Horseferry Road - south end - October 2007

Horseferry Road is a street in the

City of Westminster The City of Westminster is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and London boroughs, borough in Inner London. It is the site of the United Kingdom's Houses of Parliament and much of the British government. It occupies a large area of cent ...

central London Central London is the innermost part of London, in England, spanning several boroughs. Over time, a number of definitions have been used to define the scope of Central London for statistics, urban planning and local government. Its characteris ...

running between

Millbank Millbank is an area of central London in the City of Westminster. Millbank is located by the River Thames, east of Pimlico and south of Westminster. Millbank is known as the location of major government offices, Burberry headquarters, the Millb ...

and Greycoat Place. It is perhaps best known as the site of

City of Westminster Magistrates' Court The City of Westminster Magistrates' Court was a magistrates' court located at 70 Horseferry Road, in the City of Westminster, London. It was originally called Horseferry Road Magistrates' Court, after the road in which it was sited.Her Majesty's ...

(which until 2006 was called Horseferry Road Magistrates' Court). The ubiquity of the Magistrates' Court in newspaper crime reports means that the road name has wide recognition in the UK. Other notable institutions which are or have been located on Horseferry Road include

Broadwood and Sons John Broadwood & Sons is an English piano manufacturer, founded in 1728 by Burkat Shudi and continued after his death in 1773 by John Broadwood. Early history John Broadwood (1732–1812), a Scottish joiner and cabinetmaker, came to London ...

, the

Gas Light and Coke Company The Gas Light and Coke Company (also known as the Westminster Gas Light and Coke Company, and the Chartered Gas Light and Coke Company), was a company that made and supplied coal gas and coke. The headquarters of the company were located on H ...

British Standards Institution The British Standards Institution (BSI) is the national standards body of the United Kingdom. BSI produces technical standards on a wide range of products and services and also supplies certification and standards-related services to busines ...

, the

Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) is the regulatory body for veterinary surgeons in the United Kingdom, established in 1844 by royal charter. It is responsible for monitoring the educational, ethical and clinical standards of the v ...

, the Burberry Group, the

Environment Agency The Environment Agency (EA) is a non-departmental public body, established in 1996 and sponsored by the United Kingdom government's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with responsibilities relating to the protection and enha ...

headquarters in Horseferry House, the

National Probation Service The Probation Service (formerly the National Probation Service) for England and Wales is a statutory criminal justice service, mainly responsible for the supervision of offenders in the community and the provision of reports to the criminal cour ...

, the

Department for Transport The Department for Transport (DfT) is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for the English transport network and a limited number of transport matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland that have not been devolved. The d ...

and

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

. The

Marsham Street Marsham Street is a street in the City of Westminster in London, England. It is approximately one mile in length and runs south from Great Peter Street near Victoria Street and Parliament Square. Description Marsham Street bisects Horseferry R ...

Home Office building backs on to this road. The road is designated part of the B323 road, along with Greycoat Place, Artillery Row and

Buckingham Gate Buckingham Gate is a street in Westminster, London, England, near Buckingham Palace. Location At the north-west end is a junction with Buckingham Palace Road and Birdcage Walk opposite Buckingham Palace. At the south-east end is a junction wi ...

. The road takes its name from the ferry which existed on the site of what is now

Lambeth Bridge Lambeth Bridge is a road traffic and footbridge crossing the River Thames in an east–west direction in central London. The river flows north at the crossing point. Downstream, the next bridge is Westminster Bridge; upstream, the next bridge i ...

. Owned by the

Archbishop of Canterbury The archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and a principal leader of the Church of England, the ceremonial head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. The current archbishop is Justi ...

, the ferry was an important crossing over the

Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...

, from

Westminster Palace The Palace of Westminster serves as the meeting place for both the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Informally known as the Houses of Parli ...

Lambeth Palace Lambeth Palace is the official London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury. It is situated in north Lambeth, London, on the south bank of the River Thames, south-east of the Palace of Westminster, which houses Parliament, on the opposite ...

. The earliest known reference to the ferry dates to 1513, but there may have been a ford near the site in Roman times. The ferry pier was the starting point for the flight of

King James II James VII and II (14 October 1633 16 September 1701) was King of England and King of Ireland as James II, and King of Scotland as James VII from the death of his elder brother, Charles II, on 6 February 1685. He was deposed in the Glorious Re ...

from England in 1689. In 1736, Princess Augusta, who became the mother of

George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of the two kingdoms on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Br ...

, crossed the Thames via the horse ferry on the way to her wedding. In 1734, plans were drawn up for a bridge to replace the ferry. An Act of Parliament was passed in 1736, and the money was raised by lottery and grants.

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

changed the plans for the position of the bridge, and

Westminster Bridge Westminster Bridge is a road-and-foot-traffic bridge over the River Thames in London, linking Westminster on the west side and Lambeth on the east side. The bridge is painted predominantly green, the same colour as the leather seats in the H ...

was finished first, resulting in the gradual decline of the ferry. It was eventually replaced on 10 November 1862, when the first

was opened. It quickly deteriorated, and was replaced in 1932. Horseferry Road has been the site of numerous Government buildings including Horseferry House, which was the location of No. 5 (London) Regional Fire Control Centre during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, and the headquarters of 26th Middlesex (Cyclist) Volunteer Rifle Corps. The building was most recently used by the Home Office to house Prison and Probation head office staff, and is as of 2007 being converted into residential flats. The regimental headquarters and museum of the

London Scottish Regiment The London Scottish was a reserve infantry regiment then a company of the British Army. In its final incarnation it was A (The London Scottish) Company, the London Regiment until, on 1 April 2022, soldiers in the company transferred to foo ...

is at no. 95, this was where the inquiry into the sinking of RMS ''Titanic'' took place in 1912. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

the Australian Imperial Force's Administrative Headquarters was located on Horseferry Road. They rented the buildings from Westminster Training College throughout the war while the college was evacuated to Richmond. Established by the Methodist Church in 1851, Westminster College occupied the site until it relocated to Oxford in 1959. Today their Oxford site is the Harcourt Hill Campus of Oxford Brookes University, but the archives and art collections of Westminster College can still be viewed on the site. Their site on Horseferry Road meanwhile is now the location for the Channel 4 Headquarters, which were built there in 1994.

Phyllis Pearsall Phyllis Isobella Pearsall MBE (25 September 1906 – 28 August 1996) was a British painter and writer who founded the Geographers' A-Z Map Company, for which she is regarded as one of the most successful business people of the twentieth cen ...

conceived and created the London A to Z map while living in a bedsit in Horseferry Road. There is another Horseferry Road in

Limehouse Limehouse is a district in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets in East London. It is east of Charing Cross, on the northern bank of the River Thames. Its proximity to the river has given it a strong maritime character, which it retains throug ...

, London E14 parallel to

Narrow Street Narrow Street is a narrow road running parallel to the River Thames through the Limehouse area of east London, England. It used to be much narrower, and is the oldest part of Limehouse, with many buildings originating from the eighteenth century ...

, and another off Creek Road in

Greenwich Greenwich ( , ,) is a town in south-east London, England, within the ceremonial county of Greater London. It is situated east-southeast of Charing Cross. Greenwich is notable for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich ...

References

{{Coord, 51.4949, -0.1313, type:landmark, display=title Streets in the City of Westminster