of a lady, an acquaintance of my mother; the widow of Mr.
Worlidge, an artist of considerable celebrity. It was handsomely
furnished, and contained many valuable pictures by various
masters. I resided with my mother; Mr. Robinson continued at the
house of Mr. Vernon and Elderton in Southampton Buildings.”[380]
Mary, who was born at Bristol in 1758, had spent an unhappy
childhood, and had now, when only sixteen, contracted a loveless
marriage. At her husband’s request the nuptials were kept secret,
but after four months her mother insisted on their being made
public. After a visit to the west of England and stay of “many
days” at Bristol, she removed from Great Queen Street to No. 13,
Hatton Garden, a house which had been recently built.[381] Her
remarkable beauty caused her to receive many attentions, and she
was neglected by her husband. On his imprisonment for debt,
however, after less than two years’ married life, she shared his
confinement, and was for nearly ten months in the King’s Bench
Prison. She then secured an engagement at Drury Lane, where she
made her first appearance in December, 1776, as Juliet. Her stage
career lasted until May, 1780. When taking the part of “Perdita”
in a performance of the _Winter’s Tale_ in December, 1778, she
captivated the Prince of Wales (afterwards George IV.), and after
a correspondence in which the writers signed themselves “Florizel”
and “Perdita” she became his mistress for about two years. He then
deserted her, dishonouring his bond for £20,000, payable on his
coming of age. In 1783 she managed to obtain a pension of £500 a
year. She never returned to the stage, but devoted herself to
literature. In her own day she was called the English Sappho, but
her reputation in this respect has not endured. She died, crippled
and impoverished, at Englefield Cottage, Surrey, in 1800.
_Conway House._
[Illustration:
_Conway._
]
The first occupant of the fourth house on the site of the
Freemasons’ buildings seems to have been Lord Conway. A deed,
dated 20th December, 1641,[382] mentions Edward, Lord Viscount
Conway, as then in occupation, and no doubt the house is identical
with that referred to as Lord Conway’s residence in Queen Street
in a letter dated 31st March, 1639.[383]
Edward, second Viscount Conway and Killultagh, was born in 1594,
and succeeded to the title in February, 1631.[384] Shortly
afterwards he was living in Drury Lane.[385]
His residence in Great Queen Street dates from 1638 or the
commencement of 1639, but he did not purchase the house until 17th
July, 1645.[386]
Conway died at Lyons in 1655[387], and was succeeded by his son
Edward, the third Viscount and first Earl of Conway, born about
1623. He held several important military appointments, and was for
two years, 1681–3, secretary of state for the north department. He
was the author of a work entitled _Opuscula Philosophica_. He was
married three times, his first wife being Anne, the daughter of
Sir Henry Finch. Lady Conway was a most accomplished woman, her
chief study being metaphysical science, which she carried on with
the utmost assiduity in spite of tormenting headaches which never
left her. In later life she adopted the tenets of the Society of
Friends. She died on 23rd February, 1679, while her husband was
absent in Ireland, but in order that he might be enabled to see
her features again, Van Helmont, her physician, preserved the body
in spirits of wine and placed it in a coffin with a glass over the
face. The burial finally took place on 17th April, 1679. She was
the author of numerous works, but only one, a philosophical
treatise, was printed, and that in a Latin translation published
at Amsterdam in 1690. Conway was created an Earl in 1679 and died
in August, 1683, leaving his estates to his cousin, Popham
Seymour, who assumed the name of Conway.
Up to 1670 the Earl seems to have resided frequently in Great
Queen Street. The Hearth Tax Rolls for 1665 and 1666 show him as
occupier, though the former contains a note: “Note, Lord Wharton
to pay,”[388] and several references to his residence there occur
in the correspondence of the time. Thus on 18th March, 1664–5, he
writes to Sir Edward Harley, “Direct to me at my house in Queen
Street”;[389] in June [?], 1665, he informs Sir John Finch: “I am
settled in my house in Queen Street”;[390] a letter to him
describes how on the occasion of the Great Fire in 1666, “your
servant in Queen Street put some of your best chairs and fine
goods into your rich coach and sent for my horses to draw them to
Kensington, where they now are”;[391] on 19th October, 1667, his
mother writes to him at “Great Queen Street, London”;[392] in
February, 1667–8, he tells Sir J. Finch that he hopes “you will
ere long be merry in my house in Queen Street, which you are to
look upon as your own”;[393] and on 4th March, 1668–9, Robert
Bransby asks for payment of his bill of £200 “for goods delivered
at your house in Queen Street.”[394] On 25th September, 1669, we
learn that a new (or perhaps rather an additional) resident is
expected, Edward Wayte mentioning in a letter that “the room your
lordship wished to have new floored is going to be occupied by
Lord Orrery’s[395] daughter, who is coming with her mother to
England.”[396] The visit evidently took place, for on 4th
November, 1669, Conway’s importunate creditor, Bransby, writes, in
connection with the non-payment of his account, “I beg the
delivery of divers goods in the house in Queen Street, which are
being used by some of Lord Orrery’s family, and also of some green
serge chairs lent, which are in your study”;[397] and again on
15th March, 1669–70: “there are some goods belonging to me in the
house in Queen Street, which are in Lord Orrery’s wearing.”[398]
Later in the same year the house seems to have been given up, as
Bransby on 27th September in the course of another pitiful
complaint says: “I hear that you have disposed of your house in
Queen Street and sent the furniture to Ragley.”
