Russell Street
The part of this street lying within the parish of
St. Paul, Covent Garden, was built under leases
granted in 1631 and 1632, which are tabulated on
pages 308–9. It was fully inhabited by about 1637.
A splendidly broad street, it commanded a fine
view of the church directly opposite across the
Piazza, and afforded access to the latter from
Drury Lane via the narrower (Little) Russell
Street, which had been built a few years earlier
beyond the third Earl of Bedford's brick wall of
c. 1610. (ref. 2) Both parts bore the name of Russell
from the beginning.
Almost as soon as it was built all the south side
of the street, between the Piazza and Brydges
Street, and some of the north side east of Bow
Street, was settled on the fourth Earl's younger son
Edward by the family agreement of 1640–1. (ref. 63)
He sold these parts to John Athy, a haberdasher,
probably in 1663, (ref. 64) and they were only partially
regained for the Bedford estate by purchases in the
nineteenth century.
An early resident in the street in 1644–5
(probably at one of the corners with Bow Street)
was the notorious Earl of Somerset, father-in-law
of the fourth Earl of Bedford's daughter, in the
last year or so of his life. (ref. 65) But despite its good
position and generous width Russell Street did not
prove attractive to Covent Garden's more aristocratic residents and hardly any other people of
title appear among its ratepayers.
The first occupants probably included at least
three victuallers or vintners. One had the house
later numbered 6: another, William Clifton, was
in c. 1633–4 the proprietor of the Goat tavern at
the north-west corner with Bow Street, (ref. 66) which
was at that time sufficiently well known to be
made the resort of riotous characters in Richard
Brome's topical comedy, The Weeding of the
Covent Garden (see page 322). A longer-lived
tavern, the Rose, was situated at the east corner of
Brydges Street, where it also became very well
known (see page 200). The north side of the street
near the Piazza contained some lodging-houses of
good reputation. The Verneys had favourable
reports of Mrs. Dubber's house at No. 18 in the
1650's; and next door at No. 17 (the Three
Feathers) Evelyn took rooms for the winter of
1659–60, (ref. 67) when John Cosin, Bishop of Durham,
was evidently a fellow-lodger. The bishop, however, although prepared to stay there again in
the following autumn, would have preferred
somewhere about Tothill Street as 'more private
and more commodious for me than this in Russell
street wilbe, which is a thoroughfare for all
company', (ref. 68) and perhaps it was the stir and bustle
of its location between the Piazza and Drury
Lane that told against Russell Street as a place of
settled residence. In 1668 it had twelve shops
assessed in the ratebooks, a higher proportion than
in most of the Covent Garden streets. (ref. 2)
The western and more consequential part of
the street contained a coffee house by this time,
the Turk's Head at or near No. 20, (ref. 69) and it was
with its coffee houses that the name of the street
was to be most closely associated. Apart from the
Rose on the corner of Brydges Street (see page
200), and Will's on the corner of Bow Street
(see page 185), the two most famous were
Tom's and Button's. The former was established
at No. 17 between 1698 and 1703 and continued
(after about 1768 as a subscription club) until
1814. (ref. 70) Button's was established about 1712 and
appears to have died out by the 1730's. Its location is not certain, except that it was on the south
side more or less opposite Tom's: Johnson in his
life of Addison said it was 'about two doors from
Covent-garden', (ref. 71) which would correspond well
enough with No. 10, where Daniel Button, who
had formerly kept Button's coffee house, died in
1731 in a penurious condition: Button was not,
however, the ratepayer here before 1720. (ref. 72)
Strype spoke of Russell Street as 'a fine broad
Street, well inhabited by Tradesmen' (ref. 3) and
Mortimer's Universal Director of trades in 1763
listed nine residents—an engraver (William
Ryland), (ref. 8) a music-master, a printer, a clockmaker,
a distiller, a metal-button maker, two apothecaries
and a grocer. The eastern end of the street, towards the boundary of St. Martin's parish, was
more disreputable: the ratebooks list a 'gaiming
house' at No. 24 in 1722, and it was at this end of
the street that the late eighteenth-century parish
officers contended with disorderly taverns, and
ratepayers who absconded or retired to gaol. (ref. 73)
The street retained in the early nineteenth
century an attraction for lovers of the busy life of
central London. In 1817 Charles and Mary
Lamb took rooms at No. 20, and in letters to
Dorothy Wordsworth described the appeal of
Russell Street for them: 'We are in the individual
spot I like best in all this great city', Charles
wrote, 'The theatres with all [their noises;
Covent Garden,] dearer to me than any gardens
of Alcinous, where we are morally sure of the
earliest peas and 'sparagus; Bow Street, where the
thieves are examined, within a few yards of us.
