[1] The institution was being formed chiefly in 1831. There is a prospectus dated May 28, 1831.[2a] On the owners of Cremorne House, built circa 1740, see Beaver, Chelsea, p. 156.[2b] A double-barrelled gun made according to the Baron’s patent for preventing accidents is shown in a table-case in the Chelsea Public Library. It is inscribed, ‘Patent Gun Manufactory, Cremorne House, Chelsea.’[2c] The fullest account of this extraordinary affair is in Atlay’s Trial of Lord Cochrane, in which the evidence is carefully brought together and sifted.[2d] Cruikshank also illustrated a ‘Stadium’ prospectus which was published in the form of an attractive little book in 1834.[3] In 1836 fireworks by Duffell and Darby. In 1837 a music and dancing licence was granted to ‘Charles Random.’ In 1837 and 1839 John Hampton’s balloon ascents and parachute experiments (cf. the Mirror, June 15, 1839). A fÊte-champÊtre and Mrs. Graham’s balloon, June 16, 1838. ‘A fÊte-champÊtre to the Foreign Ambassadors,’ July 21, 1838. Admission 5s. to 10s. 6d. FÊte for the benefit of the Poles, 1840 (Bell’s Life, August 23, 1840).[4a] See note by Cecil Howard and Clement Scott in Blanchard’s Life. Some details are differently given by Boase, Dict. Nat. Biog., art. ‘Nicholson.’ But I am not attempting a critical biography of this worthy.[4b] A portrait of Nicholson by James Ward, formerly hanging at the old Judge and Jury, Leicester Square, was sold at Puttick’s on February 7, 1899.[5] It is sometimes stated that Simpson bought the property in 1846, and put in James Ellis to act as manager. But other accounts speak of Ellis as the real lessee, 1846–1849, and this seems to be correct, because, when Ellis became bankrupt in 1849, execution for £8,000 was levied upon Cremorne. Ellis’s unsecured debts amounted to over £16,000, of which £250 was due to a confiding Cremorne waiter. The rent of the gardens had been £582 per annum, and there was an unpaid gas-bill for £665. Simpson was certainly proprietor from 1850 onwards to 1861.[7] In 1850 under Borini; in 1851 under Isaacson, of the Grecian Theatre. In 1860, Marriott’s band.[8a] At White Conduit House. See Wroth, London Pleasure-Gardens of the Eighteenth Century, p. 136.[8b] Among the miscellaneous amusements of this period are: 1849, circus from Astley’s; storming of Mooltan, military and pyrotechnic spectacle. 1850, dahlia show. 1851, Franconi’s circus; the Bosjesmans, the bushmen of South Africa.[9a] Theatrical Journal, 1852, p. 260.[9b] London Pleasure-Gardens, p. 321.[10a] Coxwell, My Life, second series, p. 13 f.; Boase, Biog. Dict., s.v. Latour.[10b] Creole choristers under Cave and Mackney in 1846. Miss Love also sang in 1846. In 1851 Lambert Edwards became popular as a comic singer. He published a Cremorne Song-Book, which, both for matter and metre, is trying reading.[10c] Stuart and Park, Variety Stage, p. 20 f.[10d] Ibid., p. 18 f.[12a] The programmes in the seventies were generally of virginal white, with embossed edges. They were scented by Rimmell, and some were printed in colours, with views of the gardens. They were of the ordinary theatre-programme shape.[12b] He died in 1872.[12c] Boase’s Biog. Dict., s.v.; Blanchard’s Life, ii., p. 472 f.; Sala in Daily Telegraph, August 7, 1894; Licensed Victuallers’ Gazette, March 22, 1889.[14a] G. L. Banks, Blondin (1862), p. 85.