Thrale history

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enjoy hunting, women not then being accepted. Curiously, it was Queeney's only daughter Georgina Elphinstone, later to be Mrs. Jack Villiers who was one of the first women to invade the hunting field.

The good natured Irishman Murphy knew Dr. Johnson well, and in January 1765 Johnson was introduced into the Thrale family. Very rapidly he became domesticated with the family referring to Henry as "master' and Hester as 'mistress'. He stayed at Streatham sixteen years. a period for him of comfort and happy environment, but it is perhaps not surprising to remark that during this period he produced very little. Johnson's new home, Thrale Place, was on the south side of Tooting Hill Common. The house was a large white building of three floors, and a right wing of curved proportions. It stood in a park of about a hundred acres. Around the surrounds of the grounds was a gravel walk of nearly two miles in length. The kitchen gardens were surrounded by fourteen feet high brick walls, and Fanny Burney in her first visit recorded her astonishment at the quantity of grapes, melons, peaches, and nectarines she saw daily at table as well as pineapples which were served daily. Henry prided himself as being the owner of the most extensive gardens in England at that time. Johnson had his own room, his usual seat at the table and fireside, and the library was his special province. During the mid-part of the present century, estate plans came to hand, the house having been demolished and materials sold by auction in May 1863. From the plan, one can see how it was possible to view the early morning bird catchers on Tooting Common. After Henry Thrale's death, Hester with her new husband Signor Piozzi had made alterations, but the Thrale interest was extinguished in 1825, the price of £30,500 being paid. There was a sweeping approach one hundred yards long from the lodge gates, which stand at the side of the present lodge at the corner of Aldrington Road. One existing road, Ullathorne Road, corresponds with the island so often mentioned by Johnson. The parish church of Streatham at which Johnson worshipped was curiously enough St. Leonards, as in Sandridge, and when it was his time to leave, the sad old man bade his leave by kissing the church door. Bordering one side of the old estate is the present Thrale Road, and the railway now bisects what was once one of the finest of English gardens.¹⁸

When Johnson went to Thrale Place, Thrale himself was thirty-seven and Hester twenty-four. According to his wife Henry 'was manly, his countenance agreeable, his eyes steady and of the deepest blue; his look thoughtful and intelligent; his behaviour devoid of every trick or particularity

Footnotes

18. J.P. Collins, probably Sunday Times, date unknown.↩︎