CHAPTER I
The Killigrew and Davenant Patents
Alone among the theatres of London, the
Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, and the
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden,
enjoy the distinction of deriving their rights to
present theatrical entertainments not from licences
issued by the Lord Chamberlain or the local
authority, but by direct grant from the Crown.
These rights are of great antiquity. They were
conferred by Charles II by two letters patent
granted on 25 April 1662 to Thomas Killigrew (ref. 1)
and on 15 January 1662/3 to Sir William Davenant. (ref. 2) Drury Lane Theatre exercises its rights
under Killigrew's patent, the original document
being now in the possession of the present lessees,
Theatre Royal Drury Lane Limited. (ref. 3) The
rights of the Royal Opera House stem from
Davenant's patent, but the original document is
now lost. (ref. 4)
The two patents severally conferred upon
Killigrew and Davenant the right to build a
theatre in London or Westminster and to establish and manage a company of actors to perform
in it; Killigrew's actors were to be styled the
King's Company, and Davenant's were to be
known as the Duke of York's. All other companies performing in London and Westminster
were to be suppressed forthwith.
The grants to Killigrew and Davenant thus
established in London a dual monopoly of theatrical rights which, although frequently evaded in
varying degrees, nevertheless survived as a powerful element in the history of the metropolitan
theatre until the passing of the Act for regulating
theatres of 1843. This Act ended the monopoly,
but did not otherwise affect the rights conferred
by the patents, which (as has been mentioned
above) continue to be exercised down to the
present day. (ref. 5) During this long quasi-monopolistic
period from 1662–3 to 1843 the two patents
therefore became a valuable form of property
which could be and indeed frequently was bought,
sold, divided, shared or bequeathed like any other
property. The purpose of this chapter is to trace,
so far as possible, the extremely complex history of
their ownership.
When Charles II returned to England in May
1660 the theatrical affairs of London were in
some confusion. In March 1660 Sir William
Davenant, the dramatist and poet laureate, who
still had in his possession a patent for a playhouse
granted by Charles I, had taken a lease of Lisle's
Tennis Court in Portugal Street near Lincoln's
Inn Fields, for conversion into a theatre. (ref. 6) He had
then departed to France, presumably to persuade
the King to restore and confirm his rights. (ref. 7)
Already in France with the King was Thomas
Killigrew, playwright, one of the grooms of the
bedchamber, and according to Pepys, 'a merry
droll, but a gentleman of great esteem with the
King', (ref. 8) who may well have already promised him
some theatrical preferment. (ref. 9) At all events, on 9
July, less than six weeks after the Restoration, a
royal warrant required the issue of a patent under
the Great Seal authorizing Killigrew to establish
a company of actors and build a theatre. The
warrant recognized Davenant's rights under his
patent from Charles I, but all other companies of
actors were to be suppressed. (ref. 10) Davenant, however, appears not to have been satisfied with this
indirect authority and ten days later he drafted a
second warrant which was to authorize by a
patent the establishment of a theatrical monopoly
to be shared by Killigrew and himself. (ref. 11)
This proposal evoked the hostility of Sir Henry
Herbert, the master of the revels, who on 4
August presented a petition to the King opposing
it on the ground that it would be 'destructive' of
the authority of his office. (ref. 12) The question was
referred to the attorney general, Sir Jeffry
Palmer, who reported that he thought 'the matter
more proper for A tolleration; than A Grant
under the greate Seale of England'. (ref. 13) The grant
nevertheless passed the privy signet on 21 August
1660, but did not reach the final stage of a patent
under the Great Seal. This was probably because
Davenant had decided not to press the matter in
face of the opposition of the master of the revels,
for in September Palmer added a note to Herbert's
petition, stating that he had 'foreborne to proceede
further haveinge alsoe receaved an intimacion by
Letter from Sir William Davenant that I was
freed from further hearing in this matter'. (ref. 12)
The grant under the privy signet authorized
Killigrew and Davenant to build or hire two
playhouses in London and to maintain two companies to act in them. But although the grant
stated that there were to be no other theatrical
establishments rival companies nevertheless continued to act, (ref. 14) and Killigrew and Davenant were
not immune from the hostile authority of the
master of the revels. So on 25 April 1662 Killigrew at last obtained from the King a patent under
the authority of the Great Seal. This contained
two vital new clauses, the first of which authorized him to enjoy his rights 'peaceably and
quietly without the impeachment or impediment
of any person or persons whatsoever' (i.e., including the master of the revels); the second
categorically required the suppression of all other
playhouses in London except Davenant's. (ref. 1) On 15
January 1662/3 Davenant was granted a similar
patent, (ref. 2) and the joint monopoly of the London
theatre which persisted, in theory at least, until
1843 had been established.
