Chelsea

The Chapel has always been famous for its music and singing. It was among the first of the London churches to have a choral service. The students now number 120, and a large majority of these take Holy Orders. The grounds are kept in beautiful order, and the great elms which overshadow the green lawns must be contemporary with the house.

The King’s Road was so named in honour of Charles II., and it was notorious in its early days for footpads and robbers. In the eighteenth century the Earl of Peterborough was stopped in it by highwaymen, one of whom was discovered to be a student of the Temple, who lived “by play, sharping, and a little on the highway.” There was an attempt made at first to keep the road for the use of the Royal Family, and later on, those who had the privilege of using it had metal tickets given to them, and it was not opened for public traffic until 1830.

At no part of its length can King’s Road claim to show any fine vista, and at the west end the buildings are particularly poor and squalid. In Park Walk stands Park Chapel, an old-fashioned church with a gallery in no particular style of architecture. It was founded in 1718, and in it General Gordon received the Holy Communion before he left for Khartoum. Park Walk is marked on Hamilton’s Survey as Lovers’ Walk, and forms the western boundary of the ancient Lord Wharton’s Park, which extended from the King’s Road to Fulham Road and contained forty acres. Faulkner says that it was part of the estate purchased by Sir Thomas More. There was an attempt made in 1721 to encourage the manufacture of raw silk; for this purpose the park was planted with mulberry-trees. The scheme, however, failed. The park is now thickly covered with houses; its eastern side was bounded by the “Road to the Cross Tree” – in other words, to what was called the Queen’s Elm. This name still survives in a public-house at the north corner of what is now Church Street. It was derived from a tradition that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth stood here to shelter from a shower under a great elm-tree, accompanied by her courtier Lord Burleigh. The tree is mentioned in the parish books in 1586. At the top of Church Street, near the Fulham Road, there is a high stone wall enclosing the Jews’ Burial-ground. The graves lie in long rows, but are not divided according to sex as with the Moravians. Overlooking the burial-ground is the Hospital for Women founded in 1871. It is a red-brick building with ornate stone facing. Beyond it is the Consumption Hospital, which is only an off-shoot of the main building over the road in the borough of Kensington. Arthur Street (formerly Charles Street), a few yards further on, leads us into the South Parade, which forms the northern side of Trafalgar Square. The square is wide, with a garden in the centre. At the south-western corner it is adjacent to Carlyle Square, which faces the King’s Road.

This is a most picturesque little square with a country-like profusion of trees in its green garden. On the eastern side the road through Trafalgar Square runs on under the name of Manresa Road. This is lined with studios, and abounds in artists and sculptors.

In Manresa Road are the Chelsea Public Library and the Polytechnic for South-west London north of the river. The latter cannot be claimed exclusively by Chelsea, and therefore is not described in detail. The library was opened temporarily in 1887, and by 1891 the new building was ready. The librarian is Mr. J. H. Quinn, who has been there since the inauguration. The rooms have, since the opening, been greatly improved, and the library is now exceptionally interesting. On the ground-floor is a gallery open from 3 to 9 p.m. every week-day, except Wednesday, when the time of opening is two hours later. Here there is a collection of water-colour paintings and old prints illustrative of old Chelsea, and anyone who has taken any interest in the magnificent old mansions that made Chelsea a village of palaces will be well advised to go to see what these buildings were actually like. In the gallery also are cases containing the Keats collection, deposited by Sir Charles Dilke during his lifetime, but at his death to go to Hampstead, on account of the poet’s connection with that place. Here are to be seen the editions of Shakespeare and Bacon annotated by Keats’ own hands, and his love-letters; also a letter from his publishers, abusing him furiously, which shows how much the contemporary judgment of the poems differed from that of posterity.

The reference-room in the library upstairs is exceptionally fine, and especial care has been taken to make the local topographical department as rich as possible. Among the volumes of the greatest value are Bowack’s “Middlesex,” which formerly belonged to Lord Brabourne; Faulkner’s two-volume edition of “Chelsea,” which has been “grangerized,” and is illustrated by innumerable portraits, letters, views, etc., and in the process has been expanded into four large quarto volumes. There is also the original manuscript of Faulkner’s account of the Royal Military Asylum and the Royal College and Hospital, with all the author’s corrections.

