The Bedford Estate from 1541
to 1627
Covent Garden was only a very small part of the
enormous estates acquired by the Russell family
during the sixteenth century. The founder of
the family fortunes was John Russell (c. 1485–
1555), created Earl of Bedford in 1550, a native
of Dorset where his family owned the manor of
Berwick. (ref. 40) His great-grandfather, Henry Russell, sometimes called Henry Gascoigne, was a
merchant who had represented Weymouth in the
House of Commons and conducted a considerable
trading business with France. (ref. 41) Possibly these
antecedents gave rise to the tradition that the
family originally came from France, and when in
1854 the seventh Duke of Bedford presented a
bell to the church of Rosel in Normandy, it was in
the belief that his ancestors had come from that
area. (ref. 42) Another family tradition was that the
young John Russell owed his position at court to
the service which he rendered the Archduke
Philip and his wife when the ship in which they
were travelling was blown ashore near Weymouth
in 1506. The story relates that Sir Thomas
Trenchard received the royal couple at his house
in Dorset and sent for Russell, who had a reputation as a linguist, to act as interpreter; that Russell
accompanied the Archduke to court, and was subsequently appointed a gentleman usher to Henry
VII. (ref. 43) Under Henry VIII he served with
distinction both as a soldier and a diplomat, being
first knighted and then raised to the peerage as
Baron Russell of Chenies in Buckinghamshire.
He had acquired this property with Thornhaugh
in Northamptonshire on his marriage to Anne
Jerningham, and made it his home. (ref. 44) He was
further rewarded for his services to the King by
grants of lands, mostly monastic, in Bedfordshire,
Buckinghamshire, Cambridgeshire, Cornwall,
Devon, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Suffolk; the most notable estates
were those which had formerly belonged to the
Abbeys of Tavistock, Thorney and Woburn, the
last of which later superseded Chenies as the
principal country seat of the head of the family.
Later Russells added to these estates by advantageous marriages, and thus acquired properties in
Hampshire, Wiltshire, Bloomsbury and Surrey.
For over a century, from c. 1586 to 1700, the administrative centre of this huge private domain
was in Covent Garden, at the Russells' London
house on the north side of the Strand.
For some years before 1586 the family had
occupied another house nearby. This had formerly
been the London residence of the Bishops of
Carlisle and stood on the south side of the Strand,
in the parish of St. Clement Danes. It had been
acquired by the future first Earl of Bedford in
1539, and was commonly known as Russell Place
or House, though sometimes, after his elevation
to the earldom in 1550, it was referred to as
Bedford House. (ref. 45) When he took possession of
Carlisle House all the southern frontage of the
Strand was already occupied and there was therefore no room for expansion. Consequently, it
may be conjectured, when property nearly opposite the house came into the King's hands through
the suppression of Westminster Abbey, Russell
made a request that it should be given to him.