In later years Killigrew's patent was used as the
authority for Drury Lane Theatre and Davenant's for Covent Garden. But in the seventeenth
century theatrical affairs were still extremely
fluid and it was not until the opening of Covent
Garden by John Rich under Davenant's patent
in 1732 that a more stable pattern began to
emerge. For the first seventy years of their existence, therefore, the history of the patents is
extremely confused, a major factor in this confusion being an agreement of 1682 between the
then owners of the two patents whereby they
united their two acting companies and Killigrew's
patent, which was thus made redundant, became
dormant. It remained in this ambiguous and perplexing condition, even its continuing legal
validity being sometimes open to doubt, until as
late as 1813, when its purchase by the owners of
Drury Lane Theatre was finally completed.
When he received his patent in April 1662
Thomas Killigrew and his actors, known as the
King's Company, were at a theatre in Vere Street,
near Clare Market, but he was already building
a new theatre in Brydges Street—the forerunner
of, and occupying part of the site of the present
Drury Lane Theatre—and in May 1663 he and
his company removed to this new home. (ref. 15)
Until the union of 1682 the Killigrew patent
provided the authority to act at this theatre in
Brydges Street, which by the 1690's had become
known by its modern name, the Theatre Royal,
Drury Lane. As a valuable article of property the
patent soon formed part of the consideration in a
number of legal transactions. After the destruction of the theatre by fire in January 1671/2
Killigrew in 1673 mortgaged all his interests in
the property, including the patent, and three
years later these mortgages had been assigned to
trustees for Richard Kent. (ref. 16)
In February 1680/1 Kent and a number of his
associates filed a bill in Chancery (ref. 17) complaining
that Charles Killigrew, one of Thomas's younger
sons and manager of the theatre since 1677, had
denied them the profits which were due to them
under these assignments. The case was settled on
14 December 1682, when the Court decreed that
the Killigrews should be 'for ever debarred and
foreclosed of all Equity of Redemption' of the
property which had been assigned to Kent's
trustees, and that Kent should hold and enjoy it. (ref. 18)
Three months after being thus deprived of all
his theatrical interests Thomas Killigrew died,
bequeathing the bulk of his estate to his eldest son,
Henry, (ref. 19) who in May 1683 instituted proceedings in Chancery in an attempt to recover his
father's patent and other theatrical interests from
Kent's trustees. He challenged Kent's title to
the property and accused him of having made a
secret agreement to assign all his interests to
Charles Killigrew—Henry's half-brother. (ref. 20)
In his reply Kent quoted the decree which
established his title, and the agreement which he
had indeed made to sell his interest to Charles
Killigrew 'in consideration of £500 and a greater
sum to be thereafter paid'. (ref. 18) A copy of this
agreement exists, and is dated 15 August 1682, (ref. 21)
four months before the Chancery decree which
confirmed Kent's title. There is no record of any
judgment in this suit, but it appears that the agreement between Kent and Charles Killigrew,
whether secret or not, was upheld, for the latter
was in possession of the patent when he died in
1724. (ref. 22)
Meanwhile since 1661 Sir William Davenant
and his actors, known as the Duke's Company,
were acting in the Duke's Theatre, Lincoln's Inn
Fields, a conversion of Lisle's Tennis Court. (ref. 15)
The company was still there when Sir William
died in 1668, intestate. The estate was administered for a few years by his widow (his eldest
son, Charles, being still a minor), and during this
period a new Duke's Theatre was built at Dorset
Garden, fronting the Thames to the south of
Fleet Street in the City. The company moved
here in 1671, and prospered. (ref. 23)
By 1682 the King's Company at Drury Lane
had declined to a very parlous condition, and on 4
May of that year Charles Killigrew entered into
an agreement with Charles Davenant and his
principal associates at Dorset Garden for the
union of the two establishments. One clause of
the agreement provided that the two patents were
to be united. (ref. 24) In November 1682 the new
amalgamated company opened at Drury Lane
under the authority of Davenant's patent.
