Norfolk House

Last updated

Norfolk House in 1932 NorfolkHouse StJames'sSquare 1932.jpg
Norfolk House in 1932
Norfolk House is on the far right on this mid-18th-century engraving. J Bowles's view of St James's Square.jpg
Norfolk House is on the far right on this mid-18th-century engraving.
The location of Norfolk House is shown on this 1799 map. St James's Square 1799.jpg
The location of Norfolk House is shown on this 1799 map.
The office block known as "Norfolk House" which replaced the ducal townhouse in 1938, and which is due for demolition and redevelopment after 2019 Norfolk House, St James's Square - geograph.org.uk - 784034.jpg
The office block known as "Norfolk House" which replaced the ducal townhouse in 1938, and which is due for demolition and redevelopment after 2019

Norfolk House was the London residence of the Howard family headed by the Dukes of Norfolk, and as such more than one building has been given this name. The first was opposite Lambeth Palace, set in acres of garden and orchards on a site occupying what is now the Novotel London Waterloo on Lambeth Road (the remains of the Howard family vault and chapel still being visible in the former parish church of St Mary-at-Lambeth).

Contents

The later Norfolk House at 31 St James's Square, Westminster, was built between 1748 and 1752 as the London townhouse of Edward Howard, 9th Duke of Norfolk (1686–1777), to the design of Matthew Brettingham (1699–1769), "the Elder". This building was demolished in 1938. [2] The duke's country house and main seat was Worksop Manor in Nottinghamshire. Norfolk House was built on a site formerly occupied by two houses, namely St Albans House, the residence of the Earl of St Albans (purchased by Thomas Howard, 8th Duke of Norfolk in 1722), and the other the residence of John Belasyse, 1st Baron Belasyse (1614–1689) (purchased by the 9th Duke of Norfolk in 1748). Both these houses were demolished in 1748 by the 9th Duke of Norfolk in preparation for his new house.

St Albans House

St Albans House was a royal residence for a short time, after the 9th Duke of Norfolk offered it to Frederick, Prince of Wales, following his marriage in 1736 to Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha. The couple lived there 1737–1741, and their son King George III was born in the house. The family moved to Leicester House in 1742, which remained the prince's home until his death nine years later, and that of his widow until her death in 1772.

Norfolk House

Norfolk House remained in the ownership of the Dukes of Norfolk until 1938 when it was pulled down and replaced by an office building. During the Second World War this building served as offices for senior officers from a variety of Allied armed forces, including the Canadian 1st Army and the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force under General Dwight D. Eisenhower. Two plaques on the exterior of the building commemorate the role of the building in the War. The 1930s building was fully refitted in the years before 2019. The office space became obsolete for modern requirements and in 2019 plans were submitted to demolish it and rebuild at a cost of £60 million in line with modern requirements. [3]

Music Room

Parts of the interior of the eighteenth-century house survive, having been removed before demolition, including the Music Room, designed by Giovanni Battista Borra for the ninth Duke's wife Mary Blount, now displayed in the Victoria and Albert Museum, restored and redecorated to its original scheme of brilliant white paintwork with gilt, carved woodwork.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Theater of Operations, United States Army</span> Major formation of the United States Army in the Western Front of World War II

The European Theater of Operations, United States Army (ETOUSA) was a theater of Operations responsible for directing United States Army operations throughout the European theatre of World War II, from 1942 to 1945. It commanded Army Ground Forces (AGF), United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), and Army Service Forces (ASF) operations north of Italy and the Mediterranean coast. It was bordered to the south by the North African Theater of Operations, United States Army (NATOUSA), which later became the Mediterranean Theater of Operations, United States Army (MTOUSA).

Supreme Allied Commander is the title held by the most senior commander within certain multinational military alliances. It originated as a term used by the Allies during World War I, and is currently used only within NATO for Supreme Allied Commander Europe and Supreme Allied Commander Transformation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bushy Park</span> Public park in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames

Bushy Park in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames is the second largest of London's Royal Parks, at 445 hectares in area, after Richmond Park. The park, most of which is open to the public, is immediately north of Hampton Court Palace and Hampton Court Park and is a few minutes' walk from the west side of Kingston Bridge. It is surrounded by Teddington, Hampton, Hampton Hill and Hampton Wick and is mainly within the post towns of Hampton and Teddington, those of East Molesey and Kingston upon Thames taking the remainder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force</span> Military unit

Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force was the headquarters of the Commander of Allied forces in northwest Europe, from late 1943 until the end of World War II. US General Dwight D. Eisenhower was the commander in SHAEF throughout its existence. The position itself shares a common lineage with Supreme Allied Commander Europe and Atlantic, but they are different titles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Allied Force Headquarters</span> Mediterranean headquarters 1942–1945

Allied Force Headquarters (AFHQ) was the headquarters that controlled all Allied operational forces in the Mediterranean theatre of World War II from August 1942 until the end of the war in Europe in May 1945.

