Hanover Square

Hanover-Square,—nearly op. 132, Oxford-st. about ⅝ of a mile on the L. from St. Giles's, or a few doors E. from 58, New Bond-st.

Hanover-Sq., Oxford-street, is a square built about 1760, and named in compliment to the present royal family. It is situated on the south side of Oxford-street, between Regent-street and New Bond-street, and is entered by Harewood-place, in which is the town mansion of the Earl of Harewood. In Great George-street is the handsome church of st. George, Hanover-square. See that church.

Hanover Square, Oxford Street, between Regent Street and New Bond Street, built circ. 1718. In 1719 it is called "Hanover Square Street." The first inhabitants were: (1720) Lord Carpenter, Sir Theodore Jansen, Lord Hillsborough, Duke of Montrose, Lord Dunmore. North.—Colonel Fane, Mr. Sheldon, Earl of Coventry, Lord Brook, General Stewart, Duke of Roxburgh, General Evans,¹ Count Kinski, Austrian ambassador.

Among these suburban temtories on this side, in the way towards Tyburn, there are certain new and splendid buildings, called in honour of his present Majesty [George I.],—Hanover Square,—some finished, and some erecting; consisting of many compleat and noble houses. One whereof is taken by my Lord Cowper, late Lord High Chancellor of England.—Strype, B. iv. p. 120.

September 4, 1725.—I went away towards Hyde Park, being told of a fine avenue made to the east side of the park, fine gates and a large Visa, or opening, from the new squares called Hanover Square, etc. ... In the tour I passed an amazing scene of new foundations, not of houses only, but as I might say of new cities, new towns, new squares, and fine buildings, the like of which no city, no town, nay no place in the world can show; nor is it possible to judge where or when they will make an end or stop of building.—Applebee's Journal

Colonel. And pray, Sir John, how do you like the town? You have been absent for a long time.
Sir John. Why I find little London stands just where it did when I left it last.
Neveront. What do you think of Hanover Square? Why, Sir John, London is gone out of town since you saw it.—Swift's Polite Conversation.

Malone in a memorandum, dated March 8, 1789, of a conversation with Horace Walpole that morning, says:—

He [Walpole] has a copy of a very curious letter of Lady M.W. Montague's, giving an account of a private society that used to meet about the year 1730 at Lord Hillsborough's in Hanover Square, where each gentleman came masked, and brought with him one lady—either his mistress, or any other man's wife, or perhaps a woman of the town—who was also masked. They were on oath not to divulge names, and continued masked the whole time. There were tables set out for supper, artificial arbours, couches, etc., to which parties retired when they pleased, and called for what refreshment they chose. ... This institution probably lasted but a short time. The late Captain O'Brian told me that his father, Sir Edward, was one of the members.—Prior's Life of Malone, p. 152.

George Granville, Lord Lansdowne, the poet, died in Hanover Square, January 30, 1735. Here Pope's Lord Cobham had a house; Ambrose Philips died here in 1749, and Admiral Lord Rodney in 1792. Lord Anson (d. 1762).

I went next morning to visit Admiral Anson. ... I was shown into the back parlour of a small house in Hanover Square. It was well adorned with books in glass-cases, even from the ceiling to the floor.—Mrs. Pilkington's Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 273.

I have been down at Stoke to see poor Lady Cobham, and after about three weeks passed there I returned with her to town, and have been ever since, till about ten days ago, by her desire with her in Hanover Square.—Gray to Wharton, November 28, 1759.

Single-speech Hamilton was living in Hanover Square (April 1765) when he persisted in demanding that Burke should transfer his pension to his attorney in trust for Hamilton himself.¹ Perceval Pott, the celebrated surgeon, took a house in Hanover Square in 1777, and died in it in 1788. No. 23 was the last London residence of Augusta, Duchess of Brunswick, wife of the Duke of Brunswick who fell at Jena, and mother of the Duke who fell at Quatrebras. She was the first-born of Frederick Prince of Wales, and was the baby whose birth occasioned the quarrel between George II. and Queen Caroline and their son the Prince of Wales. She was born in 1737 and died in 1813. No. 21, corner of Brook Street, was the residence of Talleyrand when ambassador to England. Thomas Campbell.

