Charterhouse Street leads north-east from Holborn Circus, past the north side of the Central Meat Market, to Aldersgate St. On the way it passes Charterhouse Square, once a fashionable place of residence. Here Thackeray lodged while attending Charterhouse School. On the north side of the square lies the Charterhouse, founded in the 14th century as a convent but since 1611 a famous hostel for poor gentlemen, known to all readers of 'The Newcomes.' Apart from the pensioners' quarters, the buildings date mainly from the 16th century. Visitors are shown the buildings by the porter (fee 1/) on Monday, Wednesday,and Friday, from 3 to 5. For admission to the services in the chapel (Sunday 8 and 11, week-days 9.30 and 6), apply at the porter's lodge. The services are usually suspended in July.
In 1371 the Carthusian priory of the Salutation of the Mother of God was founded here by Sir Walter de Manny, a distinguished soldier under Edward III., on a burial-ground where 50,000 victims of the Black Death had been interred. This was the fourth English house of the Carthusians, an order founded by St. Bruno in 1084 at the Grande Chartreuse, near Grenoble; the name Charterhouse is a corruption of the French name Chartreuse. In 1535 the last prior, John Houghton, was executed at Tyburn for denying Henry VIII.'s ecclesiastical supremacy, and in 1538 the priory was seized and secularized. Sir Edward North, afterwards Lord North, to whom the property was granted in 1545, built a mansion (later known as Howard House) on the site of the Little Cloisters, and here Queen Elizabeth visited him for some days immediately after her coronation and again in 1561. In 1565 Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of Norfolk, bought the Charterhouse, in which he made considerable alterations and additions, and here he carried on the conspiracy in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots, that led to his execution in 1572. His second son, Thomas Lord Howard, afterwards Earl of Suffolk, to whom the property passed in 1595. entertained James I. for four days after the royal entry into London in 1603. This Lord Howard was the admiral who commanded the attack on the Azores fleet rendered ever memorable by the exploit of the 'Revenge.' In 1611 the Charterhouse was bought for �13,000 by Thomas Sutton, a shrewd Elizabethan soldier, who had amassed a large fortune from rich coal lands in Durham and probably also as a merchant-adventurer; and here he founded the 'Hospital of King James in Charterhouse,' including a hospital for 80 poor brethren and a free school for 40 poor boys.
Owing to a decline in the revenues, the number of pensioners is now 60. Each receives a room, dinner in hall, a black gown to wear within the precincts, and �52 a year. Pensioners must be bachelors or widowers, members of the Church of England, and over sixty years of age; and they must have been officers in the Army or Navy, clergymen, doctors, lawyers, artists, or professional men. A curfew-bell tolls at 8 or 9 p.m. as many times as there are brethren in residence.
