Chancery Lane

South out of High Holborn at 310 to 192 Fleet Street. The southern end only is in Farringdon Ward Without, the northern portion lying outside the City boundary in the Borough of Holborn and the City of Westminster (P.O. Directory).

First mention: "Chauncery lane," 32 H. VI. 1454 (Cal. P.R. H. VI. 1452–61, p. 153).

Former names and forms: "Newstrate," 1227 (Cal. Ch. Rolls, I. 51). "Neustrate," 1231 (ib. 143). "Newestret," 1235 (ib. 199). "Vico conversorum," "Convers lane," 1278 (Ct. H.W. I. 36–9). "Nova Strata," 10 Ed. I (Hust. Roll, 13, No. 80). In "nouo vico," called in English "Newstrete," 1232 (Ely Epis. Rec. G. 3 f. 225d). "Converslone," 1338 (Cal. P.R. Ed. III. 1338–40, p. 61). "Chauncelleres lane," 13 Ed. III. (Cal. P.R. Ed. III. 1338–40, p. 305). "le Chaunceler lane," 7 Rich. II. (Cott. MS. Nero, E. VI. f. 31). "Chauncler Lane," 11th H. VIII. (L. and P. H. VIII. III. (1), p. 126). "Channsler Lane," 6 H. VIII. (ib. I. p. 814).

The original name "Neustrate" commemorates its erection, the second name, "vico conversorum," commemorates the House of Converts which stood in the lane, See Converts (House of), while the name seems to have been altered to "Chauncellereslane" in the time of Ed. III., probably when the House of Converts was made use of as a Rolls Office for the security of the records (S. p. 396).

In the course of excavations in 1898 for a new building on the site of No. 89 the gravel was reached at a depth of 12 ft.

Chancery Lane, a long lane, running northwards from Fleet Street into Holborn; called originally New Street.

Long Chancery Lane retentive rolls the sound.—POPE.

Beyond this Old Temple and the Bishop of Lincolne's House is New Street, so called in the reign of Henry III., when he of a Jew's house, founded the House of Converts betwixt the Old Temple and the New. The same street hath since been called Chancery Lane, by reason that King Edward III. annexed the House of Converts by patent to the Office of Custos Rotulorum, or Master of the Rolls.—Stow, p. 163.

Next to this house of friars [the "old friar house juxta Holborne"] was one other great house, sometime belonging to the Bishop of Chichester, whereof Matthew Paris writeth thus: "Ralph de Nova Villa, or Nevill, Bishop of Chichester and Chancellor of England, sometime built a noble house, even from the ground, not far from the new Temple and House of Converts; in which place he deceased in the year 1244." In this place, after the decease of the said bishop, and in place of the House of Black Friars before spoken of, Henry Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, Constable of Chester, and Custos of England, built his inn, and for the most part was lodged there: he deceased in this house in the year 1310. ... This Lincoln's Inn, sometime pertaining to the Bishops of Chichester, as a part of the said great house, is now an Inn of Court. ... In the reign of Henry VIII. Sir Thomas Lovell was a great builder there; especially he built the Gate-house and forefront towards the east, placing thereon as well the Lacies' arms as his own. ... The rest of that side, even to Fleet Street, is replenished with fair buildings.—Stow, p. 164.

The memory of the bishops' house is preserved in Chichester Rents. In the Syllabus to vol. xvii. of Rymer's Foedera a document is indexed of 37 Edw. III. (1363), "De pecuniis consuetis pro emendatione Faytour Lane et Chanceller Lane."

This Chancellor's Lane (now called Chancery Lane), in Edward I.'s time, was so foul and miry, that John Briton, Custos of London, had it barred up, to hinder any harm that might happen in passing that way: and the Bishop of Chichester, whose house was there, kept up the bar for many years. But after divers years, upon an inquisition made of the annoyances of London, the inquest presented that John Bishop of Chichester, ten years past, stopt up a certain Lane, called Chancellor's Lane, "Levando ibid. duas stapulas cum una barra," i.e. by setting up there two staples with one bar cross the said lane, whereby men with carts and other carriages could not pass. The Bishop said that John Breton, while he was Custos of London, for that the said lane was so dirty that no man could pass, set up the said staples and bar "ad viam illam defutand." and he granted that what was annoyance should be taken away. And so the sheriff was commanded to do it.—Strype, B. iv. p. 70.