Manresa Road runs into the King’s Road, and after the next turning eastward there is an old burial-ground, given to the parish by Sir Hans Sloane, and consecrated 1736. Cipriani, the engraver, a foundation member of the Royal Academy, is buried here, and there is a monument erected to his memory by his friend and contemporary, Bartolozzi. When the Sydney Street burial-ground was opened in 1810, this was used for interment no more. Chelsea Workhouse stands just behind it, and the old women use the burial-ground for exercise. It is a quaint sight to see them through the tall iron railings wandering about dressed in their bright red-and-black check shawls, blue cotton dresses, and white frilled caps. The workhouse was begun in 1787, but has been largely added to since then. The Guardians’ offices adjoin the burial-ground, and on the opposite side of the street, a little further eastward, is the Town Hall, with a row of urns surmounting its parapet. The borough Councillors have their offices here.

Further on is Sydney Street, formerly Robert Street, running out of the King’s Road on the north side. Here stands St. Luke’s Church. The foundation-stone of this building was laid in 1820, and it was consecrated in 1824. For many years previously a discussion concerning the desirability of further church accommodation had been going on. The church was built on the old burial-ground, and the tombstones which were removed in the course of erection are placed in long rows round a low wall. The building is of Bath stone, and has flying buttresses and a high square tower. In the interior it presents the greatest possible contrast to the old church. Here there is great height, the arches are pointed, the stonework light. The spire is 142 feet high, and the interior 130 feet long by 60 broad. From the interior vault of the roof to the pavement the height is 60 feet. Over the Communion-table is “The Entombment of Christ,” an oil-painting by J. Northcote, R.A. To the north of the church lies Pond Place, a remembrance of the time when a “pond and pits” stood on Chelsea Common hereabouts.

Not far from the top of Sydney Street, in the Fulham Road, is the Cancer Hospital, founded by William Marsden, M.D., in 1851. It was only on a small scale at first, but public donations and subscriptions now enable 100 patients to receive all the care and treatment necessary to alleviate their terrible infliction, and more than 1,500 are treated as out-patients. The chief fact about the hospital is that it is absolutely free. The disease itself is the passport of admittance. In this respect there is only one other hospital in London like it, and that is the Royal Free Hospital in Gray’s Inn Road, which was founded by the same benefactor. The small chapel attached, in which there is daily service, was built about ten years ago, and consecrated by the Bishop of London. There is almost an acre of garden. Following the Fulham Road eastwards, we come to Marlborough Road. There is a tradition that the Duke of Marlborough at one time occupied a house here, but there seems to be no truth in it whatever.

Cale Street was named after one Judith Cale, who was a benefactor to the parish. South of it we have Jubilee Place, recalling the jubilee of George III., and Markham Street and Markham Square. At the corner of the former is an old house still called the Box Farm, and bearing the date 1686. In Markham Square is a large Congregational chapel, opened in 1860.

Cadogan Street contains St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church, almshouses, school and cemetery. The actual fabric of this church was founded in 1879, but the mission of which it is the development began in 1812, and was at first established on the opposite side of the road. The building is of stone, and is in the Early English style, from designs by J. Bentley. Two oil-paintings on the pillars at the entrance to the chancel are by Westlake. There is also a large oil-painting over the altar. A statue to the memory of the founder of the mission, the Abbé Voyaux de Franous, stands in the northern aisle, and a small chapel on the southern side has a magnificent carved stone altarpiece by the younger Pugin, supposed to have been executed from a design by his father.

Halsey Street and Moore Street lead northward into Milner Terrace, in which stands the modern church of St. Simon Zelotes. We now get back into the aristocratic part of Chelsea in Lennox Gardens, which open out of Milner Terrace.

At the west end of Pont Street stands the Church of St. Columba, opened 1884. Here the services are conducted according to the use of the Established Church of Scotland in London. The building, which is of red brick with stone dressings, is in the style of the thirteenth century. It was opened in 1884, and seats about 800 people. The pillars in the interior are of granite, and the pulpit of carved Aubigné stone. There are several stained-glass windows. The architect was Mr. Granderson.

