Among the archives of Chelsea may be seen the will, dated in 1369, of the Earl of Warwick; and we know that long before that year he had come here with the prestige of his prowess at Poictiers, his courage at Cressy, and had built himself a house—the first great nobleman’s house erected here. But we do not know where it stood, nor anything more of it, than that it was afterwards leased by Richard III. to the widowed Duchess of Norfolk for the yearly rental of one red rose.
Sir Thomas More’s is the first house, as well as the fullest of human interest, of which we have any authentic record in Chelsea; and it was he who laid the foundations of the prosperity of the place. He built it for himself in 1520: glad to go from narrow Bucklersbury in the City to sweet sights and sounds and air for his young children. For more than two centuries his house stood here, tenanted by many families, famous and infamous, until 1740, when it was pulled down. It is a labour of love, and no difficult one, to reconstruct it as Bowack saw it: “This house is between 200 and 300 feet in length, has a stately ancient front towards the Thames, also two spacious courtyards, and behind it are _very fine gardens_. It is so pleasantly situated that the late Queen Mary had a great desire to purchase it before King William built Kensington Palace, but was prevented by some secret obstacles.” An old view signed “L. Knyff del: 1699,” shows us a projecting porch in the centre, a dozen or more generous windows on each floor, four of them oriel; and above, many gables, turrets, and a small tower. The back view crowds together, in picturesque confusion, a mass of casements, close packed gables, and jutting pent-houses. Such was “this pore howse in Chelchith” from which More dated one of his letters; and Erasmus wrote of it that it was “neither mean nor invidiously grand, and so subject to envy, yet commodious enough.” It stood on the slope a little back from the river, half-way up to the King’s Road, about where Beaufort Street now runs. A spacious garden lay in front, too, wherein the great Chancellor was wont to walk, as well as on the gate-house, which, in the words of Aubrey, “was flatt on the top, leaded, from whence is a most pleasant prospect of the Thames and the fields beyond.” Sometimes he walked with his guest Holbein; sometimes with his friend Ellis Heywood, poet and playwright, who wrote warmly about “this enchanting spot”; sometimes with his King, Henry VIII., who, still posing as a good Catholic and Defender of the Faith, used to come up the river, drop into dinner, and saunter afterward in the garden, his arm about More’s neck. The son-in-law, Roper, records this with delight, “never having seen the King so familiar with any one else, except Wolsey.” More knew just what all this was worth, and that his head would count, with the king, for nothing against “say a French city or a citadel.” Wolsey’s fate—the fate of so many others—howbeit warned none of the rest; else could they not have forgotten that to every neck on which had hung that royal ruffian’s arm the axe soon came; and that to be his friend was only a little less dangerous than to be his wife.