Killigrew's was no longer needed and so became
dormant, but the Killigrew family nevertheless
retained possession of the actual document. (ref. 25)
From 1682 until 1695 there was only one
company performing in London, sometimes at
Dorset Garden but more usually at Drury Lane.
On 30 August 1687 Charles Davenant sold his
patent and theatrical interests for £2,400. (ref. 26) The
purchaser was his brother, Alexander Davenant,
but five-sixths of the money (£2,000) was supplied to him by Sir Thomas Skipwith, (ref. 27) a
Lincolnshire baronet whose womanizing propensities had earned him an 'unenviable notoriety' at
Court. (ref. 28) Less than two weeks later, on 12
September 1687, Skipwith agreed to lease the
benefit of his five-sixths share to Alexander
Davenant for seven years in return for certain
ticket privileges and a weekly rent of £6. On 17
March 1689/90 Davenant sold his remaining
one-sixth share for £400 to Christopher Rich, an
attorney of inexhaustible guile who had previously
been associated with Skipwith in building development in the area of Theobalds Road. On the
following day Rich leased this share back to
Davenant on terms similar to the arrangement
already made with Skipwith, but at a weekly rent
of £1 4s. (ref. 27)
These arrangements between Alexander Davenant on the one hand, and Skipwith and Rich
on the other (subsequently confirmed by another
deed in March 1691), had provided that at the
end of the seven-year term Davenant was
entitled to redeem his property on payment of
£2,000 to Skipwith and £300 to Rich. (ref. 29)
Davenant's management of theatrical affairs
proved financially unsuccessful, however, and in
October 1693 he fled to the Canary Islands to
escape his creditors. (ref. 30) His weekly rents were a
year in arrears, and in December 1693 Skipwith
and Rich foreclosed on the equity of redemption of
Davenant's patent and other theatrical property. (ref. 31)
At this time, therefore, Skipwith evidently
owned five-sixths of the Davenant patent and
Rich one sixth. But in a Chancery suit of 1704
Rich claimed to have bought three-eighths of the
patent, and Skipwith five-eighths. (ref. 31) Four years
later, however, Skipwith claimed only threefifths, 'ye Whole into five parts being divided'. (ref. 32)
It is not known which of these various versions is
correct, but in 1761 Christopher Rich's son, John,
mentioned in his will that his father's share in the
Davenant patent had only been one sixth. (ref. 33)
After Skipwith and Rich had asserted their
rights at Drury Lane in 1693 the effective control
of the theatre passed to Rich. (ref. 34) His treatment of
the players soon provoked them to rebellion, and
under the leadership of the veteran Thomas
Betterton they obtained from the Lord Chamberlain a licence to act (not a patent) (ref. 35) and removed
to the old theatre at Lincoln's Inn Fields, where
they opened on 30 April 1695. (ref. 36) The singlecompany monopoly which had existed since 1682
had been broken, and the grant of this licence also
marked the first important breach of the monopoly rights claimed by the owners of the patents.