The great Lord Strafford was born in this lane, April 13, 1593, "at the house of his mother's father, Mr. Robert Atkinson, a bencher of Lincoln's Inn;" the register of St. Dunstan's, Fleet Street, records his baptism. Henry Baker (1698–1774), one of the founders of the Society of Arts, and Defoe's son-in-law, was born here. Eminent Inhabitants.—Isaak Walton (1627–1644), in what was then the seventh house on the left hand as you walk from Fleet Street into Holborn. In 1638 his yearly rent was estimated at £31: 10s. higher than any other except one in that part of Chancery Lane. In 1644, when the King demanded a sum of £40,000 from the citizens, "Isaack Walton, of St. Dunstan's in the West," was assessed at £3. Walton subsequently lived in the house at the western corner of the Lane and Fleet Street. The house had two doors, and his was the second door from the corner. Lord Chief-Justice Hyde (d. 1631). Francis North, Lord Keeper Guilford.

His Lordship [Lord Keeper Guilford] settled himself in the great brick house near Serjeants' Inn in Chancery Lane, which was formerly the Lord Chief Justice Hyde's; and that he held till he had the Great Seal, and some time after. ... When his lordship lived in this house, before his lady began to want her health, he was in the height of all the felicity his nature was capable of. He had a seat in St. Dunstan's Church appropriated to him, and constantly kept the church in the mornings. ... His house was to his mind, and having, with leave, a door into Serjeants' Inn Garden, he passed daily with ease to his chambers dedicated to business and study.—North's Life of Lord Keeper Guilford, p. 164.

The sewerage arrangements, however, somewhat marred his felicity. He found the cellar of his house obnoxious from all the drainage of the house going into a small well there, "and when it was full a pump went to work to carry it into the open kennel of the street." He tried to persuade the other owners of houses to "join in the charges of making a drain, or sewer, all along the street, deep enough to discharge into the grand common sewer of Fleet Street." Chancery Lane, down to about 1670, was therefore without any sewer. Even then the inhabitants strongly resisted the proposal, and it was only by applying to the Commissioners of Sewers that his Lordship carried his point. November 19, 1672, "Bishop Wilkins (of Chester) died of the stone at the Dean of Canterbury's (Tillotson) house in Chancery Lane."¹ Sir John Trevor, Master of the Rolls and Speaker, died in Chancery Lane in 1717. At No. 55 Cowper the poet breakfasted with his friend, Samuel Rose. Thomas Moore describes a dinner at Horace Twiss's in Chancery Lane "in a borrowed room, with champagne, pewter spoons, and old Lady Cork."

Jacob Tonson's first shop was at or near the Fleet Street end of Chancery Lane, and distinguished by the sign of the Judge's Head. About 1697 he removed to Gray's Inn Gate, where he remained till about 1712, and then removed to a house in the Strand, over against Catherine Street. Here he adopted Shakespeare's Head for his sign.

Lord Campbell in his early London years was member of a debating society which "met at the Crown and Rolls in Chancery Lane." It was then declining, but "had boasted of such distinguished members as Canning, Scarlett, Mackintosh, Bobus Smith, Perceval, and Hallam."²

A house on the east side near Holborn, since rebuilt, was the scene of an alleged murder by poison, for which Eliza Fenning was executed in 1815. The case created the greatest interest, a very large number of persons believing that the accused person was innocent.

William Pickering, famed for choice books and choice editions, was at No. 57. At No. 119 are Messrs. Stevens the law publishers. At No. 115 are Hodgson's book auction rooms, where many fine libraries have been dispersed, and "remainders" disposed of. Hodgson previously occupied the east corner of Chancery Lane and Fleet Street, which was rebuilt and is now occupied by Partridge and Cooper, stationers.

Observe.—Old Lincoln's Inn gateway, of the age of Henry VIII. (built, as stated above, by Sir Thomas Lovell, and dated 1518); Incorporated Law Society of the United Kingdom, 103 to 111, and the large and stately Union Bank (Italian of the three orders) erected at the corner of Carey Street in 1865, from the designs of Mr. F.W. Porter. At the back of the Rolls Chapel is Bowling Inn Alley. Mary Ann Clarke (the wife of a journeyman printer at Hansard's, and subsequently the mistress of the Duke of York) was the daughter of a man named Thompson, a journeyman labourer in this narrow court. Chancery Lane has been much improved in the last few years by the widening of the north end, the removal of mean houses, and the erection of houses of a better class, among them being several large blocks of chambers.

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¹ Birch's Life of Archbishop Tillotson, p. 44.
² Life of Lord Campbell, vol. i. p. 140.