The Kensington District

Part 1

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THE FASCINATION OF LONDON

THE KENSINGTON DISTRICT

IN THIS SERIES.

Cloth, price 1s. 6d. net; leather, price 2s. net, each.

THE STRAND DISTRICT.

By Sir WALTER BESANT and G. E. MITTON.

WESTMINSTER.

By Sir WALTER BESANT and G. E. MITTON.

HAMPSTEAD AND MARYLEBONE.

By G. E. MITTON. Edited by Sir WALTER BESANT.

CHELSEA.

By G. E. MITTON. Edited by Sir WALTER BESANT.

KENSINGTON.

By G. E. MITTON. Edited by Sir WALTER BESANT.

HOLBORN AND BLOOMSBURY.

By G. E. MITTON. Edited by Sir WALTER BESANT.

Herbert Railton]

The Fascination of London

KENSINGTON

BY G. E. MITTON

EDITED BY SIR WALTER BESANT

LONDON ADAM & CHARLES BLACK 1903

PREFATORY NOTE

A survey of London, a record of the greatest of all cities, that should preserve her history, her historical and literary associations, her mighty buildings, past and present, a book that should comprise all that Londoners love, all that they ought to know of their heritage from the past--this was the work on which Sir Walter Besant was engaged when he died.

As he himself said of it: "This work fascinates me more than anything else I've ever done. Nothing at all like it has ever been attempted before. I've been walking about London for the last thirty years, and I find something fresh in it every day."

Sir Walter's idea was that two of the volumes of his survey should contain a regular and systematic perambulation of London by different persons, so that the history of each parish should be complete in itself. This was a very original feature in the great scheme, and one in which he took the keenest interest. Enough has been done of this section to warrant its issue in the form originally intended, but in the meantime it is proposed to select some of the most interesting of the districts and publish them as a series of booklets, attractive alike to the local inhabitant and the student of London, because much of the interest and the history of London lie in these street associations.

The difficulty of finding a general title for the series was very great, for the title desired was one that would express concisely the undying charm of London--that is to say, the continuity of her past history with the present times. In streets and stones, in names and palaces, her history is written for those who can read it, and the object of the series is to bring forward these associations, and to make them plain. The solution of the difficulty was found in the words of the man who loved London and planned the great scheme. The work "fascinated" him, and it was because of these associations that it did so. These links between past and present in themselves largely constitute The Fascination of London.

Part 2

G. E. M.

KENSINGTON

When people speak of Kensington they generally mean a very small area lying north and south of the High Street; to this some might add South Kensington, the district bordering on the Cromwell and Brompton Roads, and possibly a few would remember to mention West Kensington as a far-away place, where there is an entrance to the Earl's Court Exhibition. But Kensington as a borough is both more and less than the above. It does not include all West Kensington, nor even the whole of Kensington Gardens, but it stretches up to Kensal Green on the north, taking in the cemetery, which is its extreme northerly limit.

If we draw a somewhat wavering line from the west side of the cemetery, leaving outside the Roman Catholic cemetery, and continue from here to Uxbridge Road Station, thence to Addison Road Station, and thence again through West Brompton to Chelsea Station, we shall have traced roughly the western boundary of the borough. It covers an immense area, and it begins and ends in a cemetery, for at the south-western corner is the West London, locally known as the Brompton, Cemetery. In shape the borough is strikingly like a man's leg and foot in a top-boot. The western line already traced is the back of the leg, the Brompton Cemetery is the heel, the sole extends from here up Fulham Road and Walton Street, and ends at Hooper's Court, west of Sloane Street. This, it is true, makes a very much more pointed toe than is usual in a man's boot, for the line turns back immediately down the Brompton Road. It cuts across the back of Brompton Square and the Oratory, runs along Imperial Institute Road, and up Queen's Gate to Kensington Gore. Thence it goes westward to the Broad Walk, and follows it northward to the Bayswater Road. Thus we leave outside Kensington those essentially Kensington buildings the Imperial Institute and Albert Hall, and nearly all of Kensington Gardens. But we shall not omit an account of these places in our perambulation, which is guided by sense-limits rather than by arbitrary lines.

The part left outside the borough, which is of Kensington, but not in it, has belonged from time immemorial to Westminster (see same series, Westminster, p. 2).

If we continue the boundary-line we find it after the Bayswater Road very irregular, traversing Ossington Street, Chepstow Place, a bit of Westbourne Grove, Ledbury Road, St. Luke's Road, and then curving round on the south side of the canal for some distance before crossing it at Ladbroke Grove, and continuing in the Harrow Road to the western end of the cemetery from whence we started.

The borough is surrounded on the west, south, and east respectively by Hammersmith, Chelsea, and Paddington, and the above boundaries, roughly given as they are, will probably be detailed enough for the purpose.

The heart and core of Kensington is the district gathered around Kensington Square; this is the most redolent of interesting memories, from the days when the maids of honour lived in it to the present time, and in itself has furnished material for many a book. Close by in Young Street lived Thackeray, and the Square figures many times in his works. Further northward the Palace and Gardens are closely associated with the lives of our kings, from William III. onward. Northward above Notting Hill is a very poor district, poor enough to rival many an East-End parish. Associations cluster around Campden and Little Campden Houses, and the still existing Holland House, where gathered many who were notable for ability as well as high birth. To Campden House Queen Anne, then Princess, brought her sickly little son as to a country house at the "Gravel Pits," but the child never lived to inherit the throne. Not far off lived Sir Isaac Newton, the greatest philosopher the world has ever known, who also came to seek health in the fresh air of Kensington.

The southern part of the borough is comparatively new. Within the last sixty years long lines of houses have sprung up, concealing beneath unpromising exteriors, such as only London houses can show, comfort enough and to spare. This is a favourite residential quarter, though we now consider it in, not "conveniently near," town. Snipe were shot in the marshes of Brompton, and nursery gardens spread themselves over the area now devoted to the museums and institute. It is rather interesting to read the summary of John Timbs, F.S.A., writing so late as 1867: "Kensington, a mile and a half west of Hyde Park Corner, contains the hamlets of Brompton, Earl's Court, the Gravel Pits, and part of Little Chelsea, now West Brompton, but the Royal Palace and about twenty other houses north of the road are in the parish of St. Margaret's, Westminster." He adds that Brompton has long been frequented by invalids on account of its genial air. Faulkner, the local historian of all South-West London, speaks of the "delightful fruit-gardens of Brompton and Earl's Court."

The origin of the name Kensington is obscure. In Domesday Book it is called Chenesitum, and in other ancient records Kenesitune and Kensintune, on which Lysons comments: "Cheneesi was a proper name. A person of that name held the Manor of Huish in Somersetshire in the reign of Edward the Confessor." This is apparently entirely without foundation. Other writers have attempted to connect the name with Kings-town, with equal ill-success. The true derivation seems to be from the Saxon tribe of the Kensings or Kemsings, whose name also remains in the little village of Kemsing in Kent.

HISTORY.

From Domesday Book we learn that the Manor of Kensington had belonged to a certain Edward or Edwin, a thane, during the reign of Edward the Confessor. It was granted by William I. to Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, under whom it was held by Alberic or Aubrey de Ver or Vere. The Bishop died in 1093, and Aubrey then held it directly from the Crown.

Aubrey's son Godefrid or Geoffrey, being under obligations to the Abbot of Abingdon, persuaded his father to grant a strip of Kensington to the Abbot. This was done with the consent of the next heir. The strip thus granted became a subordinate manor; it is described as containing "2 hides and a virgate" of land, or about 270 acres. This estate was cut right out of the original manor, and formed a detached piece or island lying within it.

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