Both companies were soon in a state of considerable disarray, but until 1707 there was no
change in the ownership of either of the patents,
Skipwith and Rich being in possession of Davenant's, which was used at Drury Lane and
occasionally at Dorset Garden, and Charles
Killigrew still retaining his family's now dormant
patent. The theatre at Lincoln's Inn Fields was,
however, smaller than Drury Lane, and in 1705
the company was therefore glad to remove to the
larger new theatre in the Haymarket—the
Queen's Theatre, recently erected to the designs
of (Sir) John Vanbrugh, the architect and playwright, who with William Congreve was granted
a licence in December 1704. (ref. 37)
Meanwhile at Drury Lane Sir Thomas Skipwith, far from profiting from his interest there,
found himself obliged to pay out 'considerable
sumes of money under pretence of carrying the
businesse of the said Playhouse on'. He was
apprehensive of being 'drawn in and subjected to
Great Debts and demands on that account', (ref. 32) and
on 6 October 1707 he therefore assigned his share
in the patent to Colonel Henry Brett of Sandywell
Park, Gloucester, M.P., for a nominal sum. (ref. 38)
When some financial improvement had ensued
Skipwith tried to recover his lost interests, and in
February 1708/9 he filed a complaint against
Brett alleging that he had intended the assignment
of October 1707 to be only in trust and not absolute. Relying on Brett's integrity he had signed the
document (which had been drawn up by Brett's
attorney) before reading it through. In reply
Brett claimed that the deed was an absolute
assignment and that it had been intended to be
so. (ref. 32) The case was not pursued because Brett
withdrew from the management, being conscious,
according to Colley Cibber, 'that as the World
knew he had paid no Consideration for it, his
keeping it might be misconstrued, or not favourably spoken of'. (ref. 39) The share in the patent
evidently remained in Brett's possession until 8
August 1711 when he conveyed it to Sir George
Bridges Skipwith, (ref. 40) the son of Sir Thomas, who
was now dead. (ref. 28)
By this time Christopher Rich had fallen foul
of the Lord Chamberlain. Several orders had
been issued by which Rich had been 'Silenc'd from
acting', (ref. 41) but whether these orders also temporarily suspended the authority of the Davenant
patent is not clear. From November 1709, (ref. 42)
however, Drury Lane was acting under the
authority of successive licences granted by the
Lord Chamberlain, (ref. 43) a practice which continued
there until the early nineteenth century. (fn. a) Rich,
meanwhile, far from accepting defeat, acquired
the lease of the now vacant theatre at Lincoln's
Inn Fields and started rebuilding. (ref. 49) But he died
on 4 November 1714, (ref. 50) six weeks before the new
playhouse at Lincoln's Inn Fields was opened (by
his son John Rich) under the authority of the
Davenant patent. (ref. 51) By his will his one-sixth
interest in the patent was divided unequally
between his two sons: John Rich inherited
three-quarters (i.e., one eighth of the whole), and
Christopher Moyser Rich one quarter (i.e., one
twenty-fourth of the whole). (ref. 52)
From 1714 until his death in 1761 John Rich
proved to be one of the most successful and longlived London theatre managers in the whole of the
eighteenth century. In 1731–2 he was able to
build a large new theatre in Covent Garden, to
which he removed in the latter year, still acting
under the Davenant patent, of which he himself
only owned a very small part. The principal
shareholder in the patent, Sir George Bridges
Skipwith, with five-sixths, took no part in the
management, and in August 1752 he assigned
his share by deed of gift to Sir Francis Skipwith
and the latter's son Francis William Skipwith,
members of a collateral branch of the family. (ref. 53)
Between 1752 and 1760 this share passed to
another of Sir Francis's sons, (Sir) Thomas
Skipwith, who by 1767 had sold it to John Rich's
heirs. (ref. 54)
In 1759 John Rich had unsuccessfully attempted to buy his brother Christopher Moyser
Rich's one twenty-fourth share of the patent. (ref. 55)
John Rich died two years later and bequeathed to
his brother an annuity of £200 or a capital sum
of £4,000 on condition that Christopher Moyser
Rich should within two months assign his share
to John Rich's executors. (ref. 33) Christopher Moyser
accepted these terms and on 2 January 1762 he
executed the necessary deed. (ref. 53)
John Rich had already bought the whole of the
dormant Killigrew patent, which after Charles
Killigrew's death in December 1724 (ref. 55) had been
inherited by his son, also Charles. (ref. 56) At that time
the value of the patent must have seemed extremely small, for when Charles Killigrew
junior sold it along with other obsolete theatrical
interests to Rupert Clarke of Kensington, gentleman, on 17 September 1729, the price was only
£63. (ref. 57) On 9 June 1733 Rich and his trustee,
Richard Wolfe, bought the patent from Clarke,
and in January 1741/2 it was conveyed into Rich's
sole possession. (ref. 58) How much Rich paid for it is
not known but on the day of its purchase from
Clarke, Wolfe and Rich mortgaged it for £400. (ref. 59)
The Killigrew Patent 1767–1813:
The Davenant Patent 1767–1793
Thus by the latter part of the 1760's John
Rich's heirs owned the whole of both patents,
Killigrew's being still dormant and Davenant's
being the authority for Covent Garden Theatre.
