CHAPTER V
The Social Character of the Estate
At Michaelmas 1726 Sir Thomas Hanmer, baronet,
Member of Parliament for the County of Suffolk and
ex-Speaker of the House of Commons, vacated his town
residence at No. 12 Old Burlington Street, and his household moved into a new house at No. 52 Grosvenor Street
for which the price was £4,250 (Plate 8c; fig. 16 on
page 136). Sir Thomas himself was then still at his country
seat at Mildenhall in Suffolk and his housekeeper supervised the move in good time for the master's return to
town in November for the new London Season. Sir
Thomas had only lived in Old Burlington Street, where
he was also one of the first occupants, since about 1723,
but his new house in Grosvenor Street was much larger
and no doubt better fitted to accommodate his retinue of
some fourteen servants. (ref. 1) In being so soon prepared to
move to another newly developing district further to the
west, where he would inevitably be once more surrounded
by the noise and clutter of building operations, he was
following the lead of his compeers, for several of his new
neighbours belonged to the titled ranks of society. The
Earl of Arran lived on one side of him and on the other
was Sir John Werden, baronet, father-in-law of the
second Duke of St. Albans who was also living here at
about this time, while two doors away at No. 50 the first
Earl of Uxbridge was a new arrival. (ref. 2)
An indication of the attraction of the new suburb
around Grosvenor Square for the social élite can be
gathered from the standing of the first occupants, i.e.
householders, of the houses in the principal streets, viz.
Brook Street and Upper Brook Street, Grosvenor Street
and Upper Grosvenor Street, and the square itself. A full
list of these occupants is given in the tables on pages
172–95, but it should be noted that they were not all resident at the same time, as the houses were erected over
several years. Of the 277 houses built in these streets,
41 were first inhabited by peers and seven more by persons
who were created peers or succeeded to peerages while
living on the estate, making 48 (17.3 per cent) in all.
A further 69 houses were first occupied by other persons
of title, i.e. the wives, widows, sons or daughters of peers;
baronets and knights (or their widows); and foreign
nobility. Thus, in all, the initial householders of 117 of
the 277 houses (42.2 per cent) belonged to the titled classes
of society. The proportion was naturally highest in
Grosvenor Square itself, where of the 51 houses 16 were
taken by peers (31.4 per cent) and 19 more by other
persons of title, making 35 (or 68.6 per cent) in all. In
these principal streets 54 of the first occupants (19.5 per
cent) sat in the House of Commons at some time during
their residence on the estate, 19 of them living in
Grosvenor Square. Several of these M.P.'s also come into
the category of persons of title and a few were Irish peers,
who did not sit in the House of Lords and were thus
eligible for election to the lower House.
The gathering momentum of the migration of fashionable society to the new estate can be seen from the number
of members of both Houses of Parliament who had their
town addresses there. In 1733 30 members of the Commons (5.4 per cent of the whole House) and 16 peers who
could attend the Lords (8.3 per cent of the upper House)
lived on the estate. By 1741 the numbers had increased
to 45 (8 per cent) and 31 (16.3 per cent) respectively, and
by 1751 to 49 (8.8 per cent) and 39 (23.3 per cent). (ref. 3)
On the whole the aristocracy and the gentry lived in
the broad belt across the centre of the estate formed by the
principal streets referred to above, but a few lived elsewhere, notably at the south ends of Park Street and South
Audley Street, and later in Norfolk (now Dunraven)
Street and Hereford Street, and, much later, in Park
Lane. It was generally in these streets that the large
households were concentrated, such as that of Sir Thomas
Hanmer, already mentioned, or of Baron Conway (later
Marquess of Hertford), who in 1746 had twenty-two
servants at No. 16 Grosvenor Street. His steward kept
a 'Grosvenor Street House Account' which shows
that his annual expenses there amounted to little short
of £3,000, of which £345 or only about 12 per cent
was accounted for by his servants' wages, most of the
remainder being spent on the payment of tradesmen's
bills. (ref. 4)
The house account also itemised some of the travelling
costs, including the carriage of trunks to London from
other places, chiefly the Conways' seat at Ragley Hall in
Warwickshire, and in these streets the comings and goings
of the London Season must have been particularly marked.
