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manor by Henry VIII., and by him connected with the royal
manor of Whitehall by the formation or extension of the
park. The hospital was either altered or rebuilt by the same
monarch, for the purposes of a Palace, and served as the only
royal residence in London from the burning of Whitehall
Palace in the reign of William III. to the occupation of
Buckingham Palace by her present Majesty.
From the description of the boundaries of the parish contained
in the Act of 1685, it will be observed that St. James's
was only just emerging from the rural or suburban stage,
although it had already become of sufficient importance to
receive an independent existence. That the locality was not
then fully urban is even more clearly apparent when it is
remembered that the most westerly street at the time was
Albemarle Street, which was only commenced in 1683.
Building operations were, however, then in active progress,
and twenty years later the town had reached as far west as
Bolton Street.
Another proof of the growth of the parish is afforded by a
Vestry minute dated the 9th November, 1687, which directs
"That the Church Warden doe take some Gent. of the Vestry
and put the houses into the Overseers' bookes that have been
inhabited since the said bookes were made out." The rapid
growth of the Metropolis, and especially its extension westward
during the seventeenth century, is probably largely due
to the union of the two kingdoms of England and Scotland,
and the establishment of the Court of the United Kingdom at
St. James's, thus requiring the leading Scottish aristocracy to
reside in the southern Metropolis. About this time also a
large number of French Protestants, driven from their fatherland
by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in 1685, and the
events following thereon, settled in London, especially
strengthening, if they did not create, the silk-spinning
industry of Spitalfields, in much the same way as the