The Hearth Tax Roll for 1673 shows the house in occupation of
“Slingsby, Esq.,” who was probably the immediate successor of
Conway.
In the absence of more definite information Slingsby cannot be
identified. It is just possible that he was Henry Slingsby, the
Master of the Mint, and friend of Evelyn.
In the Hearth Tax Roll for 1675 the house is shown as empty, and
in the ratebook for 1683 the name of the occupier is given as:
“Sir Fr. North, Knt., Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England.”
It is known (see below) that the offices of the Great Seal were
situated in this street in 1677, and there can be no doubt that
this was the house.
It would appear, therefore, that the premises were taken for the
purpose of the offices of the Great Seal some time in the period
1675–77, and consequently during the time that the seal was in the
custody of Finch.
Heneage Finch, first Earl of Nottingham, was born in 1621, the
eldest son of Sir Heneage Finch, recorder of London and speaker in
Charles I.’s first parliament. On leaving Christ Church he joined
the Inner Temple, where he acquired a great reputation and an
extensive practice. On the Restoration he became solicitor-general
and was created a baronet. As the official representative of the
court in the House of Commons, he seems to have given every
satisfaction to the king, despite the fact that on at least one
important point (the toleration of dissent) he opposed the royal
desire. He was indeed in such favour that the king, with all the
great officers of state, attended a banquet in his house at the
Inner Temple in 1661. In 1670, he became attorney-general and
counsellor to the queen. On the dismissal of Shaftesbury in 1673,
he was made Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, and was raised to the
peerage as Baron Finch of Daventry, and a year afterwards was
appointed Lord Chancellor. During his term of office the
well-known burglary took place at the house in Great Queen Street.
Under date of 7th February, 1676–7, Anthony Wood writes: “About
one or two in the morning the Lord Chancellor his mace was stolen
out of his house in Queen Street. The seal lay under his pillow,
so the thief missed it. The famous thief that did it was Thomas
Sadler, soon after taken and hanged for it at Tyburn.”[399]
[Illustration:
_Finch._
]
As Lord Chancellor, Finch had the unpleasant task of explaining to
the House of Commons how the royal pardon given to Danby in bar of
the impeachment bore the great seal. He was created Earl of
Nottingham in 1681 and died in December, 1682. “The fact that
throughout an unceasing official career of more than twenty years,
in a time of passion and intrigue, Finch was never once the
subject of parliamentary attack, nor ever lost the royal
confidence, is a remarkable testimony both to his probity and
discretion.”[400] He was the Amri of Dryden’s _Absalom and
Achitophel_.
[Illustration:
_North._
]
Francis North, first Baron Guilford, was the third son of Dudley,
fourth Baron North, and was born in 1637. He entered the Middle
Temple in 1655, and at once gave himself up to hard study. He was
called to the Bar in 1661, and seems very early to have acquired
practice. His first great case occurred in 1668, when he was
called upon, in the attorney-general’s absence, to argue in the
House of Lords for the King _v._ Holles and others. He at once
sprang into favour and became king’s counsel. In 1671 he was made
solicitor-general and received the honour of knighthood. In 1673,
he succeeded Finch as attorney-general, and in 1675 was appointed
chief justice of the common pleas. On the death of the Earl of
Nottingham in 1682 he succeeded him as Lord Keeper, and from that
day, his brother Roger says, “he never (as poor folks say), joyed
after it, and he hath often vowed to me that he had not known a
peaceful minute since he touched that cursed seal.”[401] In 1683
he was raised to the peerage as Baron Guilford. From this time his
health began more and more to fail, and though he continued
diligently to perform his duties, he was compelled in the summer
of 1685 to retire to his seat at Wroxton, Oxfordshire, taking the
seal with him and attended by the officers of the court. Here he
died on 5th September, 1685, and the next day his brothers,
accompanied by the officials, took the seal to Windsor, and
delivered it up to the king, who at once entrusted it to Jeffreys.
George Jeffreys, first Baron Jeffreys of Wem, was born in 1648 at
Acton in Denbighshire. He was ambitious to be a great lawyer, and
after overcoming with difficulty his father’s objections, he was
admitted to the Inner Temple in 1663. He was called to the Bar in
1668, and by his wit and convivial habits making friends of the
attorneys practising at the Old Bailey and Hicks’s Hall, he soon
gained a good practice. He was appointed common serjeant of the
City of London in 1671. He now began to plead in Westminster Hall,
and by somewhat doubtful means he obtained an introduction to the
court. In 1677 he was made solicitor-general to the Duke of York,
and was knighted, and in 1678 became Recorder of the City. Both as
counsel and recorder he took a prominent part in the prosecutions
arising from the Popish Plot, and as a reward for his services in
this direction, and for initiating the movement of the “abhorrers”
against the “petitioners,” who were voicing the popular demand for
the summoning of parliament, he was appointed chief justice of
Chester.
