Estates in Bloomsbury

1 Duke of Bedford
2 City of London Corporation
3 Capper Mortimer
4 Fitzroy (Duke of Grafton)
5 Somers
6 Skinners' (Tonbridge)
7 Battle Bridge
8 Lucas
9 Harrison
10 Foundling Hospital
11 Rugby
12 Bedford Charity (Harpur)
13 Doughty
14 Gray's Inn
15 Bainbridge–Dyott (Rookeries)

Area between the Foundling and Harrison estates: Church land

Grey areas: fragmented ownership and haphazard development; already built up by 1800

About the Lucas Estate

This seven-acre estate in the north-east of Bloomsbury was originally part of the Peperfield area of the Harrison estate, but became separated from it in the eighteenth century (Survey of London, vol. 24, 1952)

Its owner at the beginning of the nineteenth century was Joseph Lucas, a tin plate worker, who decided in 1801 to develop the land (Survey of London, vol. 24, 1952)

The estate was a small strip with a curved top, stretching from the area of the Boot pub to Gray’s Inn Road

Its main street when developed was Cromer Street, which was begun in 1801, and known as Lucas Street after the landowner until 1834 (Survey of London, vol. 24, 1952)

The origin of other street names on the estate remains obscure

Brighton Street

Also known as Whidborne Street

It is in the north-east of Bloomsbury, running north from Cromer Street to the edge of the Lucas estate

It was developed in the early nineteenth century (Survey of London, vol. 24, 1952)

This area was largely rural until the end of the eighteenth century; Cary’s map of 1795 shows mainly fields

It was renamed after Sir George Ferris Whidborne, benefactor of nearby Holy Cross Church

Its houses are shown but not given numbers on Horwood’s map of 1819

Model dwellings were built here by the EEDC in the 1890s

It was renamed Whidborne Street in the twentieth century