Downshire Hill is a street in

Hampstead Hampstead () is an area in London, which lies northwest of Charing Cross, and extends from Watling Street, the A5 road (Roman Watling Street) to Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland. The area forms the northwest part of the Lon ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, in the

London Borough of Camden The London Borough of Camden () is a London borough in Inner London. Camden Town Hall, on Euston Road, lies north of Charing Cross. The borough was established on 1 April 1965 from the area of the former boroughs of Hampstead, Holborn, and St ...

. The street has always been a preferred residential address, in which the artist

Dante Gabriel Rossetti Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti (12 May 1828 – 9 April 1882), generally known as Dante Gabriel Rossetti (), was an English poet, illustrator, painter, translator and member of the Rossetti family. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhoo ...

and the actress

Peggy Ashcroft Dame Edith Margaret Emily Ashcroft (22 December 1907 – 14 June 1991), known professionally as Peggy Ashcroft, was an English actress whose career spanned more than 60 years. Born to a comfortable middle-class family, Ashcroft was deter ...

as well as the scientist

J. D. Bernal John Desmond Bernal (; 10 May 1901 – 15 September 1971) was an Irish scientist who pioneered the use of X-ray crystallography in molecular biology. He published extensively on the history of science. In addition, Bernal wrote popular boo ...

and

Peter Medawar Sir Peter Brian Medawar (; 28 February 1915 – 2 October 1987) was a Brazilian-British biologist and writer, whose works on graft rejection and the discovery of acquired immune tolerance have been fundamental to the medical practice of tissue ...

resided.

Geography

The road runs between the A 502 (Rosslyn Hill) in the southwest and East Heath Road / South End Road in the northeast. The only branches are Keats Grove and Willow Road. While the road ends in the northeast on the edge of the

Hampstead Heath Hampstead Heath (locally known simply as the Heath) is an ancient heath in London, spanning . This grassy public space sits astride a sandy ridge, one of the highest points in London, running from Hampstead to Highgate, which rests on a band o ...

nature park, it is "continued" in a south-westerly direction by Thurlow Road. On the grounds between Downshire Hill and Keats Grove is the

St John's Downshire Hill St John's Downshire Hill, Hampstead, is a proprietary chapel of the Church of England, located in Downshire Hill, Hampstead, London, in the Parish of St Stephen with All Hallows. Referred to as St John's Church, the building is formally a chapel ...

History

The road was laid out at the beginning of the 19th century and is probably named after the first

Marquess of Downshire Marquess of Downshire is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1789 for Wills Hill, 1st Earl of Hillsborough, a former Secretary of State. Hill had already been created Earl of Hillsborough and Viscount Kilwarlin of County Down ...

, Wills Hill (1718–1793).

Known residents

During the First World War, the literary figures

Constance Constance may refer to: Places *Konstanz, Germany, sometimes written as Constance in English *Constance Bay, Ottawa, Canada * Constance, Kentucky * Constance, Minnesota * Constance (Portugal) * Mount Constance, Washington State People * Consta ...

Edward Edward is an English given name. It is derived from the Anglo-Saxon name ''Ēadweard'', composed of the elements '' ēad'' "wealth, fortune; prosperous" and '' weard'' "guardian, protector”. History The name Edward was very popular in Anglo-Sa ...

and

David Garnett David Garnett (9 March 1892 – 17 February 1981) was an English writer and publisher. As a child, he had a cloak made of rabbit skin and thus received the nickname "Bunny", by which he was known to friends and intimates all his life. Early ...

lived in house number 6. In the 1930s the Scottish writer

Edwin Muir Edwin Muir CBE (15 May 1887 – 3 January 1959) was a Scottish poet, novelist and translator. Born on a farm in Deerness, a parish of Orkney, Scotland, he is remembered for his deeply felt and vivid poetry written in plain language and wit ...

and then the two-time

Wimbledon Wimbledon most often refers to: * Wimbledon, London, a district of southwest London * Wimbledon Championships, the oldest tennis tournament in the world and one of the four Grand Slam championships Wimbledon may also refer to: Places London * ...

finalist

Bunny Austin Henry Wilfred "Bunny" Austin (26 August 1906 – 26 August 2000) was an English tennis player. For 74 years he was the last Briton to reach the final of the men's singles at Wimbledon, until Andy Murray did so in 2012. He was also a finalist ...

lived under number 7. At the turn of the century, the actor

Edward Gordon Craig Edward Henry Gordon CraigSome sources give "Henry Edward Gordon Craig". (born Edward Godwin; 16 January 1872 – 29 July 1966), sometimes known as Gordon Craig, was an English modernist theatre practitioner; he worked as an actor, director and ...