At Lord Minto's residence in Hanover Square, a Poet's Room was prepared for his reception; and here according to invitation he took up his residence for the season. His Lordship, it is understood, availed himself occasionally of his services as secretary.—Beattie's Life of Thomas Campbell, vol. i. p. 383.

The statue of William Pitt, by Sir Francis Chantrey, set up in the year 1831, is of bronze, and cost £7000. On the east side of the square, No. 4, is the Hanover Square Club, formerly the Hanover Square Rooms, and on the west, No. 18, is the Oriental Club. No. 3 is the Zoological Society; No. 12 the Royal Agricultural Society; No. 13 Harewood House, the Earl of Harewood's (designed by R. Adam for the Duke of Roxburghe); No. 15 is the Royal Orthopoedic Hospital; No. 17 the Arts Club.

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¹ Harl. MS., 6850.
¹ Prior's Life of Burke, p. 74; Burke's Letters, vol. i. p. 63.

Hanover Square ... house-building in London was not continuously carried on but came in waves. Each wave had its origin in a period of confidence and initiative, resulting partly from political events, partly from the turn of the trade cycle and a psychological recoil in favour of expansion and enterprise. One of these phases of confidence occurred about the time of the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. Utrecht was a Tory peace terminating a Whig war; but the death of Anne a year later brought the Whigs back to power under the dynasty whose favour they had prudently cultivated. After the fiasco of 1715 the texture of English opinion, shot through with prejudice of both kinds, was firmer than it had been for a century.

Against this background of social stability comes the great building salient in the north-west, conducted almost simultaneously on four large properties and extending from Swallow Street (roughly on the site of Regent Street) to Hyde Park. The first move appears to have been the planning of George Street and Hanover Square, westward of Swallow Street. The history of this unit is extremely obscure; no historian of London records the names of the promoters, builders or architect in spite of the fact that Hanover Square represents the foundation-stone of the Mayfair district almost as conspicuously as does Bloomsbury Square that of the northern residential area.

Some relevant facts, however, are known. One is that when the building of St. George's, Hanover Square, was projected in 1712 it was on a site presented by a certain General Stewart. Another is that when the first houses in the Square were finishing in 1717, this same Stewart was among the pioneer residents. He had been Anne's commander-in-chief in Ireland, where he owned considerable property; he died at the age of 82 in 1726 and his will mentions "messuages, lands, tenements and hereditaments" in Great Britain as well as Ireland, though it does not specify the locality, nor are any building activities mentioned in the contemporary notices of his death.

Whether or not Stewart took the initiative in forming Hanover Square, it is highly significant that the other residents there in 1717 included four of his brother Generals—Lord Cadogan, General Evans, General Carpenter and General Pepper. This little gang of military Whigs—all had served, with more or less distinction, in Marlborough's campaigns or in the "fifteen"—can hardly have come together in the new suburb by chance. Building developments of the period were very apt to take on a political character and the whole atmosphere of Hanover Square is as Whig as it can be: the very name of it stamps it with Whig loyalty—and, in addition, there are George Street and St. George's Church. Clearly, the generals pitched their camp in a definitely Whig terrain.

Both the plan and the architecture of this Hanoverian development are unique. The "Square" itself is a rectangle, with two streets entering on the long (east and west) sides and one street in the middle of each of the short (north and south) sides. The street entering from the south—George Street¹—is funnel-shaped, increasing rapidly in width as it approaches the square. Whether this freak of planning is a device to secure an imposing entry to the square, or whether it is a compromise with buildings already built before the square was conceived, I do not know. It certainly gives the portico of St. George's a better chance than it would have in a street of ordinary regular width; but, beyond that, the advantages are questionable. From the point of view of traffic, George Street is simply a bottle-neck. From the point of view of effect, its curious shape is not greatly in its favour.

The architecture of Hanover Square is very curious. Several samples survive of the type of façade which originally continued round most of the square and down George Street (the best are No. 24 in the square and Nos. 24 and 30 in the Street; see Plate XV). The dark grey, red and yellow brickwork is some of the finest of its kind, while the windows are narrow and connected into long vertical strips by brick "lacing" or rusticated "aprons". The whole effect is more decidedly Baroque than that of any other terrace-houses in London. Yet the mannerisms are those of a craftsman rather than an architect. The provenance of this type of house design is a mystery.

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¹ Now St. George Street.