The influx of carriages into town at the beginning of the
parliamentary session (in the eighteenth century usually
in November, December or January) was quite noticeable.
The World in January 1790 reported that 'London is now
almost at the fullest:— every avenue yesterday was
crowded with carriages coming into town.' (ref. 5) In the first
half of the eighteenth century the parliamentary sessions
generally lasted into the early summer, but in the latter
half they usually extended into June, July or occasionally
even August. Whenever it occurred, the commencement
of the summer recess was soon followed by the departure
of many of those residents who also had country houses.
In September 1734 Mrs. Delany, who was then living at
No. 48 Upper Brook Street, remarked with characteristic
independence to Dean Swift, 'The town is now empty,
and by most people called dull; to me it is just agreeable,
for I have most of my particular friends in town.' (ref. 6) It was
during these uncomfortable, dusty months that the
builders and upholsterers were called into the grand houses
to prepare them for the next social round.
Even within those streets where the momentum of life
must often have been regulated by the social calendar
there were, however, a number of incursions from the
world of trade. Victuallers established themselves,
generally on corner sites, at the Mount Coffee House,
the Three Tuns and the Red Lion in Grosvenor Street;
the Barley Mow, the Cock and Bottle and John Dickins's
coffee house in Upper Brook Street; and the Oval and
the Wheatsheaf in Upper Grosvenor Street. Other first
occupants known to have been tradesmen included an
apothecary and a shoemaker on the north side of Brook
Street, a grocer at the corner of Brook Street and Davies
Street, and a cheesemonger and a tailor in Upper
Brook Street; while William Campbell, upholsterer, had
established himself in Grosvenor Street by 1727. (ref. 7) In a
somewhat different category were the building tradesmen
who occupied the houses they built in the main streets,
sometimes for lengthy periods.
If trade made inroads into the principal streets, however, it dominated the lesser ones. The Westminster poll
books of 1749 (ref. 8) give a useful though imperfect guide to the
occupations of many of the inhabitants of the estate at
a time when such evidence is generally unavailable. In
Westminster there was a particularly wide franchise, for
the right to vote was vested in male householders paying
'scot and lot', i.e. the parish rates; of course the large class
of women householders and the much smaller one of
peers were excluded, and not all of those eligible to vote
actually did so. The Westminster by-election of 1749–50
was, however, 'one of the most fiercely contested elections
in the first half of the eighteenth century' and there was
a very high poll. Charges of malpractice were brought,
and the high bailiff was accused of 'allowing many votes
by people who did not pay scot and lot and refusing those
of others who did, and of having declined to produce the
parish books showing who the legal voters were.' (ref. 9) Whatever the substance of these allegations the record has to
be treated with caution. It consists of a meticulously
written account of the names and occupations of the voters
and the streets in which they lived. Some of the names in
the poll books do not appear in the ratebooks but a close
comparison is not always possible because of the loss of
some ratebooks for the period of the poll. Nevertheless
by correlating the two sources for certain streets and using
only those names which can with reasonable certainty be
confirmed as the occupants of the houses, a generalized
picture can be built up.
In Mount Street, for instance, there were 116 houses
entered in the ratebooks; 91 householders were seemingly
qualified to vote and 66 of them did so. Of these 66 only
nine described themselves as gentlemen or esquires, and
one other (a schoolmaster) can be considered to belong
to the professional classes. Excluding two coachmen and
a turncock, 53 of the remainder (or 80 per cent of those
who voted) were tradesmen. Thus almost one half of
the ratepaying inhabitants of Mount Street were certainly
tradesmen and the actual proportion was undoubtedly
higher. Not only would many of the non-voting male
householders have been engaged in trade, but so also
would some of the female ratepayers, including the landlady of the Wheatsheaf tavern, and, quite possibly, a
number of milliners; while at the poll the landlord of the
Swan described himself as a gentleman. Of the 53 tradesmen who voted, 20 (37.7 per cent) belonged to the
building and decorating trades; 14 (26.4 per cent) were
purveyors of food and drink, including three victuallers
and three chandlers; and 13 (24.5 per cent) were concerned with clothing or other wearing apparel. (fn. a)
North Audley Street is a much shorter street with
direct access from Grosvenor Square, but there the predominance of the trading element was just as pronounced.
