Endell Street is crossed only by Shorts Gardens and Shelton Street. Betterton Street intersects between these on the eastern side. The northern end of the street is in the London Borough of Camden, the south in the City of Westminster. The street is an avenue with very tall, mature plane trees, widely spaced; it now equals the B401 and is one-way, southbound.
History
The land on which the southern part of Endell Street is built was originally owned by William Short, who leased it to Esmé Stewart, 3rd Duke of Lennox, in 1623-24. Lennox House was built on the site which eventually passed to Sir John Brownlow who began to build from 1682. Belton Street was created, named after the Brownlow's country seat in Lincolnshire, Belton House. Henry Wheatley writes that the southern end of the street from Castle Street to Short's Gardens was originally known as Old Belton Street, the northern end from Short's Gardens to St Giles, was known as New Belton Street. In the seventeenth century, Queen Anne is supposed to have bathed in the waters from a medical spring there at a site known as Queen Anne's Bath. The modern Endell Street was created according to the reforming plans of architect James Pennethorne. Charles Lethbridge Kingsford states that the street was built in 1846 when Belton Street was widened and extended northwards to Broad Street. The street is believed to have been named after the Reverend James Endell Tyler, rector of St Giles in the Fields in the 1840s. The British Lying-In Hospital was relocated to a purpose-built building on Endell Street in 1849.
The Lavers and Barraud Building at 22 Endell Street, together with the attached cast-iron railings, is a Grade II listed building. The polychrome brick and stone building was designed as a studio for the stained-glass firm by R.J. Withers in 1859 in the Gothic style; the gable window on Betterton Street has modern stained glass by Brian Clarke, commissioned by the Crafts Council in 1981.
Founded in 1749, this maternity hospital was built at №24 in 1849; it closed in 1913.
St Paul's Hospital
Founded in 1898, thus urology hospital took over the premises at №24 after the British Lying-In Hospital closed; St Paul's Hospital closed in 1992.
Endell Street Military Hospital
During the first world war a military hospital operated from №36, staffed entirely by women. The hospital was opened in 1915 by suffragists Dr Flora Murray and Dr Louisa Garrett Anderson and treated 24,000 patients and carried out over 7,000 operations. It closed in 1919.
Clubs
The Caravan Club
The basement of №81 was home from July 1934 to the Caravan Club that advertised itself as "London's Greatest Bohemian Rendezvous said to be the most unconventional spot in town" which was code for being gay-friendly. The club helpfully promised "All night gaiety". It was run by Jack Rudolph Neaves, known as "Iron Foot Jack" on account of the metal leg brace he wore, and was frequented by both gay men and lesbian women. It was financed by small-time criminal Billy Reynolds. The club came to the attention of the police almost straight away and in August local residents complained "It's absolutely a sink of iniquity." The club was raided on 25 August, with men arrested. Their trial at Bow Street Magistrates Court caused a sensation reported in the News of the World.
The Hospital Club opened in 2003 at №24 to serve the members of London's media and creative industries. It is on the site of the former St Paul's Hospital.