and the composer

Martin Shaw Martin Shaw (born 21 January 1945) is an English actor. He came to national recognition as Doyle in ITV (TV network), ITV crime-action television drama series ''The Professionals (TV series), The Professionals'' (1977–1983). Further notable ...

shared house number 8. The author

Sylvia Dryhurst Sylvia Lynd ( Dryhurst; 1888 – 21 February 1952) was an Anglo-Irish poet, essayist, short story writer and novelist. She was born in London but both of her parents, A.R. Dryhurst and her mother, the suffragist writer Nora Dryhurst ( Robinson) w ...

was born in house number 11. After their marriage to the writer Robert Lynd the couple moved into the neighboring building number 14 and lived there until 1918. The artist

Roland Penrose Sir Roland Algernon Penrose (14 October 1900 – 23 April 1984) was an English artist, historian and poet. He was a major promoter and collector of modern art and an associate of the surrealists in the United Kingdom. During the Second World W ...

and photographer

Lee Miller Elizabeth "Lee" Miller, Lady Penrose (April 23, 1907 – July 21, 1977), was an American photographer and photojournalist. She was a fashion model in New York City in the 1920s before going to Paris, where she became a fashion and fine art ...

lived in building number 21 and the biologist

number 25. The painter

John Constable John Constable (; 11 June 1776 – 31 March 1837) was an English landscape painter in the Romanticism, Romantic tradition. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for revolutionising the genre of landscape painting with his pictures of Dedha ...

had stayed in the same house for a short time in the previous century. At number 35 the physicist

lived in the late 1930s and in the neighboring house number 37 the actress

Flora Robson Dame Flora McKenzie Robson (28 March 19027 July 1984) was an English actress and star of the theatrical stage and cinema, particularly renowned for her performances in plays demanding dramatic and emotional intensity. Her range extended from q ...

at about the same time. The ''Regency House'' at number 47 was owned by the family of

Richard Carline Richard Cotton Carline (9 February 1896 – 18 November 1980) was a British artist, arts administrator and writer. During the First World War, Carline served on the Western Front and in the Middle East, where he travelled extensively throug ...

from 1914 onwards. In September 1938 it was acquired by the Stuttgart-born lawyer

Fred Uhlman Fred Uhlman (19 January 1901 – 11 April 1985) was a German-English writer, painter and lawyer of Jewish origin. Biography Fred Uhlman was born in Stuttgart, Germany, into a prosperous middle-class Jewish family. He studied at the Universities o ...

and his wealthy wife Diana Croft. Together with other people immigrated from Germany, they soon founded the ''Artists ’Refugee Committee'' (ARC), which had its official seat under number 47. The ARC sheltered persecuted artists. One of them was the German

Dadaist Dada () or Dadaism was an art movement of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century, with early centres in Zürich, Switzerland, at the Cabaret Voltaire (in 1916). New York Dada began c. 1915, and after 1920 Dada flourished in Paris ...

John Heartfield John Heartfield (born Helmut Herzfeld; 19 June 1891 – 26 April 1968) was a 20th century German visual artist who pioneered the use of art as a political weapon. Some of his most famous photomontages were anti-Nazi and anti-fascist statements ...

. It was originally intended to be recorded for two weeks, but he ended up spending five years there. Soon after, the writer Elizabeth Jenkins moved to the Regency House and named her 2004

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobi ...

(''The View from Downshire Hill'') after the street. It was only in 1896 that the ''Hampstead Hill Mansions'' made it possible to move into a single apartment in the area. The most famous resident of this residential complex was

, who had moved in there temporarily in 1946. The poet and painter

lived with his wife

Elizabeth Siddal Elizabeth Eleanor Siddall (25 July 1829 – 11 February 1862), better known as Elizabeth Siddal, was an English artist, poet, and artists' model. Significant collections of her artworks can be found at Wightwick Manor and the Ashmolean. Siddal ...

for a short time in the neighboring ''Spring Cottage''. The

Pink Floyd Pink Floyd are an English rock band formed in London in 1965. Gaining an early following as one of the first British psychedelic music, psychedelic groups, they were distinguished by their extended compositions, sonic experimentation, philo ...

drummer

Nick Mason Nicholas Berkeley Mason, (born 27 January 1944) is an English drummer and a founder member of the progressive rock band Pink Floyd. He is the only member to feature on every Pink Floyd album, and the only constant member since its formation in ...

grew up in Downshire Hill after his family moved here from

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

in 1946.Hugh Fielder
''Pink Floyd – Behind the Wall''
Race Point Publishing, 2013, , S. 12.

References

{{coords, 51.5560, -0.1699, display=title Streets in the London Borough of Camden Hampstead