This straightforward situation did not last long,
however, for in July 1767 John Rich's widow and
four daughters sold their entire interest in both the
lease and contents of Covent Garden Theatre and
the freehold of the two patents for £60,000. The
purchasers were Thomas Harris, John Rutherford, George Colman and William Powell, each
of whom thus possessed one quarter share of the
whole property. (ref. 60) Neither Harris, described as of
Holborn, esquire, nor Rutherford, described as of
Newman Street, esquire, appears to have had any
previous theatrical experience, but Colman was an
established dramatist and Powell was a successful
actor at Drury Lane. This division of ownership produced a series of extremely complex
transactions in which, until 1793, shares in the
leasehold of Covent Garden Theatre and the freehold of both the Killigrew and Davenant patents
were always bought and sold as one property.
Ultimately Harris acquired the two quarter shares
which had originally belonged to Rutherford and
Colman, and one fifteenth of Powell's quarter,
thus bringing his holding up to 46/60 of the whole.
These transactions began in July 1767 when
all four partners mortgaged their respective
shares. (ref. 61) In September 1768 Rutherford sold
two-thirds of his quarter (i.e., one sixth of the
whole) to Henry Dagge of the Inner Temple,
esquire, and the remaining one third (i.e., one
twelfth of the whole) to James Leake of the
Strand, esquire, for £18,500. (ref. 62) On 1 July 1774
Leake bought Colman's quarter share for
£20,000, (ref. 63) but five days later he sold his one
third of Rutherford's quarter (i.e., one twelfth of
the whole) to Harris. (ref. 64) By 1784 Harris had
bought the quarter which Leake had acquired
from Colman (ref. 65) and in the following year he
signed articles of agreement for the purchase of
Dagge's one sixth. (ref. 66) (fn. b) Harris's interest had thus
risen to three-quarters of the whole—¼+1/12+¼+1/6.
But this calculation excludes the descent of
William Powell's quarter share, in which Harris
had also acquired a small interest. Powell had
died suddenly in 1769 at the early age of thirtyfour, and his widow, Elizabeth, had subsequently
married John Abraham Fisher, the violinist. (ref. 68)
In September 1778 the Fishers leased the use of
their quarter share to Harris and Richard Brinsley
Sheridan for twenty-one years at a rental of
£1,600 per annum. (ref. 53) In 1780, however, Fisher
conditionally assigned the equity of redemption in
one fifteenth of the quarter (i.e., one sixtieth of
the whole) to Robert Kilbye Cox (or Cocks),
esquire. (ref. 69) This mortgage was evidently not
redeemed, for in 1781 Cox assigned his rights in
this one-sixtieth share to Harris, (ref. 70) whose share in
the whole property thus amounted in 1785 (after
the other purchases described above) to 46/60 (¾+1/60),
plus a twenty-one-year leasehold interest in the
remaining 14/60. The freehold of the 14/60 descended
in undivided moieties to Powell's two daughters,
Ann (who married as her second husband John
Martindale, (ref. 71) proprietor of White's in St. James's
Street), and Elizabeth Mary, who married George
White, esquire, a clerk at the House of Commons. (ref. 72)
Ever since 1777 Sheridan and Harris, as the
principal proprietors of Drury Lane and Covent
Garden respectively, had been planning to build a
new theatre which they intended to manage
jointly under the authority of the Killigrew
patent. (ref. 73) By this means their theatrical monopoly
would have been preserved, and by the establishment of a new theatre the public criticism of the
monopoly would, they hoped, have been abated.
