To the north of Conduit Street we come to Maddox Street, one of those formed by the Earl of Burlington as part of his building development, in 1721. It takes its curious name from that of the original ground landlord, Sir Benjamin Maddox, who died in 1670.
GEORGE STREET.
The chief thoroughfare running through Maddox Street is George Street, connecting Conduit Street with Hanover Square.
First named Great George Street in honour of King George I., it was formed about 1719, and, apart from its many past inhabitants of light and leading, is known all the world over as containing that church of St. George’s, Hanover Square, which has always been associated with the weddings of fashion.
ST. GEORGE’S, HANOVER SQUARE.
It was one of the fifty churches which were ordered to be erected in Queen Anne’s reign, and was commenced during the last year of her rule. It either took an unconscionable time in building or its erection was delayed, for it was not consecrated till 1724. James of Greenwich, as he is called, was the architect, and even Ralph, who wrote a sort of gossiping survey of London, and is so hypercritical that hardly anything in the metropolis wholly pleases him, unreservedly praises the elevation of its Corinthian portico and its lofty clock-tower. The interior is not particularly striking, but the marriage-registers are of the greatest interest and importance. Here will be found the names of the Duke of Kingston and Miss Chudleigh, who were married in 1769, the lady already being the wife of Mr. Hervey, and afterwards figuring in that celebrated bigamy case, about which most of us have read or heard. Three years after this wedding, we find the great miniature painter, Richard Cosway’s name opposite that of Marion Hatfield, who, as Mrs. Cosway, also made some mark as a painter of portraits “in little.”
Twenty years later Sir William Hamilton leads to the altar Emma Hart, whose name is as closely associated with the fame of Nelson and the genius of Romney as with that of her lawful lord; while at least one member of the Royal family has been married in St. George’s; for here, in 1793, the Duke of Sussex was united to Lady Augusta Murray, a marriage rendered void by the Royal Marriage Act.
Among other names which may be picked out from an almost inexhaustible list, are those of the Earl of Derby, who, on the death of his first wife, married in somewhat indecent haste, the beautiful and talented actress, Miss Farren, although the actual ceremony was performed at his Lordship’s house in Grosvenor Square; Mr. Heath, who was united here to the notorious Lola Montes, for whose “beaux yeux,” a king of Bavaria almost lost his throne; and Mr. Cross, who was married, in 1880, to Miss Evans, known to all readers as George Eliot.
George Street, Continued.
George Street, as well as Hanover Square, has in latter days taken on itself a certain business and commercial air, sadly at variance with its past traditions, for where we now find offices, and particularly dressmakers’ headquarters, once dwelt people of fashion, and some of national importance. For instance, No. 25, with its fine stone front, erected for Earl Temple in 1864, and later the residence of the Duchess of Buckingham, was, before its transformation a smaller house in which lived successively John Copley, the painter of the well-known “Death of Chatham,” and other much engraved pictures, and his son, who became Lord Chancellor Lyndhurst, and who died here in 1863.