Ordinary life in an extraordinary place
Hampton Court Palace is best known as the home of King Henry VIII. But during the reign of Queen Victoria, the palace was no longer a principal royal residence. Instead, it became a top tourist attraction and home to famous faces like scientist Michael Faraday and suffragette Sophia Duleep Singh.
The palace’s grace and favour community turned Hampton Court into a vibrant and unusual little village. Living in a palace wasn’t always easy, however. Residents complained about the cold, their neighbours and the noisy ghosts banging on their walls.
Hampton Court opened to the public in 1838, and visitors flocked to enjoy the palace’s architecture, gardens and famous hedge maze. Meanwhile parts of the palace were transformed to reflect its famous Tudor past.
Image: Engraving of King George II. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Why did the Royal Family leave Hampton Court Palace?
George II and Queen Caroline: The last court visit
George II and Caroline of Ansbach were the last king and queen to live at Hampton Court. Their final stay was in the summer of 1737 – less than 40 years after Christopher Wren remodelled the palace for William III and Mary II.
Caroline died in November 1737. Without his beloved Queen, George made occasional trips to Hampton Court, but the palace never hosted a royal court visit again.
George III: A new era
George II died in 1760, and his grandson George III inherited the throne. The new King chose not to live at Hampton Court. He and Queen Charlotte preferred life at Kew Palace and Buckingham House.
Hampton Court gradually entered a new era. No longer home to kings and queens, the palace hosted a new, unusual set of residents known as the grace and favour community.
What is 'grace and favour'?
Grace and favour apartments were lodgings granted by the monarch, usually to recognise a person’s service to the crown.
It began as a medieval practice where courtiers were given apartments in royal residences so they could follow the monarch from palace to palace. At Hampton Court, people continued to live in these spaces even after the palace fell out of regular use. The Lord Chamberlain began granting official warrants to live at Hampton Court from the late 18th century.
By the reign of Queen Victoria, the practice was well established and in demand – the wait for a grace and favour apartment could last as long as twenty years.
I’ve often thought I should like to live at Hampton Court. It looks so peaceful and so quiet, and it is such a dear old place to ramble round in the early morning before many people are about.
Jerome K Jerome in Three Men in a Boat, 1889.
Where were the grace and favour apartments at Hampton Court?
There were around 60 grace and favour apartments at Hampton Court Palace. Visitors can still spot their front doors around the palace, usually marked by doorbells, name plates and letter boxes.
Some residents occupied famous spaces like the Tudor Kitchens, the Clock Tower and even the Haunted Gallery. Others were spread out amongst the gardens and surrounding parks.
Image: The name plate of Mrs Collin Ravenhill at Hampton Court Palace. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Who were the grace and favour residents?
Most grace-and-favour residents at Hampton Court were women – usually widows or relatives of powerful courtiers, politicians and military officers.
Hampton Court became home to many well-known names within British society. Many residents were linked to the army, navy or other colonial offices and had been granted their apartments to recognise service in places like India, the Caribbean and South Africa.
These residents were distinguished but financially vulnerable - apartments were usually granted rent-free to those fallen on hard times. William IV, who lived in Bushy Park before he became king, called Hampton Court the ‘quality poorhouse’.
My mother lives in a most primitive manner down in that dreary red-brick dungeon at Hampton Court.
Quote from the character Henry Gowan in Little Dorrit, by Charles Dickens.
Who lived at Hampton Court Palace during the grace and favour period?
A selection of some of the most notable residents:
Anne Wellesley, Countess of Mornington
Lady Mornington was the mother of famous military commander Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington. She lived near Chapel Court from 1795 to 1831, and her adjoining garden on the East Front is still known as ‘Lady Mornington’s Garden’.
Wellington visited his mother at Hampton Court. He described a spot on the East Front called ‘Purr Corner’ where she and her friends would chat on sunny days. Relatives of Lady Mornington lived at the palace as late as the 1870s.
Image: A painting of the East Front and 'Lady Mornington's garden' at Hampton Court Palace. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Michael Faraday
Michael Faraday was a famous scientist, best known for his experiments with electricity. A rarer male resident, Faraday was granted apartments to recognise his work and lived with his wife Sarah Barnard on Hampton Court Green from 1858 to 1867. Their home was renamed ‘Faraday House’ after his death.
Image: The King’s Private Dining Room, also known as the ‘Oak Room' at Hampton Court Palace. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Lady Georgiana Grey
Lady Georgiana Grey was the daughter of Prime Minister Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey whose government passed the Reform Acts of 1832. She lived along Fountain Court from 1875 to 1900 and died at the palace aged 99.
