Petty France, London

The back of No. 19, York Street (1848). In 1651 John Milton moved into a "pretty garden-house" in Petty France. He lived there until the Restoration. Later it became No. 19 York Street, belonged to Jeremy Bentham, was occupied successively by James Mill and William Hazlitt, and finally demolished in 1877.[1]

Jeremy Bentham lived in a house next to 19 York street.[2] The commemorative plaque was unveiled on 12 October 2004.

In A New View of London (1708) Edward Hatton wrote: 'Petit France' [sic], a considerable street between Tothill Street Westminster E and James Street W ... Stow says here was built 20 houses for poor women to dwell in rent free, by Cornelius Van Dun, a Brabanter, Yeoman of the Guard to King Henry VIII, King Edward VI, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth.'

The name is generally thought to refer to the settlement of Huguenot refugees in the area.[3] However, John Stow wrote of Petty France in A Survey of London (1598) and it is uncertain whether Huguenot refugees would have formed a notable community at that time. The London Encyclopaedia (1983, rev 1993) refers to the name deriving from the French wool merchants who used to live there.[4]

The name is also used to refer to the area in the vicinity of the street, the 7th Ward of Westminster.[3] There are similar street names elsewhere in London: e.g. a short street in Billingsgate in the City of London called Petty Wales.[3]

In the second half of the 18th century, "the name was changed to York Street from [Edward], Duke of York, son of George II, who had made a temporary residence amongst them".[5][lower-alpha 1] It retained this name until around 1925, when its previous name was restored.[lower-alpha 2]

In 1719, a house was acquired in Petty France to accommodate the Westminster Infirmary.[6] It was the first street in London to be paved for pedestrians,[7] and it was the location of the first custom built artificial ice-rink in London, called Niagara, which opened in the late 1890s.[8] The street was also the home for 50 years until 2002 of the London passport office at Clive House; it is now located at Globe House in Eccleston Square, Victoria.[9]

• Queen Anne's Mansions – Early block of flats in London
• John Cleland (1709–1789), journalist and the author of Fanny Hill, lived and died in a house on Petty France.[10]

• Grayling, A.C. (2013). "19 York Street". The Quarrel Of The Age: The Life And Times Of William Hazlitt. ISBN 9781780226798.
• Maskell, J. (1849). White, William (ed.). "Note". Notes and Queries. London [etc.] : Oxford University Press [etc.]: 254.
• Russan, Lilian; Russan, Ashmore (1923). Historic streets of London : an alphabetical handbook. London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent. p. 230.
• Schürer, Norbert, ed. (2012). Charlotte Lennox: Correspondence and Miscellaneous Documents (annotated ed.). Bucknell University Press. p. 205. ISBN 9781611483918.
• SFP staff (16 March 1927). "Ice carnivals of long ago". The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser (1884-1942). p. 6.
• Stephen, Leslie (1894). "Milton, John (1608-1674)" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 38. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 32.
• Taylor, David (9 January 2002). "New passport office opens". London Evening Standard.
• Wheatley, Henry Benjamin; Cunningham, Peter (2011) [1891]. London Past and Present: Its History, Associations, and Traditions. Vol. 3. Cambridge University Press. p. 79. ISBN 9781108028080.

• Hills, John (19 October 2014). "Adam & Eve, 82 York Street, St Margaret, Westminster". UK pub history and historical Street directory.
• Walford, Edward (1878). "Westminster: Tothill Fields and neighbourhood". Old and New London. Vol. 4. London: Cassell, Petter & Galpin. pp. 14–26.

51°29′58″N 0°8′10″W