Pont Street is built entirely of red brick, the houses being in a modernized seventeenth century style. From Pont Street opens out Cadogan Square. This square is very modern, and stands on part of the site of Princes’ Cricket-ground.

Hans Place deserves more special mention. “L. E. L.” (Letitia Elizabeth Landon), the poetess who was “dying for a little love,” spent the greater part of her life here. She was born at No. 25, and educated at No. 22, both of which have now disappeared. Shelley stayed here for a short time, and Miss Mitford was educated at a school (No. 2) which turned out several literary pupils. Hans Place was laid out in 1777 by a Mr. Holland, who built a great house called the Pavilion, as a model for the Prince of Wales’s Pavilion at Brighton; it was pulled down in 1879. The grounds comprised twenty-one acres of land, and contained a large piece of ornamental water. To the west of Hans Place, in Walton Street, is St. Saviour’s Church, founded in 1839. A handsome chancel was added in 1890, and opened by the Bishop of London. At the same time a new organ was added. The chief feature of interest is a fine oak screen, on which the carving represents the nine orders of angels.

On the east is Pavilion Road: the derivation of the name is obvious. It runs parallel to the whole length of Sloane Street. Sloane Street itself is exactly a mile long from the square to Knightsbridge. The Church of Holy Trinity, just above the square, is in an unusual style of architecture; its two tall towers of red brick faced with stone add an imposing detail to the architecture of the street. The first church was consecrated in 1830, but pulled down in 1889 and replaced by the present one, due to the generosity of Earl Cadogan. The architect was F. R. Sedding, F.R.I.B.A. Within, the building is very light and high, and all the fittings are exquisitely finished. The pulpit is of marble with inlaid panels. The east window is very fine, and the stained glass was designed by Burne-Jones, R.A., and supplied by Morris. The wrought-iron gates and brass panels on the chancel stalls are worth notice, also the graceful figure supporting the lectern, which is the work of H. H. Armstead, R.A. The handsome organ screen of iron, gilded over, and oxidized copper is a memorial gift, and the frontal picture on the chapel altar is by Reynolds Stephens.

East of Sloane Street is the aristocratic Lowndes Square, of which the name is evidently derived from a former owner, for on a map of Chelsea, 1741-45, this spot is marked “Lowndes, Esq.” Cadogan Place lies a little further south, and is open to Sloane Street on one side. Chelsea House, Earl Cadogan’s town residence, is in the north-east corner, and is marked by its stone facing in contrast with its brick neighbours. Below Cadogan Place is a network of little, unimportant streets. Byron stayed in Sloane Terrace with his mother in 1799, when he came to London for medical advice about his foot. The Court theatre in the square has been erected within the last thirty years. Sloane Gardens runs parallel to Lower Sloane Street, and behind is Holbein Place, from which we started on our perambulations. We have now made a complete circuit through Chelsea, looking into every street and commenting on every building or site of importance in the parish.

PART III

THE ROYAL HOSPITAL AND RANELAGH GARDENS

Chelsea College originally stood on the site of the present Royal Hospital, and was founded by Matthew Sutcliffe, Dean of Exeter in 1610, as a school for polemical discussion. It was nicknamed by Laud “Controversy College.” King James I. called it after himself, and gave all the timber required for building purposes from Windsor Forest free of charge, and, according to the manner of Princes in those days, issued royal letters inciting his subjects to contribute to his own scheme. Sutcliffe spent £3,000 on the portion of the building which was completed. The original intention was to have two large quadrangles ornamented by towers and cloisters, but only one eighth of this was ever completed – one side only of the first quadrangle, “which,” remarks Fuller, “made not of free stone, though of free timber, cost – oh the dearness of church and college work! – full three thousand pounds!”

An Act of Parliament, secured by the King as an endowment for the college, empowered the authorities to raise water from the Hackney Marshes to supply the City of London; but this was rendered useless by the success of Sir Hugh Middleton’s scheme for supplying London with water in the same year. The constitution of the college included a Provost and twenty Fellows, of whom eighteen were to be in Holy Orders. Dean Sutcliffe himself was the first Provost. In 1616 the building stopped altogether for want of funds.