Mary had not been here four and twenty hours
before she saw a Thief. She sits at the window
working, and casually throwing out her eyes, she
sees a concourse of people coming this way, with
a constable to conduct the solemnity. These
little incidents agreeably diversify a female life.'
Mary called it 'a place all alive with noise and
bustle, Drury Lane Theatre in sight from our
front and Covent Garden from our back windows.
The hubbub of the carriages returning from the
play does not annoy me in the least—strange that
it does not, for it is quite tremendous …' They
stayed for six years, then moved to Islington. (ref. 74)
(fn. a)
The development of the adjacent market in the
nineteenth century no doubt enhanced the value
of sites here, and a good deal of the property
alienated by the fourth Earl in the seventeenth
century was re-acquired in the nineteenth. (ref. 76) The
market's expansion is now very evident in the
street, not least on the north-west side where
Nos. 13–16 were pulled down in 1887 and the
wooden sheds subsequently erected remain to this
day. (ref. 77) On the south side of the street between
Catherine Street and Wellington Street the small
and very unpretentious houses at Nos. 1–4 probably date in carcase from a rebuilding of 1775–6, (ref. 78)
and at No. 9 the site of the Market House public
house has, under other names, been in the hands
of licensed victuallers since at least 1708. (ref. 79) The
most notable surviving house, however, by reason
of its associations, is next door, at No. 8.
Ratepaying occupants in Russell Street include:
Richard Ryder (II), carpenter, 1631–63, in
several houses, at least two of which were outside the parish in (Little) Russell Street, the last
adjoining the newly building Drury Lane Theatre
(see Survey of London, vol. XXXV); Dr. Nicholas
Phiske, 1633–58, astrologer and physician; Lady
Follard (Fulwood), 1635–6; Dr. Eglyn (Egling),
1636; Joseph Taylor, 1637–41, ? actor; Captain
Adams, 1638; Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset,
1644–5 (who with his wife had been involved
in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury); Dr.
Nesbeth, 1647; Dr. Bever, 1651; Lady Beltemon,
1654; Nicholas Burt, 1663–7, actor; 'Major
Moone', 1665, probably Michael Mohun, actor;
John Bancroft, 1691–c. 1694, dramatist; John
Smith, 1693–1717, mezzotint engraver; George
Kelly, 1722, ? Jacobite; Dr. Butler, 1733–4,
1741–6; Captain Thomas Baker, 1737–42;
Henry Holcombe, 1748, musical composer;
Thomas Hudson, 1754–6, ? portrait painter;
John Kirk, 1756–68, medallist; Thomas Davies,
1760–85, bookseller; William Ryland, 1763–5,
engraver; William Norris, c. 1787–91, ? secretary of the Society of Antiquaries.
No. 8 Russell Street
In his Life of Johnson James Boswell noted
that since the Doctor's death he had never passed
this house without feelings of 'reverence and
regret', for it was here on a spring evening in 1763
that the two had met for the first time. (ref. 80) No. 8
was then in the occupation of Thomas Davies, a
friend and contemporary of Johnson's, who after
a chequered career as an actor had resumed in
this house his former trade of bookseller and
publisher. (ref. 8)
The house itself was then recently built, having
been erected (together with the two houses eastward) in 1759–60 (ref. 2) (Plates
55a, 55b). The site did
not belong to the Duke of Bedford and the circumstances of the building of the house are not
known, nor exactly what kind of tenure Davies
had. Wrangling letters which passed between him
and Garrick in August 1763 imply, however,
that he had not acquired the freehold, which had
been sold, he says, for 'near 1100l.'. (ref. 81) Nevertheless he remained here until his death in 1785. (ref. 2)
Davies, who had hospitable inclinations and a
pretty wife, was visited by many of the litterateurs of his day here. Topham Beauclerk quipped
that he 'could not conceive a more humiliating
situation than to be clapped on the back by Tom
Davies', and Johnson, who knew that the book
seller had abandoned the stage partly from fear of
Charles Churchill's criticism, tempered his fondness for Davies with some contempt: perhaps he
also had an inkling that Davies was the most
accomplished of his mimics. But he admired
Davies's erudition, and their easy relations persisted until Johnson's last illness. (ref. 82)
Before his meeting with the Doctor, Boswell
had already met Oliver Goldsmith for the first
time here, at a Christmas dinner in 1762. 'It
was quite a literary dinner. I had seen no warm
victuals for four days, and therefore played a very
bold knife and fork. It is inconceivable how
hearty I eat and how comfortable I felt myself
after it. We talked entirely in the way of Geniuses.' (ref. 83) The encounter for which Davies is now
chiefly memorable occurred a few months later,
on 16 May 1763, about seven in the evening.