Of 36 householders paying rates 27 were eligible to vote
and 25 did so. Of these 25 only five were gentlemen,
esquires, or, in the case of Sir John Ligonier, a knight;
one other was a schoolmaster but the remaining 19 (76 per
cent of those who voted) were tradesmen. Five of them
were builders or decorators, including a cabinet-maker;
eight supplied food and drink, including three victuallers;
and six worked in the world of clothing and fashion,
including a staymaker and two peruke-makers.
In Davies Street, where most of the houses had been
standing for twenty years or more, the pattern only varied
slightly. Of 55 householders, 51 were entitled to vote and
44 of them did so. Three were gentlemen or esquires,
and there were also a surgeon, a cook and a beadle, but
38, well over half of all the ratepayers in the street, were
tradesmen. Of these 38, some five (13.2 per cent) were
connected with building or decorating; 21 (55.3 per cent)
were in the food and drink trades, including the resident
victuallers of six taverns in the street and three chandlers;
and six (15.8 per cent) supplied clothes, materials or wigs.
South Audley Street had its fashionable element, particularly at the south end, but over the whole street the
tradesmen were still apparently dominant. Of 66 householders, 49 were eligible to vote and 38 exercised their
franchise; 13 of these 38 were gentlemen or esquires and
there was also one chairman, but the remaining 24 (63.2
per cent of the voters) were all tradesmen. Five of the 24
(20.8 per cent) pursued building or allied occupations;
14 (58.3 per cent) worked in the food and drink trades;
only one, a peruke-maker, was concerned with clothing
and fashion, but it is possible that some of the many single
female householders were milliners. One at least was in
trade, for Elizabeth Jones was the licensed victualler of
the Albemarle Arms.
Some of the less salubrious areas of the estate lay
immediately to the south of Oxford Street where land
had been parcelled out in large blocks at low rents with
few restrictive covenants in the original building leases.
Two of these enclaves where building had progressed
sufficiently by the mid eighteenth century for a coherent
pattern of occupation to be established were the hinterlands behind the north side of Grosvenor Square between
North Audley Street and Duke Street, and behind the
north side of Brook Street between Duke Street and
Davies Street. Here developers had laid out several
narrow streets, viz. George (now Balderton), Queen (now
Lumley), Brown and Hart Streets (now combined into
Brown Hart Gardens) north of Grosvenor Square; and
Bird (now Binney), James (now Gilbert) and Chandler
(now Weighhouse) Streets north of Brook Street. The
ratebooks show that by 1749 some 150 houses had been
built in these streets and along the south side of Oxford
Street. Several of them were let to tenants who did not
pay rates and were thus ineligible to vote; against one
such entry in the ratebooks where the ratepayer's name
was left blank the collector had noted 'takes in vagabonds
for Lodgers'. Nevertheless 92 ratepaying occupants of
these streets did vote in the election of that year. Eleven
were gentlemen, some of these being landlords like John
Taylor who lived in one house in James Street himself
and let half a dozen others to tenants; six fall into the
general category of servants, including two coachmen and
two chairmen; and 71 (77.2 per cent of the voters) were
tradesmen. The remainder included a schoolmaster,
a surgeon, a yeoman and a gardener. Of the tradesmen
26 (36.6 per cent) worked in the building trades, 22 (31 per
cent) supplied food and drink including no fewer than
eight victuallers, and 11 (15.5 per cent) were concerned
with dress.
The impression created by the occupations of the voters
in these streets could also be found in other parts of the
estate. There were, however, some differences in the
distribution of trades. Building workers were under-standably most numerous in those parts of the estate
where development was still in progress, in the streets
to the north of Brook Street and Grosvenor Square, in
the south-west corner around South Street and Chapel
(now Aldford) Street, in Park Street and Green Street,
and, more surprisingly, in Mount Street. Those involved
in some capacity with horses or carriages, the wheel-wrights, farriers, stable-keepers and coachmen, tended
to live in the mews where there was clearly a good deal of
residential accommodation. But, at this period, by no
means all mews dwellers belonged to these or allied trades;
in Grosvenor Mews, for instance, there were also victuallers, chandlers, builders, servants and a chimney-sweep
among others. There was, however, no obvious concentration of food retailers and the numerous victuallers who
presided over some 75 taverns or licensed coffee houses (ref. 10)
were scattered throughout the estate. The chandler, that
eighteenth-century Jack-of-all-trades, could also be found
almost everywhere outside the five main streets.
