CHAPTER IV
The Piazza
The building of the Piazza may be said
to have started with the erection of St.
Paul's Church, which was begun in July
1631, and to have ended when the lease of the
last house was granted, in 1637. As first laid out
it contained some twenty-two domestic buildings. (fn. a)
The earliest to be completed was probably that on
the site let to Sir Humphrey Foster (No. 4
Henrietta Street) but although this house faced the
Piazza, it was built as the easternmost of the
range of houses on the south side of Henrietta
Street, for which leases had been granted in 1631. (ref. 1)
The next two houses to be built were those
which flanked the portico of the church and terminated the ranges along the south side of King
Street (No. 1) and the north side of Henrietta
Street (No. 37). The former was let in 1633 to
Thomas Turney, bricklayer, (ref. 2) and the latter in the
same year to Edward Palmer, citizen and girdler
of London. (ref. 3) Some special requirement was evidently made for the building of these two houses,
for Turney warranted in his lease that he had
erected his house in the same way as had Palmer.
They were certainly built to a Jonesian pattern
(see page 70) and are illustrated in the views
reproduced on Plates 11, 12, 13a and 26.
In 1634–5 another two houses were built on
the south side of the Piazza, squeezed in between
the east wall of Bedford House garden and the east
range of the portico houses. The western house
(numbered 2–3 on fig. 45) was let to Robert
Hope of St. Giles in the Fields, tailor, in 1634 or
1635. (ref. 4) There is no evidence to show what sort of
house Hope built, but the house on the east
(numbered 1 on fig. 45) was two storeys high,
with a basement and garrets. It was built by
Robert Scawen, gentleman, a servant to the
fourth Earl of Bedford, under a lease granted in
1634. (ref. 5) Scawen's site was awkwardly situated in
the corner of the square, but a passage was made
in front, leading from the Piazza into Charles
Street (Plate 3), and he was given liberty to open
a door and windows into the south end wall of the
eastern portico walk.
None of the houses so far mentioned formed
part of the most celebrated feature of the Piazza,
the superimposition of houses over arcaded portico
walks. Of these houses (which in this account are
distinguished as 'portico houses') there were
seventeen in all, built between 1633 and 1637,
and ranged in groups of four and six on the north
side of the Piazza and of three and four on the
east side. The ranges on either side of James
Street and north of Russell Street became known
as the 'Great' Piazza and that to the south of
Russell Street as the 'Little' Piazza. (fn. b) The houses
in the Great Piazza, except those which stood
at or adjoining the corners of James Street and
Russell Street, had large gardens which extended
back to Hart Street, where their stables and coachhouses were situated. The houses in the Little
Piazza backed on to the houses in Russell Street
and Charles Street and thus had somewhat
smaller gardens.
Not all of the original leases of the portico
houses have survived, but it appears that the
earliest was granted on 24 June 1633 to George
Hulbert for the site on the east side of the Piazza
which abutted south on Scawen's, (ref. 6) and the last
was granted on 1 April 1637 to Lord Paget. (ref. 7)
Hulbert's term was an exceptionally long one,
being for fifty years, and Lord Paget's was for
forty-six years, but the commonest term was
forty-one years.
The total number of individual lessees was
thirteen. Three (Lord Paget, Edward Sydenham
and Sir Edmund Verney) obtained their leases
for specified sums of money (ref. 7) or for 'divers good
causes' (ref. 8) (presumably also monetary): their houses
were already built and were thereupon occupied
by them. The other lessees, including an 'esquire', a 'gentleman', a scrivener, a girdler and six
building tradesmen, (ref. 9) were evidently speculators,
and all their leases which survive were granted
in consideration of building: none of them occupied the houses they built, except for the 'esquire',
George Hulbert, who lived in one of his two
houses.
Unlike the earlier Covent Garden leases (see
page 29), those which were granted to speculators for the portico houses do not have articles of
agreement attached to them. They do, however,
have a common formula in the consideration clause
which states that the lessee, or some other person
for him, had erected a fair building intended to
be finished for a 'Piazza howse', with a portico
walk underneath and 'according to agreement
and contract in that behalf made'. Unfortunately,
not one of these contracts has survived, but there
can be little doubt that the speculators were required to erect their portico houses conformable
with the three houses which the fourth Earl of
Bedford had caused to be erected by direct labour
at his own expense.
