Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 12.djvu/227

 10 s. XIL SEPT. 4, 1909.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

183

My correspondent states that there is no indication as to who caused the memorial to be erected. JOHN T. PAGE.

Long Itchington, Warwickshire.

BOURDON HOUSE.

THIS old mansion has on several occasions formed the subject of inquiry in these pages (4 S. xii. 329 ; 8 S. vi. 177, 455 ; vii. 271 ; 10 S. xi. 231). Some interest has recently been aroused in the subject in consequence of the death 011 1 6 April last, in her seventy- eighth year, of the last occupant of the house, Miss Emily Leslie, the youngest and last surviving daughter of the late Col. Charles Powell Leslie, M.P., and sister of Sir John Leslie, Bt., of Glaslough, co. Monaghan. In The Daily Mail for 27 April was the following description of the house :

" A pleasant old brick building, mellowed with age, overshadowed by the tall plane trees which grow in the courtyard, Bourdon House is sufficiently picturesque from the outside, but the interior is a revelation of artistic beauty in respect of richly panelled rooms and finely carved wood- work. The floors are of polished oak, and some of the rooms have oaken rafters. It is supposed that the pupils of one Bourdon, a Belgian or French carver, carried out the decorations in the early part of the eighteenth century. One of the carved lintels bears the date 1720, and the name Bourdon first appears on the parish rate-book in 1739.

" Tradition has it that in the days when Mayfair was green fields, Bourdon House was a farm building, but the more probable story is that it was originally the manor house of the Davies family. Miss Mary Davies was a wealthy heiress of the seventeenth century, who brought much property to the house of Grosvenor by her marriage with one of its members.

" In common with many old houses, Bourdon House is supposed to have a subterranean passage. The passage is reputed to have extended to the ide of Apsley House. A vast cellar, stretching under the courtyard and into Berkeley Square, where It has been blocked up, is regarded as lending some colour to the story."

Some of the information contained in this extract seems to be derived from MR. PHILIP NORMAN'S reply at 8 S. vi. 455. A corre- spondent of MR. NORMAN informed him (p. 456) that Bourdon " was the name of a French wood-carver, who came to London from Bruges." He also stated that "Bour- don or rather Burdon Street first appears by name in 1739," i.e., in the parish rate-book. I find, however, that it is mentioned seven years earlier in the "New Remarks of London, Collected by the Company of Parish Clerks," 1732, p. 262, where, under the name of Burdon Street, it figures in the " Grosvenour- street Ward " of the parish of St. Geoige, Hanover Square.

It appears also that a family of the name

of Bourdon was settled in the West End of London about the close of the seventeenth century. There is a Marriage Allegation under date 14 Oct., 1687, between Michael Liege of St. Giles in the Fields, bach., about 23, " and Margaret Bourdon of St. James, Westminster, spinster, about 20, at the French Church or Chapel of Savoy (Harl. Soc. vol. xxxi. p. 22) ; and a later one to which Anne Bourden of St. Martin in the Fields was a party (ib., p. 184). These two ladies ma;y have been sisters, as in each case the consent of the mother, who seems to have been a widow, was given. On 15 June, 1695, there is a Marriage Allegation between Isaac Bourdon of St. James, Westminster, bach., aged SO, and Mary Hendery of St. Anne in the Fields (Harl. Soc. vol. xxiv. p. 215). This Isaac was very likely a brother of the Margaret above mentioned, and it is possible that he was the French or Flemish wood-carver who is supposed by some authorities to have given his name to the house. Further information regarding him would probably, on investigation, be forth- coming. There is no evidence that the mansion was in any way connected with the Davies family, although it was built upon their property.

Some apprehension has been felt by the London Press lest the old house should be pulled down and flats erected on the site. If it could be preserved for some public purpose to serve, for instance, as a library or museum of objects connected with the parish of St. George I think most lovers of old London would feel that it had met with its appropriate destiny.

W. F. PRIDEAUX.

INSCRIPTIONS AT PETIT SACONNEX, GENEVA.

THE Cemetery of Petit Saconnex may be reached by tram from the Place Cor- navin in about fifteen minutes. The " An- cien Cimetiere," from which these inscrip- tions were taken, forms only a small portion of the cemetery, and is to the right as you enter. It is divided into " Cote Droit 3> and " C6te Gauche " by a footpath. A few of the monuments are so covered by creepers that it was impossible to ascertain whether the inscriptions were in English. The modern portion of the cemetery is very extensive, and a hurried survey of it in May, 1908, yielded no further English inscriptions.

COTE GAUCHE. Nos. 1-336. Beginning at the end nearest the entrance.

1. Charlotte, w. of Wm. Allen, F.B.S., of London, ob. at P. S., 3 Oct., 1816.