The poll provides less evidence about the inhabitants
of the principal streets, both because the presence of
numerous peers and female householders (the latter
accounting for over a third of the ratepaying occupants
of Upper Brook Street alone) meant that fewer of them
were eligible to vote, and because, of those who could
have voted, a lower proportion exercised their right. Westminster tradesmen appear to have been more assiduous
in using their political rights than the titled classes or
country gentlemen. Many of these may indeed have been
out of town, although the poll was taken during a parliamentary session. For comparative purposes the examples
of Brook Street (that part on the Grosvenor estate only)
and Upper Brook Street may be cited. There were then
94 houses already erected in the two streets and the
householders of 54 of them were eligible to vote, but
only 33 did so. Of these 33, gentlemen, esquires, 'honourables', knights, baronets, a general, a physician and a
clerk account for 20, and the remaining 13 (39.4 per cent
of the voters) were tradesmen, a surprisingly high number
(considering that there may have been others who did not
vote) for these august thoroughfares. They included two
victuallers and a 'coffee man', all in Upper Brook Street
at corner sites, two apothecaries, a linen-draper, a tailor,
a wine merchant, a cheesemonger, a saddler, a smith, a
glassman, and the master carpenter John Phillips at
No. 39 Brook Street.
Thus by the mid eighteenth century, when the estate
was still by no means completely built over, a coherent
picture of its social composition had begun to emerge.
It was that of a fashionable core of streets and a grand
square occupied by the beau monde, encroached upon to
a limited degree by residents engaged in trade, who in turn
were to be found in overwhelming preponderance in the
surrounding streets. Just as some tradesmen lived in
the preserves of the socially distinguished, so also there
were small coteries of the fashionable gathered in the
outlying streets, and except in Grosvenor Square there
was no strict segregation. The houses of the upper classes
dominated physically by their size and by their large plots
with long gardens extending to mews stabling at the rear,
but they account for only about a quarter of the building
fabric of the estate. The tradesmen, who formed such a
substantial element of the population, evidently varied
greatly in wealth and status, there being no doubt a considerable difference between, for instance, John Edmonson, saddler, of Upper Brook Street, who was listed in
Mortimer's Universal Director of 1763, and the chandlers
of Grosvenor Mews; and the gulf between the tradesmen
of North Audley Street and the nearby inhabitants of
Brown's Court or Parr's Buildings off North Row must
have been almost as great as that between a well-established tradesman and his fashionable clientèle. Many of
these tradesmen would have relied greatly on the patronage
of the rich and titled inhabitants, as Lord Conway's
household accounts testify; and in the case of the perukemakers, of whom there were at least sixteen on the estate
in 1749 (four of them in Mount Street), their dependence
must have been almost complete.
Over fifty years ago Mrs. Dorothy George commented
that 'Eighteenth-century London inevitably suggests the
brilliant society which made up the world of politics and
fashion. This small world of statesmen and politicians
and placemen, of wits and rakes and fops, was so self-sufficient, so conscious that it was the only world that
counted, that it imposes its point of view on us… We
know little of the artisans and labourers, the shopkeepers
and clerks and street-sellers, who made up the mass of
the population.' (ref. 11) The nature of the evidence is such that
it could hardly be otherwise, but at least sufficient can
be gleaned from very fragmentary information to suggest
that the impression generally prevalent that this part of
Mayfair was the almost exclusive province of the well-to-do and the well-connected is in some respects highly
misleading. Fortunately the somewhat crude outline of
the social composition of the area that can be drawn from
such evidence as that provided by the poll books of 1749
can be filled in by more detailed and reliable evidence in
later years.