Holborn: Great Queen Street

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Sir Walter Besant, in The Fascination of London, published in 1903, continues his survey of Holborn with this look at Great Queen Street:

The boundary of St. Giles's parish runs down Drury Lane between Long Acre and Great Queen Street.

Of the last of these Strype says: "It is a street graced with a goodly row of large uniform houses on the south side, but on the north side is indifferent."

The street was begun in the early years of the seventeenth century, but the building spread over a long time, so that we find the "goodly row of houses" on the south side to have been built by Webb, a pupil of Inigo Jones, about 1646.

A number of celebrated people lived in Great Queen Street.

The first Lord Herbert of Cherbury had a house on the south side at the corner of Great Wild Street; here he died in 1648.

Sir Thomas Fairfax, the Parliamentary General, lived here; also Sir Heneage Finch, created Earl of Nottingham; Sir Godfrey Kneller, when he moved from Covent Garden; Thomas Worlidge, the portrait-painter, and afterwards, in the same house, Hoole, the translator of Dante and Ariosto; Sir Robert Strange, the engraver; John Opie, the artist; Wolcott, better known as Peter Pindar, who was buried at St. Paul's, Covent Garden.

Sheridan is also said to have lived here, and it would be conveniently near Drury Lane Theatre, which was under his management from 1776.

On the south side of the street are the Freemasons' Hall, built originally in 1775, and the Freemasons' Tavern, erected subsequently.

Both have been rebuilt, and the hall, having been recently repainted, looks at the time of writing startlingly new.

Near it are two of the original old houses, all that are left with the pilasters and carved capitals which are so sure a sign of Inigo Jones's influence.

On the north side of the street is the Novelty Theatre.

Next: Holborn: Journeyman Printer: Benjamin Franklin