Westmoreland Street is in the

Marylebone Marylebone (usually , also , ) is a district in the West End of London, in the City of Westminster. Oxford Street, Europe's busiest shopping street, forms its southern boundary. An Civil parish#Ancient parishes, ancient parish and latterly a ...

district of the

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in London, England. The street was built from the 1760s by William Franks and runs from

Beaumont Street Beaumont Street is a street in the centre of Oxford, England. The street was laid out from 1828 to 1837 with elegant terraced houses in the Regency style. Before that, it was the location of Beaumont Palace, now noted by a plaque near the j ...

and

Weymouth Street Weymouth Street lies in the Marylebone district of the City of Westminster and connects Marylebone High Street with Great Portland Street. The area was developed in the late 18th century by Henrietta Cavendish Holles and her husband Edward Ha ...

in the north to

New Cavendish Street New Cavendish Street is a street in the City of Westminster, London, that runs from Marylebone High Street in the west to Cleveland Street in the east. The street was built in 1775 and named after the Cavendish family, who were related to the ...

in the south. It was formerly the location of the Welbeck Chapel, which became St James's Church. In 1968, it was the site of Britain's first

heart transplant A heart transplant, or a cardiac transplant, is a surgical transplant procedure performed on patients with end-stage heart failure or severe coronary artery disease when other medical or surgical treatments have failed. , the most common proce ...

when the National Heart Hospital was located there. The hospital is now known as

University College Hospital at Westmoreland Street University College Hospital at Westmoreland Street, named The Heart Hospital until refurbished and renamed in 2015, was a specialist cardiac hospital located in London, United Kingdom until 2015. It is part of the University College London Hospi ...

Origins and location

Westmoreland Street is located in the Marylebone district of the City of Westminster, London, and runs from Beaumont Street and Weymouth Street in the north to New Cavendish Street in the south. Woodstock Mews is accessed from its eastern side, and Wheatley Street and De Walden Street join it on its western side. It was built from the 1760s by the local builder William Franks. The origin of its name is unknown. The northern section above Wheatley Street was originally named Woodstock Street,Laxton, Paul & Joseph Wisdom. (1985) ''The A to Z of Regency London''. London: London Topographical Society. p. 24. ISBN 0902087193 which is still the name of the adjoining mews, and was a separate and narrower street. It was widened in 1862 and 1874 until the two streets became one. Another location with the same name, Westmoreland Street, SW1, was renamed to Westmoreland Terrace in the 1930s.

Buildings

The street was formerly the location of the Tichfield Chapel, which was built by William Franks facing Wheatley Street. In 1773, he sold it to John Sarson who owned the stable-yard in Little Marylebone Street. It became the Welbeck Chapel around 1800 and in 1817 was transferred to the Crown. It was renovated and in 1831 was renamed St James's Church."Chapter 16: Beaumont Street to New Cavendish Street"
in ''South-East Marylebone'', Survey of London Vols. 51 & 52, London, 2017.

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spent part of his early clerical career there and

Hugh Reginald Haweis Hugh Reginald Haweis (3 April 1838 – 29 January 1901) was an English cleric and writer. He was the husband of author Mary Eliza Haweis and the father of painter Stephen Haweis. Biography The Reverend H.R. Haweis was born in Egham, Surrey in ...

officiated from 1866, who has been described as the "most prominent exponent of spiritualism among London clergy". The church was highly successful under Haweis and was renovated again in 1870–71 with the installation of new stained-glass windows and later in the decade George Gilbert Scott Jr. drew-up designs for a new exterior. The church stagnated under the later years of Haweis's tenure after he was affected by scandal, and it closed two years after his death in 1901. It was demolished around 1907. Records relating to the church are held by the

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. It is the former home of the National Heart Hospital, which moved there from Soho Square in 1914,"National Heart Hospital"
in and occupies the site left vacant by the demolition of St James's Church. During the First World War it became a centre for the treatment of military recruits with heart problems. In 1968, Donald Ross and his team carried out Britain's first

there. That day, on 3 May 1968, traffic stood still while the ambulance arrived with the donor heart, and photographs of the street appeared in the ''Sun'', ''Daily Mail'' and ''Daily Express''. The hospital moved to the Fulham Road, London, in 1991 and after a period of private ownership the hospital in 2001 re-entered the National Health Service, where it is known as

.University College Hospital at Westmoreland Street (formerly the Heart Hospital).
University College London Hospitals. Retrieved 17 September 2015. Westmoreland Street and Wheatley Street were seriously damaged by German bombing during the Second World War with the whole of Wheatley Street marked as damaged to some degree. Numbers 18 to 28 on the south side of Wheatley at the Westmoreland end were hit in September 1940 during the

Blitz Blitz, German for "lightning", may refer to: Military uses *Blitzkrieg, blitz campaign, or blitz, a type of military campaign *The Blitz, the German aerial campaign against Britain in the Second World War *, an Imperial German Navy light cruiser b ...

and marked as "damaged beyond repair" on the London County Council's bomb damage maps but were rebuilt in duplicate in 1948. The maps also show blast damage to other buildings on the west side of Westmoreland Street and to a row of six buildings on the east side of the street opposite the entrance to Wheatley Street, including the hospital.Ward, Laurence. (2015) ''The London County Council Bomb Damage Maps 1939–1945''. London: Thames & Hudson. p. 92. ISBN 9780500518250 The King's Head public house at 13 Westmoreland Street, on the corner with Wheatley Street, was badly damaged and required partial rebuilding.

References

External links

{{commons category inline, Westmoreland Street, London Streets in the City of Westminster Marylebone