The two pieces of land called Friars Pyes, described above, were granted to him in 1541, and
on the western piece either he or his son had a
large stable built as a necessary appendage to the
family mansion. When Russell, now Earl of
Bedford, received a grant of Covent Garden and
Long Acre in 1552, he probably saw his acquisition primarily as a means of providing pasture and
fodder for his horses and dairy produce for his
household. Indeed, from the time of its acquisition until building took place in the 1630's,
Covent Garden was always described as pasture
land. Nothing is known for certain about the
first Earl's use of the estate, however, and not long
after he became the owner, he died at Russell
Place in 1555 and was succeeded by his son,
Francis. (ref. 46)
During the lifetime of the second Earl the
estate was let out to tenants. In 1567 the rents
received were £30 for Covent Garden, £6 for
Long Acre and £6 12s. for Friars Pyes. (ref. 47) The
Earl had already sold off some small parts of the
estate between 1560 and 1565, (ref. 48) but this did not
represent a general policy, since the sales were
made to oblige a powerful neighbour, Sir William
Cecil, who was engaged in enlarging his house
next the Earl's property on the north side of the
Strand, to match his standing as the Queen's chief
secretary. The Earl of Bedford also granted Cecil
liberty to open a door or gate into Covent Garden
in order that he and his family might walk
there. (ref. 49) Certain other local inhabitants had
similar privileges. (ref. 50)
In 1582 the convent garden, described as the
great pasture and a 6-acre close on the southwest, was let for £66 a year to Humphrey
Gosling, (ref. 51) vintner, who kept the White Hart
on the north side of the Strand. Gosling was
allowed to use half the loft over the Earl's stable
in Friars Pyes for the storage of his hay, and,
during the absence of the Earl from town, to use
half the stable for his horses. (ref. 50) Gosling's epitaph,
formerly in the Savoy Chapel, described him as 'a
Neighbour of vertuous Behaviour, a very good
Archer, and of honest Mirth, a good Company
keeper', (ref. 52) but his behaviour as a tenant casts
doubt on his virtue, for he was said to have cut
down some of the elm trees growing in Covent
Garden, which he had no right to do, and to have
hidden the wood 'under the Haye Ryckes in his
yerde'. (ref. 50)
In 1585 the second Earl of Bedford died at
Russell Place. (ref. 46) His eldest surviving son,
Francis, had died the day before, as a result of
wounds received in an affray, so the earldom
passed to Francis's son, Edward. He was a
minor at the time of his father's death and was
made a ward of the Crown, (ref. 50) but in 1586 the
Queen granted his wardship to Ambrose, Earl of
Warwick, and Anne, Countess of Warwick,
Edward's aunt. (ref. 53)
In 1588 the estate was producing a yearly
rental of £66 for Covent Garden, £6 for Long
Acre and £5 10s. for houses in Friars Pyes. (ref. 54)
Russell Place had not descended to the third Earl (ref. 46)
(see page 205) so a new house was built for his
future occupation on the north side of the Strand
on the western piece of Friars Pyes. (ref. 55) At his
coming of age in 1593 the estate was still let as it
was when he had inherited it but during the next
twenty-five years he increased its revenue from less
than £80 to £500 (ref. 56) and established the features
which were to govern its ultimate development.
A large portion of the estate was again granted
on lease in 1599, this time to John Dauson, who
was described as Widow Gosling's son (ref. 57) and had
presumably succeeded Gosling at the White Hart.
The area let to Dauson was almost certainly less
than that let to Gosling, and was said to measure
28 acres within 'the Inward Pales'. The growing
timber, which Gosling had misappropriated, was
excluded from the lease; so was a 'Laundry
howse' to which certain other people had access.
The Earl retained the right to pasture 'eight
mylche Kyne' in the close 'or in like pasture',
with free access for his servants to enter 'for
mylking fodering and other lyke occasions'.
Dauson's annual rent was £51, plus 50s. when
the 'mylch beasts' ceased to be pastured on his
land; he was also required to keep in repair the
two gates at the east and west ends of the close,
the posts, rails and pales on the north side and to
maintain a quickset hedge under the pales. The
Earl reserved the right to repossess himself of the
close on giving two months' notice, if he or his
heirs wanted to make 'his or their aboade and
keepe hospitalety with his famely at his house
called Bedford house'. (ref. 58) The 'Inward Pales'
mentioned in the lease probably stood about 131
feet east of St. Martin's Lane (ref. 59) and about 77 feet
west of Drury Lane. (ref. 60) The east and west gates
were probably situated in White Hart Yard and
what was later called (Little) Chandos Street.
Between 1610 and 1613 the central close of
pasture was again reduced by the erection of a
brick wall within the former wooden fence. (ref. 61)
This wall, whose position is shown on fig. I,
both determined and confined the area available
for building development in the 1630's and its
effect upon the topography of the area has therefore survived to the present day.
In 1615, shortly after the wall was built, the
third Earl carried out the first major development
on the estate by laying out Long Acre in collaboration with the lessee of the Mercers' Company
land on his northern boundary.