The King issued a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury exhorting him to stir up the clergy to incite the people to contribute. This had little effect. Probably collections then going on for repairs at St. Paul’s militated against it. Sutcliffe died in 1628, leaving to the College four farms in Devonshire, the benefit of an extent on Sir Lewis Stukeley’s estate, valued at between three and four thousand pounds, a share in the Great Neptune (a ship at Whitby), a tenement at Stoke Rivers, his books and goods in the College, and part of his library at Exeter, all subject to the proviso “that the work of the college be not hindered.”

In 1669 the King presented the buildings to the newly-incorporated Royal Society, but they were in such a ruinous condition that the society could make no use of them, and after thirteen years resold the site to Sir Stephen Fox, for the use of the King. The buildings were then destroyed to make way for the present Royal Hospital.

THE ROYAL HOSPITAL

The solid and yet harmonious building designed by Sir Christopher Wren is the nucleus of Chelsea. Indeed, the inhabitants locally call the hospital itself “Chelsea.” In all prints later than the end of the seventeenth century the central cupola rising above the two great wings forms a conspicuous landmark. In the days of William and Mary the gardens sloping down to the Thames were laid out in the stiff, formal Dutch style. Canals, in the shape of a capital L, with the foot reaching to the river, intersected prim gardens, and rows of little limes, pollarded like willows, edged the banks. It was only in 1852 that these canals were finally filled in, and the limes transplanted in the avenue bordering Ranelagh Gardens, where they still flourish. The Court favourite of Charles II., Nell Gwynne, whose name is strongly associated with Chelsea, is said to have suggested the idea of this home for aged and infirm soldiers. Evelyn evidently considers the merit to belong to Sir Stephen Fox, who certainly was a great benefactor. It has been suggested that the latter persuaded the favourite to use her influence with the King, which seems probable. The idea, at all events, commended itself to Charles, who accordingly set about getting his subjects’ money to carry it out. He gave £6,787 odd from unsupplied secret service money. To this, Tobias Rustat, an under-keeper of the Royal Palace of Hampton Court, and yeoman of the robes to Charles II., described by Evelyn as “page of the back stairs, a very simple, ignorant, but honest and loyal creature,” contributed £1,000. However simple this man was, his simplicity manifested itself in a commendable direction. He is said to have given away his whole fortune in charity. It is to him we owe the statue of Charles II. in Roman dress which stands in the centre of the Hospital court. This statue is made of bronze, and there is a companion one of James II., a gift from the same benefactor, in Whitehall. Walpole attributes one of these to Grinling Gibbons, but which one is uncertain.

Sir Stephen Fox had been faithful to King Charles II. during his exile, and at the Restoration he received the reward of his services. He sat in the House of Commons from then until his death, twice representing Westminster. He was made Paymaster-General of the Forces and one of the Lords of the Treasury. He seems to have been an active-minded man, with considerable business propensity. He devised a scheme for paying the troops out of his private purse, and levying a certain percentage on them for the convenience. As the pay of the army was much in arrears, and at all times irregular, this arrangement was thankfully accepted. The King saw in it the germ of an idea by which he might raise money for the Hospital. Accordingly, in 1683 he directed by letters of Privy Seal that one third of the money raised by imposing a poundage on the troops should go to the Hospital. He also added a clause to the effect that this was to be retrospective, to take effect from 1681. Hence the first haul amounted to over £20,000. Emboldened by success, Charles in the following year added to his demands one day’s pay from every man in the army.

But the building of the Hospital was more expensive than he had anticipated. It cost altogether £150,000, and when finished it would need an endowment. Charles had, therefore, recourse to the Stuart device of stirring up the people to give, by means of letters to the clergy, but without result, and in 1686 he directed that two-thirds of the army poundage should go to the continuance of the building, and finally that the whole should be devoted to this purpose after deductions for necessary expenses.

James II. carried on the design of his predecessor during his short reign, but the building was not completed until 1694, under William and Mary. Sir Stephen Fox became chairman of the first Board of Commissioners, an office which has been ever since attached to the Paymaster-Generalship.