These three houses stood on the east side of the
Piazza north of Russell Street. The most
northerly (No. 13–14) was let to (Sir) Edward
Sydenham on 1 November 1634 for a term of
four years and the other two (Nos. 16–17, 18–19)
were let together on one lease on the same day and
for the same term to Sir Edmund Verney. (ref. 8) The
annual rent was £150 for Sydenham's house and
£160 for Verney's two houses.
The building of the Earl's three houses presumably began at least a year before they were let,
possibly in 1633. The surviving accounts are
dated 20 June 1635 and contain clear indications
that the original design was varied slightly in
execution and altered after completion, partly by
the intervention of 'Mr. Decause' and partly to
suit the incoming tenants. The total cost of
the work, as shown in the accounts, was
£4,703 16s. 5¾d. The builders whom the Earl
employed were John Taylor, bricklayer, plasterer
and tyler; Richard Vesey, carpenter; Thomas
Thorneton and John Rider, glaziers; James
Davis and Robert Linton, joiners; William Mason
and Thomas Styles, masons; Edmund Johnson,
painter; Thomas Hunney and William Knight,
paviours; James Avis and Martin Es(t)bourne,
plasterers; Thomas Charley, John Embree and
William George, plumbers; and Samuel Clarke
and Thomas Seabrooke, smiths. (ref. 10) Some of these
tradesmen were also employed at the church, but
only one, Richard Vesey, took a lease for building
a portico house.
Besides building the three houses on the east
side of the Piazza the fourth Earl was probably
also responsible for setting out the foundations of
the other portico buildings. The leases granted
to speculators all stated that the Earl had made the
brick vaults which lay under the portico walk.
These vaults were arched over in order to support
'a pair of stairs'—presumably a reference to the
two steps which led up to the portico walk from
the open square. In 1933 building excavations in
the Piazza uncovered some of these brick arches (ref. 11)
(Plate 45c); previous encounters with them, when
alterations below ground were being carried out,
probably explain the stories of the existence of
'convent' foundations in the Piazza.
The vaults were always included when the
portico houses were granted on lease. The portico
walk itself, on the other hand, was always excluded, although the original speculators were
required to finish the walk with 'seeled arches'
and to pave it with 'broad stone comonly called
Michells' and subsequent tenants were required to
maintain the paving, piers and arches. The walk
was excluded from all leases in order to preserve
its use for the 'free passage walking and recreation
of all persons whatsoever'. The early tenants
were, however, at liberty to 'expell putt or dryve
awaye or out of the sayde Walke any Youthe or
other person or persons whatsoever which shall
play or be in the sayde Portico Walke [an]
offence or disturbance'. By the 1720's this clause
had been reduced to the right to expel 'disorderly'
persons, (ref. 12) and the engraving made in 1768 of
Thomas Sandby's drawing of the portico walk
(Plate 32a) depicts a woman with a fruit stall and
a sleeping chairman as well as boys at play and
servants cleaning shoes.
In the treatment of the south side of the Piazza
it was probably never the fourth Earl's intention
to allow building other than at the east and west
extremities, for any houses there, of whatever
design, would have greatly reduced the area of the
garden of Bedford House and deprived the remainder of the garden of any privacy. In the
early nineteenth century, however, a tradition
current among members of the Russell family
related that the Earl had originally intended to
build portico houses there to match those on the
north and east sides of the Piazza, but the payment in 1635 of an additional fine in the Court
of Star Chamber for infringement of the building
regulations (see page 33) had 'vexed him so much
that he would not proceed'. (ref. 13) But the leases of at
least two of the houses actually built on the south
side of the square at its western and eastern extremities antedate the raising of the fine, and one
of these houses, moreover, was required to be
built on a smaller scale than the portico houses.
Even if he had intended to build houses along the
entire length of the south side, which seems
extremely unlikely, it is therefore certain that
the Earl was not envisaging portico buildings
there.