The Allied Expeditionary Air Force (AEAF), also known as the Allied Armies’ Expeditionary Air Force (AAEAF), was the expeditionary warfare component of the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) which controlled the tactical air power of the Allied forces during Operation Overlord during World War II in 1944.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">St James's Square</span> Square in the City of Westminster, London

St James's Square is the only square in the St James's district of the City of Westminster and is a garden square. It has predominantly Georgian and Neo-Georgian architecture. For its first two hundred or so years it was one of the three or four most fashionable residential streets in London. It now has headquarters of a number of well-known businesses, including BP and Rio Tinto Group; four private members' clubs, the East India Club, the Naval and Military Club, the Canning Club, and the Army and Navy Club; the High Commission of Cyprus; the London Library; and global think tank and peace-promoter Chatham House.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lambeth Walk</span> Road in Lambeth, London

Lambeth Walk is a street in Lambeth, London, England, off Lambeth Road. It was at the heart of a working-class residential area and there was a street market.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Robb (RAF officer)</span> Royal Air Force Air Chief Marshal (1895–1968)

Air Chief Marshal Sir James Milne Robb, was a senior Royal Air Force commander. After early service in the First World War with the Northumberland Fusiliers, Robb joined the Royal Flying Corps and became a flying ace credited with seven aerial victories. He was granted a permanent commission in the Royal Air Force in 1919 and commanded No. 30 Squadron RAF in the Iraqi revolt against the British. In 1939, Robb travelled to Canada to help establish the Empire Air Training Scheme, a massive training program that provided the Royal Air Force with trained aircrew from Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Southern Rhodesia. He commanded No. 2 Group RAF of RAF Bomber Command and No. 15 Group RAF of RAF Coastal Command.

Robert Abraham (1773–1850) was an English building surveyor and later architect in London. He was the son of a builder and was educated as a surveyor as a pupil of James Bowen. He turned to architecture after 1818, and was chiefly employed by the leading Roman Catholic families in England, including the Duke of Norfolk and the Earl of Shrewsbury.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Bingham, 2nd Earl of Lucan</span> Irish landowner and Tory politician (1764–1839)

Richard Bingham, 2nd Earl of Lucan, styled The Honourable from 1776 to 1795 and subsequently Lord Bingham until 1799, was an Irish peer and Tory politician.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Whiteley (British Army officer)</span>

General Sir John Francis Martin Whiteley, was a senior British Army officer who became Deputy Chief of the Imperial General Staff (DCIGS). A career soldier, Whiteley was commissioned into the Royal Engineers from the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich in 1915 during the First World War. During the war he served in Salonika and the Middle East.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Camp Griffiss</span> Former US military base in Bushy Park, London

Camp Griffiss was a US military base in the United Kingdom during and after World War II. Constructed within the grounds of Bushy Park in Middlesex, England, it served as the European Headquarters for the United States Army Air Forces from July 1942 to December 1944. From here Dwight D. Eisenhower planned the D-Day invasion. Most of the camp's huts had been removed by the early 1960s, and a memorial tablet now stands on the site.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth Strong</span> British Army general and civil servant (1900–1982)

Major-General Sir Kenneth William Dobson Strong was a senior officer of the British Army who served in the Second World War, rising to become Director General of Intelligence. A graduate of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Strong was commissioned into the 1st Battalion, Royal Scots Fusiliers in 1920. After service as an Intelligence Officer with his battalion in Ireland from 1920 to 1922 during the Irish War of Independence, he volunteered for service as an interpreter and was posted to Germany with the British Army of the Rhine. In 1935 he returned to Germany as a member of the International Force supervising the Saarland plebiscite. Afterwards, he joined the German Intelligence Section at the War Office. In 1937 he became Assistant Military attaché in Berlin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Humfrey Gale</span> British Army general (1890–1971)

Lieutenant General Sir Humfrey Myddelton Gale, was an officer in the British Army who served in the First and Second World War, during which he was Chief Administrative Officer at Allied Forces Headquarters and later SHAEF under General Dwight D. Eisenhower. After the Second World War he was European Director of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, worked for the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, and was chairman of the Basildon, Essex New Town Development Corporation

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American War Memorial, Gibraltar</span> Monument in Line Wall Road, Gibraltar

The American War Memorial is a World War I memorial in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. It was built for the American Battle Monuments Commission in 1933, and incorporated into the main city wall, the Line Wall Curtain. It commemorated the successful alliance of the United States and the United Kingdom in their naval exploits in the vicinity of Gibraltar during the Great War. The monument was inaugurated in 1937. Sixty-one years later, in November 1998, the monument was the site of another unveiling ceremony, that of a bronze plaque which commemorated the World War II Allied invasion of North Africa, Operation Torch. That unveiling ceremony was one of a number of events that weekend whose guests included dignitaries from the United Kingdom and the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Townhouse (Great Britain)</span> Town or city residence of a member of the British nobility or gentry

In British usage, the term townhouse originally referred to the opulent town or city residence of a member of the nobility or gentry, as opposed to their country seat, generally known as a country house or, colloquially, for the larger ones, stately home. The grandest of the London townhouses were stand-alone buildings, but many were terraced buildings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henry J. F. Miller</span> US Army general

Henry Jervis Friese Miller served as a general in the United States Army Air Forces during World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">June 6, 1944, order of the day</span> World War II order

The June 6, 1944, order of the day was issued by Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force General Dwight D. Eisenhower to Allied forces on the eve of D-Day, the first day of the invasion of Normandy. The message was intended to impress upon the troops the importance of their mission which Eisenhower called a "Great Crusade". Eisenhower had been drafting the order since February 1944 and recorded a spoken version on May 28, that was broadcast on British and American radio on D-Day.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">People of Western Europe speech</span> 1944 speech by Dwight D. Eisenhower

The "People of Western Europe" speech was made by Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force General Dwight D. Eisenhower in the run-up to the invasion of Normandy in 1944. Addressed to the people of occupied Europe it informed them of the start of the invasion and advised them on the actions Eisenhower wanted them to take. It also addressed the Allies' plans for post-liberation government.

References

  1. "Three gunning for £60m Eisenhower office block".
  2. 'St James's Square: No 31, Norfolk House', in Survey of London: Volumes 29 and 30, St James Westminster, Part 1, ed. F H W Sheppard (London, 1960), pp. 187-202. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-london/vols29-30/pt1/pp187-202
  3. "Three gunning for £60m Eisenhower office block".

51°30′26″N0°8′2″W / 51.50722°N 0.13389°W / 51.50722; -0.13389