A rental of the Covent Garden property drawn
up in 1618 (ref. 56) shows that only the 'great pasture',
then let to Dauson's widow for three lives or
ninety years (fn. a) at a diminished rent of £40, was
still open land. This open area was enclosed by
the brick wall. The rest of the estate outside the
wall (which was pierced by two gates giving access to Drury Lane and St. Martin's Lane by
(Little) Russell and (Little) Chandos Streets
respectively) was either built over or occupied as
gardens. (ref. 62) The four blocks which lay outside
the brick wall were described in the rental as the
north, south, east and west 'sides'. The north,
east and west sides fronted the main thoroughfares of Long Acre, Drury Lane and St. Martin's
Lane, respectively. The south side was taken up
by houses in Friars Pyes, Bedford House, and the
plots on the south side of what later became
Maiden Lane and Chandos Street (see Chapters
VII to XII).
The making of the 1618 rental was a preparatory step in handing over the management of the
estate to the Earl's cousin, Francis, Lord Russell.
In order to see this event in perspective it is
necessary to go back to 1585. Shortly before his
death in that year, the second Earl had settled his
estates on his eldest son, Francis, and his male
heirs; on the failure of that line the estates were to
devolve on the next heir to the earldom, that is
Sir William Russell, the second Earl's brother,
and on his male heirs. (ref. 63) It will be recalled that the
second Earl's son had died before him and that he
had been succeeded by his grandson. The third
Earl's minority, with the debts and legacies left
by his grandfather, was a heavy burden on the
estates. The total revenue in 1586 was £2,053 (ref. 64)
but a summary of encumbrances in 1589 showed
that although liabilities of £5,740 had been discharged by that date, payment of £4,063 still
remained due. (ref. 65) The Earl's situation deteriorated
in 1601, when he was fined £10,000 for his
complicity in the Earl of Essex's rebellion. He
managed to pay off £7,000 before the outstanding
balance was remitted by James I, but his financial
position must nevertheless have been very precarious, (ref. 66) for he had begun (in his own words)
'unthriftilie' to sell off 'divers parts of my Inheritance which by my predecessors were left
me'. (ref. 67) His heir apparent, Sir William Russell,
now Baron Russell of Thornhaugh, intervened
and compelled the Earl, 'upon deliberate and
good advise', to bind himself 'in many Thowsand
pounds for the not selling awaie anie more'. It
was for this reason that in 1610 he refused Lord
Salisbury's pressing offer to buy Covent Garden. (ref. 68)
(fn. b)
The Earl's low financial state continued and
he had no son to inherit. His legal heir, after the
death of the first Baron Russell in 1613, was
therefore his cousin, Baron Russell's son, Francis.
In 1617 the latter, now known as Lord Russell,
agreed to discharge the bonds into which the Earl
had entered with Sir William, and in return the
Earl formally vested certain of his estates, including Covent Garden, in trustees for the benefit
of Lord Russell after his own death (and after the
death of any male heirs which he might yet produce). (ref. 69) But Lord Russell did not even have to
wait for his cousin's death, for in 1619 the Earl, in
exchange for an annuity of £1,695 8s., conveyed
Bedford House, Friars Pyes, Covent Garden
and Long Acre (with certain other properties)
to him for his immediate possession. (ref. 70) On the
same day Lord Russell let Bedford House to the
Earl for so long as he should live. (ref. 71)
Thus for the rest of the third Earl's life, from
1619 to 1627, Francis Russell was in possession of
the Covent Garden estate. The development of
the four 'sides', outside the brick wall, including
Bedfordbury, was, however, begun under the
auspices of the third Earl. By 1618 he had already granted leases to a number of tenants (fn. c) and
had promised, if the tenants built, to renew their
leases at the end of their terms. Lord Russell
covenanted to honour these agreements, and to
extend the original terms for a total of not more
than thirty-one years. (ref. 70) The third Earl died in
May 1627 and was succeeded by his cousin.