Later critics, so far from seeing the unbuilt
south side as an imperfection, considered that
Bedford House garden provided one of the
pleasant features of the square. (ref. 14) It contributed
to the airiness of the Piazza and the 'small Grotto
of Trees' with the domed roofs of the two classical
banqueting houses, which could be seen rising
above the top of the garden wall (Plate 46a),
supplied a decorative feature which the centre of
the square lacked.
According to a petition presented to the King
by the inhabitants of Covent Garden in 1638, the
Earl of Bedford had promised to pave the Piazza
and to erect a 'beautiful Structure' in the middle,
to be surmounted by a brass statue of Charles I
and enclosed with a 'faire Iron gate'. (ref. 15) If this
were indeed true, it is possible that the Earl proved
unable, or unwilling, to bear the extra cost, after
the heavy fine which he had had to pay in 1635.
Thus in the early years of the Piazza's history the
only adornment of the centre of the square, which
was enclosed with a simple fence of wooden posts
and rails, was a small tree, fitted round with
benches (Plate 11). The gravelled enclosure was
often referred to as the 'Mount', and presumably
sloped gently up to the centre to provide for the
drainage of surface water. Outside the enclosure
a wide thoroughfare was left for pedestrians and
carriages. This 'street' was eventually laid with
'Pebble Paving'. (ref. 16)
The benches round the tree were probably
provided by the parishioners. They also paid for
the column which was erected in place of the
tree in 1668–9 and which stood in the square
until 1790. The erection of this column was
evidently proposed by a Mr. Tomlinson—
presumably Richard Tomlinson, a churchwarden,
who lived in the house facing the Piazza on the
south side of the church. In 1668 he informed
the vestry 'that he and his gentlemen [sic] had a
desire to erect a Doricke columne of polished
marble, for the support of a quadrangular dyall in
the midst of the railes where now the trees [sic]
are, it being very improbable they should ever
come to any maturity'. (ref. 17) The churchwardens'
accounts for 1668–9 record the receipt of gifts
'towards the Erecting of the Columne'—£20
from the fifth Earl of Bedford, and £10 each from
Sir Charles Cotterell, master of the ceremonies,
and Lord Denzil Holles. £90 were paid to Mr.
Channel(l), mason, for erecting the column itself,
while 5s. were paid to 'Mr. Keizar at the Sculpture
of the Pallas for the Columne', (fn. c) 8s. 6d. to Mr.
Wainewright for the four gnomons, and £2 to
Mr. Browne, 'the mathematicien, for his pains
about the dial'. 10s. were also paid to an unnamed recipient 'For Drawing A Modell of the
Columne to be presented to the vestry'. The
churchwardens' accounts also record that 'Upon
due consideration of those many signall services,
that the Honorable Sir John Baber hath don this
Parish from Time to Time Wee thought it good
to affix his Coate of Armes, in one of the Sheilds
belonging to the Columne, as a Perpetuall acknowledgment of our gratitude, and to Refuse any
present from him that should be tendred Towards the Charge thereof.' (ref. 19)
The conflicting evidence contained in contemporary descriptions and illustrations makes it
impossible to give an exact and detailed account
of the sundial column. John Strype, for example,
writing in 1720, states that the sundial was 'fixed
on a Pillar of black Marble, after the Corinthian
Order', but on the next page he refers to it as a
'Stone Pillar or Column'. (ref. 20) Taking all the evidence into account, a picture emerges of a fluted
column, most probably of an enriched Doric
order, standing on a pedestal having a panelled
die, rising from a square plinth formed of three
wide steps. The cube bearing the four sundial
faces appears to have rested on a group of consoles
or carved ornaments above the abacus of the
column's capital, and was in turn surmounted by
four diagonally placed consoles supporting a sphere,
probably gilded.
From 1657 the parishioners contributed towards the upkeep of the posts and rails 'round the
place Called by the name of the Mount'. The
contributions were collected annually on behalf
of the Earls and Dukes of Bedford from their
lessees, but the maintenance was carried out
under the supervision of the parish officers. (ref. 21)
Contributions continued to be collected from
lessees until 1705–6, when the market, which had
hitherto occupied the roadway on the south side
of the square, was moved inside the rails. Thereafter the market gradually encroached further and
further over the central area until it became the
dominant feature of the Piazza and its revenues
the main consideration of Bedford estate policy.