'When I was sitting in Mr Davies's back-parlour,
after having drunk tea with him and Mrs Davies,
Johnson unexpectedly came into the shop; and
Mr Davies having perceived him through the
glass-door in the room in which we were sitting,
advancing towards us,—he announced his aweful
approach to me, somewhat in the manner of an
actor in the part of Horatio, when he addresses
Hamlet on the appearance of his father's ghost,
"Look, my Lord, it comes" … . Mr Davies
mentioned my name, and respectfully introduced
me to him. I was much agitated; and recollecting
his prejudice against the Scotch, of which I had
heard much, I said to Davies, "Don't tell him
where I come from"—"From Scotland", cried
Davies, roguishly. "Mr Johnson, (said I) I do
indeed come from Scotland, but I cannot help it".
… [Johnson] retorted, "That, Sir, I find, is what
a very great many of your countrymen cannot
help." This stroke stunned me a good deal, and
when we had sat down I felt myself not a little
embarrassed and apprehensive of what might
come next. He then addressed himself to Davies:
"What do you think of Garrick? He has refused
me an order for the play for Miss Williams because he knows the house will be full and that an
order would be worth three shillings." Eager to
take any opening to get into conversation with
him, I ventured to say, "O, Sir, I cannot think
Mr Garrick would grudge such a trifle to you."
"Sir", said he with a stern look, "I have known
David Garrick longer than you have done, and I
know no right you have to talk to me on the
subject."' (ref. 84)
Davies's fortunes in his shop were as chequered
as on the stage. He put out attractive editions of
the English poets, but by 1778 had 'unfortunately
failed in his circumstances', when Johnson and
others helped him with a benefit at Drury Lane
Theatre. (ref. 85) A belated success came to him, however, with his own Memoirs of the Life of David
Garrick Esq., which he published from Russell
Street in 1780.
No. 8 Russell Street is a conventionally planned
terrace house containing a basement and four
storeys. The front, little changed above the
ground storey, is three windows wide and built in
plum-coloured stock bricks. The windowopenings, now furnished with Victorian sashes,
have stone sills and flat arches of gauged red brick,
and a block cornice of stone extends below the
attic storey, where the parapet has been rebuilt
with yellow stock bricks. The original staircase,
with turned balusters, survives in a compartment
lined full height with plain panelling. Some more
panelling remains in the back second-storey
room, but the historic back parlour no longer
exists.
Nos. 11 and 12 Russell Street:
Russell Chambers
See pages 91, 93.
No. 17 Russell Street
This building occupies the site of Tom's
coffee house and of an earlier house where John
Evelyn lodged in 1659. It was erected in 1866
under an eighty-year Bedford building lease
granted to a grocer, T. A. White, the sitting
tenant. (ref. 86) Like the contemporary Nos. 8 and 9
James Street, the Grecian style adopted for the
stucco-faced front was rather belated for its date,
and has been made to seem more so by the removal of the chamfered quoins and main cornice,
and by the present scheme of painting. (ref. 87)
Telephone Exchange
This building was erected in 1925–7, as the
Temple Bar Telephone Exchange, to the designs
of J. H. Markham of the Office of Works. The
contractors were Messrs. A. Roberts and Company. (ref. 88)
Built of Portland stone and dark red brick to a
mannered Georgian Renaissance design, typical
of the 1920's, the lofty four-storeyed front is
composed of four similar units, each three windows wide above the ground-storey shop front
(Plate 63b). One unit is on the west side and
three are on the east of an octagonal turret feature
that rises above the vehicle entrance and marks
the break in the frontage line. The shop fronts,
and the groups of second-storey windows, are
set in a stone face. The former have voussoired
straight-arched heads, and the latter are separated
by recessed panelled piers and framed in bandarchitraves. The red-brick face of the third and
fourth storeys forms a plain ground for the prominent tabernacle-frames of stone that emphasize
the middle third-storey window of each unit.
Massive block-trusses, projecting from a stepped
stone apron extending below each group of windows, carry the free-standing Doric columns that
flank the window and support an open triangular
pediment. (This curious motif, resembling a midGeorgian porch, was probably derived, through
E. Vincent Harris, from Sir Robert Taylor.) An
architrave and cornice of stone underline the
attic storey, where the three windows of each
unit, wide between narrow, are framed by bandarchitraves of stone. The crowning entablature
has a pulvinated frieze and a cornice of shallow
profile.