For the proprietors of Drury Lane (who possessed
neither the Killigrew nor the Davenant patent,
and who had for many years acted under the more
precarious authority of a series of twenty-oneyear patents), the danger of the long unused or
dormant Killigrew patent being sold away from
Covent Garden and revived as the basis for a new
theatre in competition with Drury Lane would
have been averted.
By 1784 Harris had acquired the lease of a
piece of ground near Hyde Park Corner for the
proposed new theatre, but two years later the
scheme had been altered to the establishment of a
new opera house there—probably because the
quality of the opera then being presented at the
King's Theatre in the Haymarket was very poor. (ref. 74)
In 1789, however, the King's Theatre was destroyed by fire, and the Pantheon in Oxford Street
was granted a four-year licence for the presentation of opera. By 1791 the King's Theatre had
been rebuilt, although it now had no licence, and
large debts had accumulated at the Pantheon. (ref. 75)
To settle these intricate difficulties Sheridan, in
October 1791, put forward an 'Outline for a
General Opera Arrangement', (ref. 76) most of which
was subsequently implemented. Several provisions
were concerned with the patents. The King's
Theatre was to have a monopoly in the presentation of opera. The proposed new opera house near
Hyde Park Corner would therefore be abandoned,
and the King's Theatre was to compensate
Harris with an annuity of £250 redeemable for
£5,000 for giving up the right to use the dormant
Killigrew patent (of which he was the principal
proprietor) for opera. Lastly, the dormant patent
was to be 'annexed inseparably' to Drury Lane
Theatre.
In order to implement this last proposal Sheridan, as the principal proprietor of Drury Lane
Theatre, began in the autumn of 1791 to negotiate with Harris for the purchase of the dormant
Killigrew patent. (ref. 77) Sheridan was then about to
rebuild Drury Lane Theatre, where the last
performance in the old theatre had taken place on
4 June 1791, and was intending to raise the
necessary capital sum by three hundred subscriptions of £500 each. (ref. 78) Immediate possession
of the dormant patent and the permanent authority to act which it conferred was therefore
essential for his plans, for no one would subscribe
to the costly rebuilding of a theatre which only
possessed a patent limited to twenty-one-years'
duration. Harris, however, 'readily consented to
dispose of the Killigrew patent for £15,000, (ref. 79)
and everything was proceeding smoothly when
George White (who through his wife owned the
reversionary freehold in 7/15 of Powell's one
quarter share of Covent Garden Theatre and of
both the patents, i.e. 7/60 of the whole), objected to
the sale. After a stormy meeting with Harris 'both
parties separated with mutual displeasure' and in
March 1792 White filed a bill of complaint
against Harris. The Drury Lane subscribers at
once refused to pay their subscriptions, and in
July it was reported in the newspapers that 'all
the proceedings towards erecting the new
Theatre are of course stopped'. (ref. 80)
Despite this set-back Sheridan proceeded with
the purchase of the patent. By the end of May
1792 he had agreed terms with Harris in the
confident expectation that White ('a very goodfor-nothing Fellow') must 'in common sense
soon come in' to the sale. (ref. 81) And so it quickly
proved, for in June Charles James Fox, acting as
an intermediary between Sheridan and White,
arranged that the proprietors of Drury Lane
(Sheridan and his father-in-law, Thomas
Linley) should pay £5,000 for the freehold
reversion of the 14/60 of the Killigrew patent controlled by White (in right of his wife, 7/60) and by
Powell's other daughter, Ann (the other 7/60). (ref. 82)
In 1793 the trustees of Drury Lane bought
Harris's interest (46/60) for £11,667 (the purchase
being for the ultimate use of the proprietors,
Sheridan and Linley), but Sheridan's contract for
the purchase of the remaining 14/60 was not completed, perhaps because by the terms of the
'General Opera Arrangement' the purchase
money was intended to be charged on the King's
Theatre in the Haymarket, which was already
so deeply in debt that its proprietor was either unable or unwilling to pay. (ref. 83)
At the end of 1793, therefore, the ownership
of the two patents was as follows: Harris held 46/60
of the freehold of the Davenant patent under
which Covent Garden acted, and also (in conjunction with Sheridan) the remainder of the
twenty-one-year leasehold interest created in 1778
in the other 14/60, of which White and his sister-inlaw held the reversionary freehold. The Killigrew patent was owned, as to 46/60, by the trustees of
Drury Lane for the use of the proprietors, while
the other 14/60 were held in the same way as
Davenant's.
