Mount Clare, Roehampton

Mount Clare is a Grade I listed house built in 1772 in Minstead Gardens, Roehampton, in the London Borough of Wandsworth.

Mount Clare
Mount Clare in an engraving from 1779 by William Watts
Listed Building – Grade I
Official name	Mount Clare, Minstead Gardens, SW15
Designated	14 July 1955
Reference no.	1184436

The architect was Sir Robert Taylor,^[1] and the house was enlarged with a portico and other enrichments in 1780 by Placido Columbani. It was Grade I listed on 14 July 1955.^[2]

The house was built for the politician George Clive^[1] and the gardens were landscaped by Lancelot "Capability" Brown.^[3]

Notable residents

Clive died in 1779. Subsequent residents have included:

• 1780–1804: Sir John Dick,^[3] British Consul at Leghorn,^[1] who died at the house on 2 December 1804^[4]
• 1807–1819: the chemist Charles Hatchett FRS, who discovered the element niobium^[3]
• 1830–1832: Humphrey St John-Mildmay, sixth son of the third Baronet, and Member of Parliament for Southampton^[3]
• 1840–1846: Admiral of the Fleet Sir Charles Ogle, 2nd Baronet^[3]
• 1874–1908: Hugh Colin Smith, Governor of the Bank of England.^[3] Smith's stockbroker descendants lived in the house until 1945.^[3]

Requisition in 1945 and subsequent use

The house was requisitioned by Wandsworth Borough Council in 1945. In 1963 it became a hall of residence for Garnett College, the UK's only dedicated lecturer-training college. Garnett College became part of Woolwich Polytechnic, then Thames Polytechnic, then the University of Greenwich.

Today, Mount Clare is owned by the Southlands Methodist Trust^[5] and used as a hall of residence for the University of Roehampton.^[3]

Gallery

• 
  Mount Clare, front view
• 
  Mount Clare, rear view
• 
  Statue in memory of Hugh Colin Smith, Mount Clare