View of the Junction of Howard Street and Norfolk Street, London. John Crowther, watercolour, 1880.

Norfolk Street in the Liberty of the Savoy (between Westminster and the City of London) ran from Strand in the north to the Westminster reach of the Thames. It then ran to a strand of public gardens after the Victoria Embankment was built (1865–70), what is now Temple Place. It was crossed only by Howard Street. It was demolished in the 1970s.

History

The vicinity of Norfolk Street (centre) on a 1950s Ordnance Survey map.
Map by Wenceslaus Hollar (c. 1670s) showing Arundel House.
A map showing the Liberty of the Savoy in light pink in about 1870. Based on the Ordnance Survey Town Plan of London (1871-76) at 1:1056 scale. Click for broader map and to enable varied magnification.

The Street was built on land once occupied by Arundel House and its gardens, the property of the Howard family, Dukes of Norfolk;[1] a dukedom (before which earldom) of medieval root. The head of the family plays a role in each coronation and each state opening of parliament. Off from its central crossroads are Arundel, Surrey and Howard Streets built after sprawling Arundel House was demolished by the earl of Arundel in 1678.[2] Under Duke of Norfolk, Surrey and Arundel are subsidiary earldoms, plus Howard is used, the surname of the family.

A Norfolk Street tube station was planned in 1902, never built.

Norfolk Street and Howard Street were demolished in the 1970s to build Arundel Great Court, or Great Arundel Court, itself demolished in the mid 2010s[3][4] – having been purchased in 2012.[5][6]

Buildings

The numbering scheme of latter decades is known.

№ 11 to 12: the south-west corner: Amberley House, office of the Ecclesiastical Association.[4]

№ 10: Hastings House: hosted the Women Writers' Club from 1894.[7] From here the early literary agent A. P. Watt (1834–1914) practised.[8] By the 1900s the Middle Classes Defence Organization shared the building.[9]

Oswaldestre House

Oswaldestre House, 33–35 Norfolk Street.

№ 33 to 35: Oswaldestre House: was associated with engineering and radio technology. The name is a subsidiary title of the Dukes of Norfolk. The Engineer newspaper (est. 1856) was based there[10] and the building was also the registered address of a large number of consulting engineers, such as Henry Metcalfe Hobart. The Western Electric Company had an early radio station (2WP) on the third floor of the building in 1922.[11][12]

Former inhabitants

Those having at least lived some time here include:[13]

References

  1. ^ Bebbington, Gillian. (1972) London street names. London: B.T. Batsford. p. 27. ISBN 0713401400
  2. ^ Richardson, John. (2000). The annals of London: A year-by-year record of a thousand years of history. Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press. p. 155. ISBN 978-0-520-22795-8.
  3. ^ Westminster Planning Applications: Great Arundel Court https://idoxpa.westminster.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=documents&keyVal=PR8DX5RP2NK00
  4. ^ a b Amberley House, 11–12 Norfolk Street, Westminster. Historic England. Retrieved 23 January 2017.
  5. ^ Land Securities sells Arundel Great Court. Land Securities, 29 March 2012. Retrieved 25 January 2017.
  6. ^ The Strand deserves to be treated with much more respect by King’s College. Simon Jenkins, Evening Standard, 5 May 2015. Retrieved 25 January 2017.
  7. ^ Brake, Laurel & Marysa Demoor. (Eds.) (2009). Dictionary of nineteenth-century journalism in Great Britain and Ireland. Gent & London: Academia Press & The British Library. p. 686. ISBN 978-90-382-1340-8.
  8. ^ Gillies, Mary Ann. (2007). The professional literary agent in Britain, 1880–1920. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. p. 62. ISBN 978-0-8020-9147-5.
  9. ^ "Altercation over civil society: The bitter cry of the Edwardian middle classes" by Philip Waller in Jose Harris, ed. (2005). Civil society in British history: Ideas, identities, institutions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 132. ISBN 978-0-19-927910-4.
  10. ^ Oswaldestre House, 33–35 Norfolk Street, Westminster, Greater London. Historic England. Retrieved 23 January 2017.
  11. ^ Briggs, Asa. (1961). The history of broadcasting in the United Kingdom: Volume I: The birth of broadcasting. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 81. ISBN 978-0-19-212926-0.
  12. ^ Archive: When radio went live; Chris Upton looks back 80 years to the first radio broadcast in Birmingham. thefreelibrary.com Retrieved 25 January 2017.
  13. ^ Williams, George G. Assisted by Marian and Geoffrey Williams. (1973) Guide to literary London. London: Batsford. pp. 85–86. ISBN 0713401419
  14. ^ The Quiver, Annual Volume, 1903, page 463

External links

51°30′42.62″N 0°6′52.85″W / 51.5118389°N 0.1146806°W / 51.5118389; -0.1146806

Categories