By 1801 Sheridan had acquired the interests
of the heirs of his former partner Thomas Linley
(who had died in 1795), and therefore claimed to
own inter alia the whole 46/60 of the Killigrew
patent, subject to large financial encumbrances
administered by the trustees of Drury Lane. In
1802 Sheridan sold (inter alia) one quarter of his
interest in the Killigrew patent to Joseph
Richardson, who had assisted him for some years
in the management of the theatre, and in 1806 he
conveyed another quarter to his son, Thomas
Sheridan. (ref. 84)
Meanwhile Drury Lane, not being in full
possession of the Killigrew patent, continued to
act under its twenty-one-year patent, which after
the destruction of that theatre by fire in 1809, was
extended to 1837. This grant (ref. 85) was made in 1812
to trustees for the newly formed Theatre Royal
Drury Lane Company of Proprietors which, by
an Act of 1810, had been authorized to raise a
capital sum of £300,000 for the rebuilding of the
theatre and the purchase of the outstanding
shares in the Killigrew patent. (ref. 86) By October
1813 the new company had bought the entire
theatrical interests of the two Sheridans and of
Richardson's heirs (including their share of the
Killigrew patent); (ref. 87) and after further negotiation
the company at last also bought the outstanding 14/60
share of the Killigrew patent from George White
and his sister-in-law (now Ann Martindale) in
December 1813 for £9,561 19s. 8d. The
Killigrew patent—the original document itself—
was at last lodged in the strong-room of Drury
Lane Theatre, and a few days later George White
died. (ref. 88) (fn. c)
Since 1813 the Killigrew patent has remained
annexed to Drury Lane Theatre, and although
it has changed hands more than once its ownership has never again been sub-divided.
Later History of the Killigrew Patent from 1813
In July 1812 the ground landlord, the sixth
Duke of Bedford, had granted an eighty-two-year
lease of Drury Lane Theatre to the Company of
Proprietors. A condition of this lease required
that the Killigrew patent and any other patent
which the company might acquire should 'be continued and go along with the said new Theatre'
throughout the whole term granted. (ref. 90) The
patent therefore remained in the possession of the
company until 1894. By this time, however, its
value had been greatly diminished by the Act of
1843 for regulating theatres, which, by requiring
the Lord Chamberlain to licence theatres in
London, had finally put an end to the monopoly
conferred in 1662–3 by the Davenant and Killigrew patents. In April 1894, when the renewal
of the lease to Sir Augustus Harris, manager of the
theatre since 1879, was being considered, the Lord
Chamberlain informed the eleventh Duke of
Bedford that he was strongly of opinion that
Drury Lane should in future be subject to annual
licence like all other places of amusement in
London (ref. 91) (except Covent Garden). The authority under which the theatre performed was, however, no concern of the Duke, and in negotiating
the agreement with Sir Augustus for a lease, 'all
reference to the question of the Patent' was 'carefully avoided and it has been left to Sir Augustus
either to purchase the existing Patent or to place
himself under the Lord Chamberlain's Licence
whichever he finds most advantageous'. (ref. 92)
After the death of Sir Augustus Harris in 1896
his executors surrendered his seven-year interest
in the theatre to the Duke. (ref. 93) Harris had bought
the patent from the old Company of Proprietors,
and after his death his stage manager, Arthur
Collins, who was acquiring an interest in the lease
(see page 28), bought the patent. In May 1897
Collins contracted to sell all his interest in the
theatre, including the patent, to the newly formed
Theatre Royal Drury Lane Limited, which still
owns both the lease and the patent. (ref. 94) In 1964 the
patent was included among the company's assets
at the nominal figure of one hundred pounds. (ref. 3)
Later History of the Davenant Patent from 1793
It will be recalled that at the end of 1793
Thomas Harris owned 46/60 of the freehold of the
Davenant patent, under which Covent Garden
acted, and also (in conjunction with Sheridan) the
remainder of the twenty-one-year leasehold
interest created in 1778 in the other 14/60. The
freehold of these 14/60 belonged to the descendants of
William Powell—his daughter Ann (later Ann
Martindale) and his son-in-law, George White.
