The "Six Bells", No. 197, King's Road

CXXVII.—THE "SIX BELLS" KING'S ROAD (Re-built).

The "Six Bells" was re-built in the year 1900. Its former elevation towards the King's Road had no beauty, being a plain plastered front, three storeys in height, of 19th-century date. The back view was, however, more picturesque, and the garden, with its vine-clad walls and hollow-stemmed mulberry, takes us back to the 18th century at least. In a MS. note made on 17th June, 1895, Mr. Philip Norman says: "Seeing a strip of grass which attracted my attention I entered and found a bowling green with arbours or little summer-houses, in the style of an oldfashioned tea garden. Here a bowling club was in full swing. It should number, according to the rules, sixty members, but this year there are sixty-five. By the look of those who were playing, they seem to be of the tradesman class, 'fat and scant of breath.' New churchwarden pipes are fashionable there." In a note in the Pall Mall Gazette for 8th November, 1900, it is said that the place "had known only two hosts in a hundred years." Two original drawings by W. W. Burgess, of the garden and street fronts, are preserved in the Chelsea Public Library.

In the Council's ms. collection are:—

Two photographs of the front to King's Road before demolition.