The City having complained to the House of Commons of the action
of its recorder in obstructing the citizens in their attempts to
have a parliament summoned, the House passed a resolution
requesting the king to remove him from all public offices. The
king took no such action, but Jeffreys submitted to a reprimand on
his knees at the bar of the House, and resigned the recordership,
eliciting the remark from Charles that he was “not parliament
proof.”
In 1683, Jeffreys was promoted to be Lord Chief Justice, and was
soon a member of the privy council. Shortly afterwards he tried
Algernon Sidney for high treason, conducting the proceedings with
manifest unfairness and convicting the prisoner on quite illegal
grounds. On the accession of James II. in 1685, he was raised to
the peerage, an honour never before conferred upon a chief justice
during his tenure of office.
In July, after the battle of Sedgmoor, he was appointed president
of the commission for the western circuit, and on 25th August he
opened the commission at Winchester. This, the “bloody assizes,”
was conducted with merciless severity, but the king was so
satisfied that, on Jeffreys calling at Windsor on his return to
London, he was given the custody of the great seal with the title
of Lord Chancellor. During the next three years he vigorously
supported the king in his claims to prerogative. He presided over
the ecclesiastical commission, and over the proceedings against
the Universities. Jeffreys thus became identified with the most
tyrannical measures of James II., and therefore, when the king in
December, 1688, fled from the country, he also endeavoured to
escape. He disguised himself as a common sailor, but was
recognised, and was only saved from lynching by a company of the
train-bands. He was confined at his own request in the Tower, and
here, his health having been seriously undermined by long
continued disease and dissipation, he died in April, 1689. His
name has become a by-word of infamy, although there can be little
doubt that he was not entirely as black as he has been painted,
and no impartial account can fail to insist on the traditional
picture of him being modified in many respects. Nevertheless, when
every allowance is made, the character of Jeffreys is one of the
most hateful in English history.
On his accepting the Great Seal he also took over the house in
Great Queen Street,[402] but about 1687 he removed to the new
mansion, which he had had built in Westminster overlooking the
park.[403]
For the next few years the history of Conway House is a blank. In
1696 a private Act[404] was obtained, which, after reciting that
there was a mansion house, with stables and outhouses, in Queen
Street, St. Giles, forming portion of the estate belonging to the
Marchioness of Normanby[405] (life tenant) and of the estate
belonging to Popham Seymour _alias_ Conway, and that the house was
liable to fall down from want of repair, gave authority to arrange
with a builder to effect the repairs and to let the house for 51
years at a proper rent.
The work was evidently carried out without delay, for the Jury
Presentment Roll for 1698 has the entry “Dr. Chamberlain for the
Land Credit Office,” but little luck seems to have attended the
house during most of its remaining half-century of existence.
The sewer ratebooks for 1700 and 1703 make no mention of the
house. Those for 1715, 1720 and 1723, and the parish ratebooks
from their commencement in 1730 until 1734 mention it as “The Land
Bank.” The first entry refers to it as “Empty many years,” and it
was still empty in 1720. Certain deeds of later date[406] allude
to the premises as a “large old house or building commonly called
or known by the name of the Land Bank.”[407]
The Land Bank, as known to history, was an institution founded in
1696, for the purpose of raising a public loan of two millions on
the basis of the estimated value of real property. Its promoter
was Dr. Chamberlain, an accoucheur.[408] It is unnecessary to give
here a full account of the scheme, but it may be regarded as
certain that it would never have been supported in Parliament but
for the satisfaction felt by many influential members in dealing a
blow at the recently formed Bank of England.
The evidence given above is decisive as to some connection between
the house and this scheme, but no reference to the former has been
found amongst the literature on the Land Bank.[409] The fact that
Dr. Chamberlain was in occupation of the premises in 1698, two
years after the ignominious collapse of the scheme, shows that the
Land Bank still pursued some kind of existence, and, indeed, there
is other evidence that it was surviving in some form in January,
1698.[410]
The above evidence shows that for many years after Dr.
Chamberlain’s tenancy the house lay empty, and not until 1735 is
the name of an occupier given. This was Thomas Galloway, who
stayed until 1739. After this, the house again remained empty,
until in 1743 it was pulled down, and its frontage to Great Queen
Street was occupied by four smaller houses. The residents in the
two westernmost of these (the other two occupied the site of
Markmasons’ Hall) were as follows:—
Eastern house. Western house.
1746–47. Chas. Green. 1746–49. Jas. Lacey.
1748–51. —— Dickenson. 1750–61. Mrs. Eliz. Morris.
1751. Jas. Ord. 1761–63. J. Fanshawe.
1753–57. Mrs. Barbra Johnson. 1763–83. Eliz. Pollard.
1758. W. Westbrook Richardson. 1783–91. John Opie.
1759–75. John Johnson. 1791. — Leverton.
1776–83. J. Twiney. 1792– Mallard and Richold.
1783– Thos. Pope.