Place Name
James FitzJames Butler, (April 29, 1665 – November 16, 1745) was the 2nd Duke of Ormonde, an Irish statesman and soldier, and the grandson of the 1st Duke who gave his name to Great Ormond Street, in Bloomsbury. The 2nd Duke was one of the great and popular figures of the early 18thCentury, holding high office as the Duke of Marlborough’s successor as Commander in Chief of the British Army in the reign of Queen Anne. He served in the campaign to put down the Monmouth Rebellion, in the Williamite War in Ireland, in the Nine Years’ War, and in the War of the Spanish Succession. He was well connected in his personal life too, having married the Queen’s niece, and daughter of the 1st Earl of Rochester, Lady Anne Hyde, who lived at Petersham Lodge, although she died in January 1685, less than eight months later he had married the almost equally well connected Lady Mary Somerset, daughter of the Duke of Beaufort. In 1704 he obtained a grant for the Lodge in Richmond Old Park. The property which was nearing 100 years old had only recently been renovated by William III as a hunting lodge. John Cloake in The Growth of Richmond takes up the story: “Ormonde substantially rebuilt and enlarged the house, now formally known as Richmond Lodge. In 1715 he espoused the Jacobite cause, was impeached and attainted in abstentia (having sought refuge in France) and his lands were forfeited to the Crown. Although Ormonde’s brother was permitted to retain Richmond Lodge, his interest in it was soon acquired by the Prince of Wales.” This was one of the first roads to be developed on agricultural land, although it was being used as a right of way to the ferry long before. In 1771 the whole street was known as Ormond Terrace but by 1879 it only applied to numbers 1 to 7, when Ormond Road was used. In the mid-19thCentury two semi-detached houses built in 1697 had become known as Ormond Place. Janet Dunbar in A Prospect of Richmond recounts one extraordinary episode from 1853 when householders objecting to carriages and carts running past their houses took action: “The residents placed a bar across the road to prevent traffic using it. The Vestry objected, in turn, to this high-handed proceeding, and took steps to ‘do away with the obstruction caused by the Bar now placed across the same.’ In 1877, a Mr Darley claimed the roadway as his private property (without attempting to substantiate this extraordinary claim) and had a bar put across the road. The Vestry retaliated by posting a notice declaring Ormond Road to be a public highway, and took down the bar. Mr Darley put it up again, declaring he would follow this custom for two whole days a year. The Vestry’s surveyor removed the bar once more, and continued to do so every time Mr Darley erected it. The records do not indicate who got tired first.”
