Excerpt: ... Sir Thos. More's House at Chelsea." His reasons cannot be given better than in his own words: "First, his grandson, Mr. Thomas More, who wrote his life . says that Sir Thomas More's house in Chelsea was the same which my lord of Lincoln bought of Sir Robert Cecil. Now, it appears pretty plainly that Sir Robert Cecil's house was the same which is now the Duke of Beaufort's, for in divers places are these letters R.C., and also R.c.E., with the date of the year, viz., 1597, which letters were the initials of his ...
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Excerpt: ... Sir Thos. More's House at Chelsea." His reasons cannot be given better than in his own words: "First, his grandson, Mr. Thomas More, who wrote his life . says that Sir Thomas More's house in Chelsea was the same which my lord of Lincoln bought of Sir Robert Cecil. Now, it appears pretty plainly that Sir Robert Cecil's house was the same which is now the Duke of Beaufort's, for in divers places are these letters R.C., and also R.c.E., with the date of the year, viz., 1597, which letters were the initials of his name and his lady's, and the year 1597, when he new built, or at least new fronted, it. From the Earl of Lincoln that house was conveyed to Sir Arthur Gorges; from him to Lionel Cranford, Earl of Middlesex; from him to King Charles I.; from the King to the Duke of Buckingham; from his son, since the Restoration, to Plummer, a citizen, for debts; from the said Plummer to the Earl of Bristol; and from his heirs to the Duke of Beaufort, so that we can trace all the Mesne assignments from Sir Robert Cecil to the present possessor." He goes on to add that More built the south 48 chancel (otherwise the chapel) in the church, and that this belonged to Beaufort House until Sir Arthur Gorges sold the house but retained the chapel. When Sir Thomas More came to Chelsea he was already a famous man, high in the King's favour. The house he lived in is supposed to have stood right across the site of Beaufort Street, not very far from the river. It is unnecessary here to sketch that life, already so well known and so often written, but we can picture that numerous and united household which even the second Lady More's mean and acrid temper was unable to disturb. Here royal and notable visitors frequently came. The King himself, strolling in the well-kept garden with his arm round his Chancellor's neck, would jest pleasantly, and Holbein, in the dawn of his fame, would work for his patron, ...
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