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Originally Bowling Alley or Bowling Street. Sir Richard Tufton (1585 – October 4, 1631), who lived in Tothill Street, was a lawyer and politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1614 and 1629. He matriculated at University College, Oxford on June 30, 1598, aged 13. He was called to the bar at Gray’s Inn in 1609. In 1614, he was elected MP for Grantham during the so-called Addled Parliament which ran from April 5 – June 7, 1614, under of James I, during which time not a single law was passed. Tufton was elected MP for Rye in 1628, after his more successful brother Lord Tufton offered the voters of the port town a new road, if his brother was elected. Once again his Parliamentary career came to an abrupt halt when in 1629 King Charles decided to rule without parliament for 11 years. Tufton, who during his father’s lifetime had received “£3,600 in money and inheritance of land” (this included an estate running from Millbank to the top of Horseferry Road on which this street was built), left his wife £400 a year on condition that she remained a widow. He left his Westminster estate to his friend and distant relative Sir Robert Marsham.
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