[14b] A married woman named Powell, who called herself ‘Madame Geneive (sic), the Female Blondin,’ was killed by falling from the rope on July 20, 1863, at Aston Park, Birmingham. The occasion was a Forester’s fÊte, and she was paid £15. The incident was a particularly shocking one, for the rope is said to have been old and decayed, and the poor woman, for certain reasons, ought to have been anywhere at the time rather than on the tight-rope.[15] Under Ellis in 1849 there had been a less elaborate ‘Eglinton Tournament’ managed by Batty, of Astley’s.[16a] A good account in Illustrated London News for July 18, 1863, apparently by Sala; also Illustrated Times of same date. In 1864 Smith gave a monster Belgian fÊte to the members of the Garde civique of Belgium. On the afternoon of July 14, 1866, there was a pretty juvenile fÊte, during which a number of miniature balloons were sent up to please the children.[16b] Some other entertainments during Smith’s management were: 1861, the graceful gymnast Leotard on five trapezes, in the Ashburnham Hall. March, 1863, dog-show in the Ashburnham Hall. This hall was also used for trotting matches and for wrestling and sports on Good Friday, 1865. 1868, Madame Pereira, gymnast.[16c] G. Bryan, Chelsea (1869), p. 169; Walford, Old and New London, v. 86. In July, 1864, EugÈne Godard’s huge Montgolfier balloon ascended from Cremorne, and came down in the East Greenwich marshes. It was heated by air, there being in the centre of the car a stove filled with rye-straw compressed into blocks. An earlier London ascent of a Montgolfier balloon took place at the Surrey Zoological Gardens (see infra). For Godard’s balloon, see Illustrated London News for July 30, 1864; Coxwell, My Life, second series, p. 207 f., with picture of the balloon. In August, 1865, Delamarne’s sailing balloon, L’EspÉrance, was shown. It was about 200 feet long, and had screw propellers and a rudder set in motion by machinery.[17] Burnand’s burlesque, Black-eyed Susan, was one of the entertainments under Baum.[18] Now Sydney Street.[19] Entertainments under Baum: Simmons’s balloon ascent, June 29, 1874; Audrian the dog-faced man, and his son, from a Russian forest, 1874; Boisset family, gymnasts, 1874; De Vere, conjuror, 1877; Doughty’s performing dogs, 1877.[22] Percy Fitzgerald in Gentleman’s Magazine, 1880, ‘Cremorne to Westminster.’[24] In October, 1904, this nursery was advertised for sale for building purposes, 100,000 feet and 900 feet frontage, but at the present moment (April, 1907) it has not yet been built over. In the rear of Messrs. Wimsett’s, and also on the site of Cremorne, was the nursery-ground of W. J. Bull, but since 1897 this space—an acre and a half—has been covered with flats and other buildings. The iron entrance-gates (see Frontispiece) now stand in Tetcott Street, on the premises of the Royal Chelsea Brewery (Welsh Ale Brewery, Limited), not far from the site of Cremorne.[25a] Blunt’s Chelsea, p. 19.[25b] About 1809 the Manor-House had been occupied by James Pilton, manufacturer of ornamental works for country residences (fences, summer-houses, etc.), and the grounds were neatly laid out as an open-air showroom, with a small menagerie and aviaries. A view of the garden and house from the Gentleman’s Magazine is here reproduced. See also Faulkner’s Chelsea, 1829, ii., p. 215.[28a] Blanchard says the theatre became absorbed in a building known as the Commercial Room (? the present Welsh Chapel in Radnor Street). By an evident slip he speaks of ‘Rodney’ instead of Radnor Street.[28b] There were a number of minor gardens in Chelsea and Pimlico, in the latter district the Gun and the Monster being the best known. Two others may be briefly noticed:

New Ranelagh and Minor Vauxhall, Millbank.—These gardens were near the river, and occupied a small space between the Belgrave Docks Wharf and Ranelagh Road. Part of the engineering works of James Simpson and Co., Limited (101, Grosvenor Road, Pimlico), now covers the site. They were advertised from about 1809. In the summer months (1809, 1811) there were ‘grand galas’ and balls, with concerts, and fireworks by Signora Hengler, the fireworker to Vauxhall Gardens. The admission tickets for the balls were neatly executed (see pp. 27, 28), but cost only 2s. 6d., and the dancers can hardly have been of the rank of the famous Chelsea ‘Ranelagh,’ which had come to an end in 1803. In 1810 and 1811 the proprietors gave a silver cup for sailing matches. The gardens retained some popularity till about 1829 (Picture of London; tickets, cuttings, etc., in the writer’s collection).

The Flask, Ebury Square.—An old tavern, of which there are various mentions in the eighteenth century (Crace, Catal., p. 311, No. 59; Beaver’s Chelsea, p. 307). In the thirties it had a tea-garden with a colonnade overgrown by creepers running round two sides of the garden, and a fine fountain. A skittle club played in the garden or in a covered pavilion adjoining. The tavern seems to have been demolished about 1868, when Ebury Square was partly rebuilt. There is an engraving of ‘The Flask Tavern,’ showing the garden, published in 1837 by J. Moore, from a drawing by H. Jones.[30] Hampton’s balloon, and Graham’s, which came into collision with the Exhibition, June 16, 1851 (Turnor’s Astra Castra, p. 220).[31] Soyer had superintended gratuitously various soup-kitchens for the poor of London, and established model kitchens at Scutari and in the Crimea during the war of 1855. G. A. Sala says of him: ‘He was a vain man, but he was good and kind and charitable.’[33] The house (pulled down in 1857) was about 150 yards to the east of the Albert Hall. The Imperial Institute and Imperial Institute Road are now on the site of the Horticultural Gardens.[37a] In 1828 Pickering Place and Terrace, close by, were built.[37b] Early in the thirties, before 1834.[38] Now 47, Hereford Road, Bayswater.[39] Modern Sabbath, 1797, p. 49.[40a] In 1824 a duel was interrupted by the police.[40b] August, 1822, p. 138 f.[40c] The Acrotormentarian Society.[42] The site is near the filter-beds of the New River Company.