Lady Grey loved hosting events for the palace community, including dinners and fancy-dress balls. Many entertainments took place in the King’s Private Dining Room, also known as the ‘Oak Room’ (part of William III’s apartments).
Princess Frederica of Hanover
Princess Frederica of Hanover was the daughter of King George V of Hanover and second cousin to Queen Victoria. She lived on the West Front with her husband Baron Von Pawel Rammingen from 1880 to 1889.
Princess Frederica devoted herself to charitable causes. In 1881, she hosted amateur plays in the Great Hall to raise money for a local women’s convalescent home.
Lady Napier of Magdala
Lady Mary Napier was the widow of Field Marshal Robert Napier of Magdala, a well-known military commander who led colonial campaigns in India, China and Ethiopia. Napier was also Constable of the Tower of London from 1887 to 1890.
Lady Napier lived on the top floor of Fountain Court from 1893 to 1930 and paid for one of the first lifts to be installed at the palace. Operated by hand, it required ‘extreme exertion’ and was removed in 1932.
Image: Illustration of Princess Frederica of Hanover's amateur theatricals in the Great Hall. Godefroy Durand, The Graphic, 20 August 1881. © Historic Royal Palaces.
The Duleep Singhs
Princesses Bamba, Sophia, and Catherine Duleep Singh were the daughters of Duleep Singh, the last Sikh Maharaja of the Punjab. They occupied Faraday House on Hampton Court Green from 1898 to 1945.
Out of her sisters, Sophia spent the most time Hampton Court, though Catherine managed correspondence about the house. Sophia walked her dogs through the palace gardens and sold copies of The Suffragette newspaper outside the palace gates.
Millicent Gordon
Millicent Gordon lived at Hampton Court for over 100 years. The daughter of Lord Henry Gordon, a Major in the East India Company, and Louisa Payne, Millicent arrived at the palace with her parents in 1845. She died here in 1949, aged 104.
Millicent lived at Hampton Court through the Crimean, First and Second World Wars. Despite her long residence, and pleas to the Office of Works (which managed maintenance of the palace), she never had her own bathroom.
Image: A servant bell. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Working at the palace
Grace and favour residents weren’t the only ones who lived at Hampton Court Palace. Over 200 private staff worked for the families at the palace, including butlers, valets, cooks and housemaids. Many had their own smaller rooms in their employers’ apartments.
Hampton Court also had separate employees. The palace housekeeper lived on site, as did the chaplain, gardeners and Keeper of the Great Vine. Hampton Court even had its own fire brigade and a school for the residents’ children.
‘Dreary redbrick dungeon’
Palace life was far from glamourous. Residents complained about their cold, cramped living spaces and seized any opportunity to move apartments. In 1891, Mrs Hore apologised for writing ‘directly after Mrs Mayne’s death’ but felt she had to ask ‘at once for some more room’.
Others had more prudish complaints. In 1864, Miss Baly was horrified to find her rooms in the Little Banqueting House decorated with ‘large, undressed figures’ – nude classical murals by Antonio Verrio. She demanded that they ‘should be either draped or clouded’ to make them ‘appropriate decorations for a drawing room’.
Getting around
Some grace-and-favour residents struggled to get around the palace. Many ladies used ‘the Push’ – a wheeled sedan chair used to take residents across the long cloisters and courtyards.
Others were inconvenienced with apartments on the very top floors. One clever solution was using baskets suspended on ropes. That way ladies could winch grocery deliveries up to their rooms without climbing the endless flights of stairs.
![The Chocolate Court stairs, looking down the stairwell and showing a wicker basket and pulley[wince] system (1760 to 1900).
This basket and pulley would have been used by a Grace and Favour resident to send down shopping lists and receive shopping without having to descend the stairs. It could have been used by Apartments 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 8a and 10.](https://hrp.imgix.net/https%3A%2F%2Fhistoricroyalpalaces.picturepark.com%2Fv%2FEjd7vXJG?auto=format&s=e75cde054b323e55027133c73bf92e93)
Image: Basket and pulley in the Chocolate Court stairwell. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Victorians behaving badly
Palace life came with strict rules. Residents had to stay at Hampton Court at least half the year and many got in trouble for subletting their rooms to unofficial tenants.
Some people broke more rules than others. Officials scolded Lady Gordon for lighting a fire in Home Park and letting water pour through her floor into the Queen’s Apartments below. Her children were caught picking flowers, climbing gates and defacing anti-smoking signs.
Others twisted rules around their beloved furry friends. The Lord Chamberlain tried to ban pets from the palace, only allowing residents to keep little ‘lap-dogs’. But some ladies exploited this vague definition, insisting on their ‘well-behaved’ labradors and German shepherds.
