No. 10 Downing Street in 1900

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Arthur H. Beavan's survey of London government in Imperial London, first published in 1901, continued with this look at 10 Downing Street:

"That shabby-looking old place the official residence of the First Lord of the Treasury!" exclaimed a sceptical antipodean to the imperturbable constable always to be found on duty opposite No. 10, Downing Street. "Why, our Premiers, who govern only a few millions of people out in Australia, are a jolly sight better treated! This fossil of a house the headquarters of the British Empire!"

His remarks were natural, but he had not taken into account the national reverence for any house, however dingy, that is associated with distinguished statesmen of the past.

This, however, even the matter-of-fact select committee of 1897 recognized, when it recommended that No. 10, the historic residence of the First Lord of the Treasury, on account of its associations should be retained, and the Downing Street front masked by a new building with a good architectural facade.

Certainly no other cul-de-sac (for such it almost is) could boast of similar illustrious and influential tenants.

It was built over by Sir George Downing long years ago, and the largest house, known as No. 10, was settled by George II upon Walpole and his official successors as a residence in perpetuity.

Walpole lived there; North had a suite of rooms on the first floor; the great Pitt was seldom happy away from it; and Lords Liverpool and Canning, Lord Grey, and Mr. Gladstone, also took up their abode there when in office.

Nothing could be plainer, more commonplace, I was going to say shabbier, than the external appearance of No. 10 Downing Street, in the year 1900. It looked like some decayed lodging-house in Soho or Bloomsbury, whose occupier was too impoverished to renew the dilapidated window-blinds and curtains.

But inside it was much better.

On the ground floor was the old Council Chamber, where for two centuries the affairs of nations had been discussed. Would that its venerable walls could speak, or phonographically recall the momentous words uttered within!

Upstairs was a smaller room where Mr. Gladstone used to confer with his colleagues on affairs of state. There were also three reception-rooms; and a dining-room with a gloomy outlook, a handsome ceiling, and cosy panelled walls on which hung many pictures of dead-and-gone ministers.

Here Lord Beaconsfield used to give his parliamentary dinners.

Next to No. 10 was No. 11, the office of the Chancellor of the Exchequer; but this, a duplicate externally of No. 10, in 1900, was planned for demolition (which did not take place).

The fascination of No. 10 lay in the memories it evoked. Through its old-fashioned doors passed, in every rank of life, generations of aspirants for honours, offices, and places.

Ambitions, hopes, and fears have alike been satisfied and extinguished there in one brief interview. The vanity of human wishes mingles with the atmosphere of governing power that hoveres about the spot.

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