The Eel-Pie (or Sluice) House Tavern has sometimes been confused with the Sluice House proper, a wooden building contiguous to it. The New River Company had one of their sluices here, and the house was tenanted by two of their walksmen or inspectors; view in Hone’s Every Day Book, 1826, p. 696.[44a] Sylvester (or Silvester) was one of the claimants to the invention of the optical ghost illusion well known as ‘Pepper’s Ghost’ at the Polytechnic (Frost’s Lives of the Conjurors, pp. 314, 329).[44b] J. Greenwood’s chapter is headed ‘Johnson’s Retreat.’ It may be doubtful whether it is intended for Weston’s, or for some other similar resort in the north of London.[46a] Boyne’s Trade Tokens, ed. Williamson, ii., p. 817, No. 61. An eighteenth-century proprietor named Holmes died in 1744.[46b] Green in 1823, 1832, etc.[47] On August 29, 1811, Sadler ascended from the Mermaid with Mr. H. Beaufoy; cf. Tyssen Library Catalogue (Hackney, 1888), pp. 6, 8, Journal of Aerial Voyage, etc.[48a] Stone pillars used as targets and called by various quaint names—Jehu, Old Absoly, Bob Peak, the Castle, etc. They were placed in the fields at unequal distances, like the ‘holes’ in a golf-course, and the archers passed from one to another.[48b] It is marked in a Finsbury Fields map of 1737.[48c] London Evening Post, August 4 to 7, 1764.[49] Hazlitt’s Indian Jugglers. Cavanagh declared that in this contest he played with his clenched fist.[50] There were already pony races for silver cups in August, 1836, when 2,000 people on one day visited the gardens (Bell’s Life).[51] Cf. Frost, Circus Life, p. 143.[54] According to Pinks (Clerkenwell, p. 501), the land was originally acquired in 1826 for £15,000, and walled in.[55a] Clinch, Marylebone, p. 183.[55b] Geary was the designer of the absurd statue of George IV.—the ‘Griffin’ of its day—that formerly stood at King’s Cross. He also designed one of the first gin-palaces in London (his name still appears cut in conspicuous letters as the architect of the Bell public-house (built 1835), No. 259, Pentonville Road), but afterwards repented and was one of the enthusiastic teetotallers who welcomed J. B. Gough on his visit to England, and planned a bazaar for a temperance fÊte at the Surrey Gardens in 1851 (Miller’s St. Pancras, p. 69).[56] When Lanza became bankrupt. He was the father of Rosalie Lanza, the operatic singer, and had some pupils who became well known. See Boase, Biog. Dict., s.v. Lanza.[57a] Advertisement in the Morning Post, February 8, 1781; cf. Wroth, London Pleasure-Gardens, p. 86.[57b] I find Rouse first mentioned as landlord of the Eagle in 1824, but the Eagle tavern was already in existence in November 1822, when a dinner took place there to welcome Henry Hunt, M.P., on his release from prison (Jackson’s Oxford Journal, November 16, 1822). A noisy crowd assembled in the neighbourhood and insisted on Hunt making a speech from the dining-room window.[58a] A letter from Harris written the day before his ascent, and enclosing a ticket to his balloon-makers to witness his ascent, is in the writer’s collection.[58b] He was the first proprietor (1837) of the Bower Saloon in Stangate Street, Westminster Bridge Road—a small theatre which nearly degenerated into a ‘penny gaff’ (Blanchard’s Life, p. 40, and bills of the Bower Saloon). There is a fairly common lithograph, ‘The Bower, Duke’s Arms, Stangate Street,’ showing a sort of garden entrance.[59a] On this lady and some of the tavern-concert singers of the time there is a rather breezy article in The Town for August 18, 1838.[59b] Now No. 128, Pentonville Road. Till about the seventies it had a garden space beside it, facing the road. Another place in the City Road, the Green Gate Tavern (now No. 220), preserved almost up to the nineties a small garden with its boxes and ‘a few old trees that still, in spite of fog and smoke, struggled into life as the summer came round, and formed a pleasant contrast to the dingy neighbourhood by which they were surrounded’ (H. Fancourt in the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, May 9, 1891). In the early fifties the Green Gate had a concert-room and a stage. A rough woodcut in the Paul Pry journal for 1854 shows a theatrical performance going on. Tall-hatted gentlemen are seated in the stalls, but in the pit or ‘promenade’ behind the audience is of a coster character. There is a water-colour drawing of the Green Gate by T. H. Sheperd, 1852, in the Crace Collection, Catalogue, p. 607, No. 4.[60] Glindon was famous for his ‘Biddy the Basket-woman’ and his ‘Literary Dustman.’[61a] It was generally open on Sundays for ‘promenading.’[61b] Miss M. A. Atkinson and others.[62a] H. Barton Baker, London Stage, ii., p. 30.[62b] Westland Marston, Our Recent Actors, ii., p. 261. Mr. Sala says that off the stage he was shy and sensitive.[63] His real name was Benjamin Oliver.[64a] This was on the site of an older building in the Eagle grounds, known at one time as the Olympic Pavilion, and opened in 1840.[64b] He is said (Baker, London Stage) to have given £21,000 for the Eagle, but I believe the sum paid was nearer £14,000.[66] B. O. Conquest covered this space with a permanent platform.[67] Some Singers and Actors at the Eagle.—Miss Tunstall sang in 1838, etc. Sims Reeves sang for a fortnight only—in 1839—at the garden concerts, under the name of Johnson.

Deulin ( = Isaac Dowling, d. 1860) made a reputation here as harlequin.

ThÉrÈse Cushine (d. 1856), the dancer, appeared first at the (old) Garrick and afterwards at the Eagle. She married Milano, the harlequin and ballet-master, who was at the Eagle circa 1847.

W. T. Moncrieff was one of the dramatic writers. E. L. Blanchard’s Arcadia was produced here in 1841. In this operetta Miss Forde, a charming ballad-singer, appeared as Phyllis.

Harriet Coveney, from circa 1840; Miss Carlotta Leclercq and other members of the Leclercq family; Harry Boleno, the pantomimist; Miss C. Parkes, columbine, 1851; T. Mead, the actor, 1859; Herbert Campbell (d. 1904) in pantomime in the seventies; Baldwin, baritone singer (from 1833) was chorus-master.

Charles Montgomery in 1851 succeeded Campbell (the Sadler’s Wells actor) as stage-manager.