Some legacies have been bequeathed to the Hospital since the foundation, and various sums of unclaimed prize-money were also applied to this object, amounting in the aggregate to nearly £600,000. The income at present drawn from the above sources is a mere trifle in comparison with the expenditure, only amounting to little over £3,000 yearly.

The building – which is wonderfully well adapted for its object, being, in fact, a barracks, and yet a permanent home – was, when completed, just as it is at present, without the range of outbuildings in which are the Secretary’s offices, etc., and one or two outbuildings which were added in the beginning of the present century. The out-pensioners were not included in the original scheme, but when the building was ready for occupation, it was round that nearly one hundred applicants must be disappointed owing to want of room. These men received, accordingly, a small pension while waiting for vacancies. From this small beginning has sprung an immense army of out-pensioners in all parts of the world, including natives who have served with the British flag, and the roll contains 84,500 names. The allowances vary from 5s. to 1½d. a day, the latter being paid to natives. The usual rate is about 1s. for a private, and 2s. 6d. for a sergeant. The in-pensioners, of whom 540 are at Chelsea and 150 at the sister hospital of Kilmainham in Ireland, receive sums varying from one shilling to a penny a day for tobacco money, and are “victualled, lodged, and clothed” in addition. They have rations of cocoa and bread-and-butter for breakfast; tea and bread-and-butter in the evening; mutton for dinner five days in the week, beef one day, and beef or bacon the remaining one. The allowance of meat is thirteen ounces, and the bread one pound, per diem. Besides this they have potatoes and pudding. They are clothed in dark blue in the winter, the coats being replaced by scarlet ones in the summer. Peaked caps are worn usually, and cocked hats with full dress. H. Herkomer’s picture “The Last Muster” is too well known to need more than a passing comment. The scene it represents is enacted every Sunday in the Hospital at Chelsea. Twenty thousand men have ended their days peacefully in the semi-military life which in their long service has become second nature to them, and 500,000 have passed through the list of out-pensioners.

The establishment is now kept up by annual Parliamentary grants, of which the first vote, for £550, was passed in 1703. Up to 1873 sums varying from £50,000 to £100,000 were voted annually, but these were embodied with the army votes. Since that year the Hospital grants have been recorded separately. They amount to three and three-quarter millions, but part of this is repaid by the Indian Government in consideration of the men who have served in the Indian Army. In 1833 the levies from the poundage of the army ceased.

The annual expenditure of the Hospital now equals £1,800,000, and 98 per cent. of this goes to the out-pensioners. In 1894 the question was raised as to whether the money now supplied to the in-pensioners could not be better used in increasing the amount of the out-pensions. A committee was appointed to “inquire into the origin and circumstances attending the formation of Chelsea and Kilmainham, and whether their revenues could not be more advantageously used for the benefit of the army.” Numbers of the old soldiers themselves, as well as the Governor and all the Hospital officials, were examined. One or two of the old men seemed to imagine that they would prefer a few pence a day to spend as they pleased instead of shelter and food, but the majority were decisive in their opinion that on no attainable pension could they be so comfortable as they were at present. Consequently the committee embodied their resolution in the following words: “That no amount of increased pension that it would be practicable to give would enable the men to be cared for outside the Hospital as they are cared for at present.”

The life led by the old men is peculiar, partaking as it does somewhat of a military character. The side-wings of the Hospital, built of red brick faced with stone, and darkened by age, are 360 feet in length and four stories in height. Each story contains one ward, which runs the whole length of the wing. The wide, shallow old staircase, the high doors, the wainscot, are all of oak coloured by age. The younger men and the least infirm occupy the highest wards, which look out upon the quadrangles by means of windows on the roof. Each ward contains about five-and-twenty men, including two sergeants, who have rather larger apartments than the rest, one at each end. An open space, like the between-decks of a ship, occupies half the longitudinal space, and the other half is partitioned off into separate cubicles containing a bed and a box, and these are open at the top and into the room. There is a large stove and one or two high-backed settles in each ward. Here the old fellows sit and smoke and warm up any food they have reserved from the last meal. One or two have attempted to furnish their cubicles with pictures cut from the illustrated papers, but they do not seem to care much, as a rule, for anything but warmth and a pipe.