In 1803 Harris took John Philip Kemble, who
had been for many years the leading actor at
Drury Lane, into partnership and sold him a onesixth share of the theatre and the Davenant
patent for £22,000. (ref. 95) Three years later he
granted a moiety of 1/60 of the patent to George
White and the other moiety to White's sister-inlaw, now Ann Martindale, (ref. 96) thus increasing their
share to one eighth each. By these transactions he
reduced his own share to seven-twelfths
(46/60-1/6-1/60=7/12), and at about the same time he
gave one twelfth of his remaining holding to his
son, Henry Harris. (ref. 97)
George White died in 1813, (ref. 98) and his oneeighth share in the patent passed to his two
daughters, Elizabeth and Letitia Mary, who
therefore held one sixteenth each. (ref. 99) They
married, respectively, John Saltren Willett and
John Forbes. (ref. 100) Ann Martindale, by her will
proved in 1822, bequeathed her one-eighth share
to Francis Const, esquire, chairman of Westminster Sessions, for life, with discretionary power to
sell it if he thought fit. (ref. 101) This he evidently did,
between 1825 and 1832, to Willett and Forbes,
whose shares were stated in the latter year to be
one eighth each, and not one sixteenth as had
originally been the case. (ref. 102)
In the meantime Henry Harris, through the
death of his father in 1820, had become possessed
of seven-twelfths, and in the same year J. P.
Kemble had given his one sixth to his much
younger brother Charles. (ref. 97) Henry Harris died in
1839, leaving all his property on trust for his two
daughters to William Harry Surman of Lincoln's
Inn, esquire. (ref. 103) Charles Kemble died in 1854,
leaving his estate to his three children. (ref. 104)
Thus when Covent Garden Theatre was destroyed by fire in 1856 the Davenant patent was
owned as to seven-twelfths by Surman in trust
for the Harris family, as to one sixth by the Kemble
family and as to one eighth each by Willett and
Forbes. But by this time its value, like that of the
Killigrew patent, had been greatly diminished by
the Act of 1843 for regulating theatres. (ref. 5) The
competition from the new theatres which quickly
multiplied in the metropolis had greatly impoverished the proprietors of Covent Garden,
none of whom was able to attempt to rebuild the
theatre. (ref. 105) Within a few weeks of the fire the
ground landlord, the seventh Duke of Bedford,
obtained a judgment in the Court of Queen's
Bench for possession of the site (ref. 106) and in due
course he granted a new lease, for ninety years, to
Frederick Gye, (ref. 107) who had managed the theatre
for some years previous to the fire. Gye rebuilt
the theatre and re-opened it on 15 May 1858
without a licence from the Lord Chamberlain.
His authority to perform must therefore have been
the Davenant patent, although no evidence has
been found that he ever owned it during his long
association with Covent Garden, which lasted
until his death in 1878.
It seems certain, however, that Gye did acquire at least a share in the patent, for at the sale
of the ground lease to the Grand Opera Syndicate
Limited in 1899 'all the interest' of the vendor
in the patent was included in the sale. (ref. 108) This
vendor was George Denison Faber, later Lord
Wittenham, who had inherited the lease (and
therefore presumably his interest in the patent)
from Gye's principal mortgagee; and nearly thirty
years later he recalled that the Davenant 'Letters
Patent granted by King Charles II . . . were
certainly existing when I owned the lease of the
house, and of course they still are'. (ref. 109) The
present whereabouts of the patent is not known, (ref. 4)
but the theatre still operates under the authority
originally granted to Sir William Davenant in
1662/3.