The musical director (1838–1840) was Harroway. C. Sloman, a comic singer and improvisatore, well known at the London gardens and tavern concerts, was concert director in 1860. Oscar Barrett was musical director, 1877.[69] Site.—A triangular piece of ground, bounded on the north by part of Shaftesbury Street, on the south by part of Wenlock Street; on the east by Wallbrook Street (now Cropley Street), on the west by Shepherdess Walk.

Entertainments.—The singers were of the tavern-concert rank. Miss Tunstall sang in 1843. In 1841 (or 1840?) Herring made a hit in The Imp of the Devil’s Gorge pantomime (cf. Blanchard’s Life, p. 479). In 1849 he was clown in Sinbad the Sailor. In 1840 Van Amburgh, the well-known lion-tamer of Vauxhall, etc., appeared with his lions and ‘colossal elephant.’ In 1837–1840, Devon and Cornwall wrestlers.[70a] The tavern is mentioned in Pigott’s Directory for 1827 as under John Gardner. In 1839, and still in the fifties, the proprietor was Thomas Gardner.[70b] The Globe club was still active in 1840 (Colburn’s Kalendar, 1840, p. 164).[73] Wright was landlord, 1837–1838.[75] The woodcut on Ireland’s bill announcing the race was taken from an old block representing, not Garratt, but Barry.[79] See Cremorne, supra, p. 5.[80] In 1850 ‘the immortal Charles Sloman,’ the improvisatore, appeared; 1852, Mrs. Graham’s balloon; 1855, Walter Stacey, manager; the Russelli family performed.[81a] W. C. Hazlitt’s Four Generations, etc., pp. 57, 58.[81b] The Montpelier Club afterwards (from 1840, or earlier) had their ground at the Beehive, Walworth. In 1844 the Beehive ground was required for building purposes, and the club obtained a lease (March, 1845) of the Oval, and in a year or two was merged in the Surrey County Club. The Beehive public-house, now 62, Carter Street (on the east of the site of the Surrey Gardens), represents an old tavern (1779 or earlier), which had about five acres of ground attached to it, with a tea-garden. In these gardens the balloon of the ill-fated Harris (see supra, p. 58) was exhibited in 1824 (cf. H. H. Montgomery’s Kennington, p. 169 f.). The old Beehive tavern was a long, low building with a veranda. In the garden was a maze and the original proprietor’s cottage, connected with the adjoining fields by a bridge over a stream. Mr. Wemmick’s Walworth residence in Great Expectations—a toy-house with a bridge—may be reminiscent of this (cf. H. H. Montgomery’s Old Cricket and Cricketers, London [1890], p. 44 f.).[82] At one time, apparently in the forties, there was a theatre in the gardens, at which Jefferini (Jeffreys), the long-legged clown, performed (Blanchard’s Life, p. 51).[83] Except in its last year (1877). A ball-room was built in 1850.[84] Marked in a map, 1814 (e.g.), as the Manor Farm Pond.[86a]

[86b] Cruikshank’s Comic Almanack, 1843.[88a] Cf. Cremorne, p. 16, supra.[88b] He died September, 1854. A portrait of him, after a painting by Agasse, is reproduced in Callow’s Old London Taverns, p. 303.[89] Godfrey’s band also continued to perform in 1853, under C. and D. Godfrey. The orchestra was replaced by another structure in 1848. Jullien’s band was at the gardens 1845–1852, then 1856, 1857.[90] J. Arban, musical director.[91] Site.—The Gardens were soon built over, but the site can be made out with little difficulty. There were three entrances: (1) (approached from the Walworth Road) in Manor Place; (2) and (3) (approached from the Kennington Park Road) in Penton Place and in New Street. The Manor Place entrance was about where that street is now crossed by Penton Place. The continuation of Manor Place is now on the site or boundary of the gardens.

The Penton Place entrance was about where that street is met by Amelia Street.

The New Street entrance was at the end of the street where it meets the continuation of Manor Place.

Part of Delverton Road, Suffield Road, Tarver Road, and Berryfield Road are also on the site. The Surrey Gardens Hotel, at the corner of Delverton Road and Manor Place, alone commemorates the vanished Zoo.