Queen Victoria and Hampton Court Palace
Queen Victoria never lived at Hampton Court, but she visited the palace several times throughout her reign. She called on friends and family amongst the residents, including Princess Frederica and her aunt Adelaide, consort of William IV, in Bushy Park.
At about 3 we went … to Hampton Court. The Park looked beautiful & Hampton Court itself & the gardens, with its avenues, courts & fountains, looked exceedingly handsome. Albert was very much struck by it & thought it very like Versailles … We walked through all the rooms, & looked at the pictures, which are very fine.
Queen Victoria in her journal, 3 August 1840
Image: Portrait of Queen Victoria taken in 1882 and published in 1887 to mark her Golden Jubilee. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Hampton Court Palace opens to the public
Hampton Court Palace officially opened to the public in 1838.
Travellers had visited the palace since the reign of Elizabeth I. By the 1750s, the lady housekeeper took fees for guided tours, which mostly focused on the palace’s tapestries and extensive picture collection.
Subsequent housekeeper Lady Emily Montagu continued the tours, but things changed when she died in April 1838. The palace was incredibly popular, and campaigners called to widen public access to the arts. As such, Queen Victoria agreed to reform the housekeeper's role and Hampton Court opened six days a week, free of charge.
A day at the palace
By 1881, over 10 million tourists had visited Hampton Court Palace. The palace was one of the few attractions open on Sundays and was served by omnibus (a type of horse-drawn vehicle), river and rail. This made Hampton Court more accessible, particularly to working class people.
Visitors soaked up the architecture, the picture galleries and the sprawling gardens. Many bought guidebooks and even paid an extra penny to get lost in Hampton Court’s famous hedge maze, which opened in 1856.
Image: Illustration depicting visitors enjoying the East Front Gardens from: 'The Illustrated News of the World', 29 May 1858. © Historic Royal Palaces.
The trouble with tourists
Not everyone appreciated the palace’s popularity. Grace and favour residents resented their new visitors and complained about the noise and nuisance - particularly people peering through their ground floor windows.
One lady begged the Lord Chamberlain to stop tourists bathing in the Thames, writing that ‘the scenes are most indecent - so much so that I do not like to describe them’.
Image: Armour display of St George slaying the dragon above a doorway in The Great Hall. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Victorian visions
Hampton Court underwent major building works throughout the 19th century. The palace required constant maintenance, and officials took the opportunity to ‘re-tudorise’ parts of the building to reflect its most famous occupants.
This Victorian reimagining included Master Carpenter’s Court, where craftspeople enhanced the 17th century kitchen buildings with Tudor-style windows, patterned brick work and elaborate chimneys. Other 19th century building projects included work on Anne Boleyn’s Gateway and the Great Gatehouse.
The Great Hall
In the 1840s, Edward Jesse, then Surveyor for the Office of Works, oversaw a dramatic transformation of the Great Hall. He repaired and painted the ceiling, rehung the Abraham Tapestries and commissioned colourful stained-glass windows referencing Cardinal Wolsey, Henry VIII and his six queens.
Jesse wanted to invoke the colour and grandeur of Wolsey’s Hampton Court. He also leant into romantic ideas of ‘merrie’ England, adding elaborate suits of armour and St George slaying a metal dragon.
Ghost stories of a Tudor palace
Amongst Hampton Court’s many attractions were its infamous ghosts. Grace and favour residents, who had the palace to themselves on dark and stormy nights, were eager to share encounters with their spookier neighbours.
Some whispered that Jane Seymour would wander the palace carrying a lit candle. Others described Catherine Howard running down the Haunted Gallery, or glimpsing a ‘Grey Lady’ – said to be royal nurse Sybill Penn.
In 1871, two skeletons were discovered beneath Fountain Court. One elderly resident was relieved – their spirits had been banging on her walls for years! The remains were reinterred in Hampton Church.
Image: A postcard depicting 'The ghost of Hampton Court' in the Queen's Gallery. © Historic Royal Palaces.
Memories of Hampton Court Palace
Grace and favour residents continued to live at Hampton Court Palace into the 20th and 21st centuries. The community welcomed more famous faces, from Chief Guide Lady Baden Powell to Hannah Scott, mother of the Antarctic explorer, and Grand Duchess Xenia, sister of last Tsar Nicholas II.
Today, volunteers from the Memories of Hampton Court Project collect stories from the palace and the grace and favour community. If you remember living or working at Hampton Court, please contact us at curatorial.volunteers@hrp.org.uk – we would love to hear from you!
Browse more history and stories
The story of Hampton Court Palace
Home of Henry VIII and the Tudor dynasty
Sophia Duleep Singh
The Punjabi Princess who fought for women's rights
Historic hauntings at Hampton Court Palace
Centuries of ghosts and grim tales