Somerset House, London, fronting both on the Strand and on the Thames Embankment, stands on the site of a palace built by the Protector Somerset about 1549, which fell to the crown on Somerset's execution. The original edifice was pulled down and rebuilt in 1776-86, after designs by Sir William Chambers, in the Palladian or Italian style. The building accommodates the offices of the Audit and Exchequer, Inland Revenue, Wills and Probate, and the Registry-general of Births, Deaths, and Marriages for England and Wales. The east wing, built in 1828, accommodates King's College and School.
Somerset House
Chambers's Encyclopaedia, Volume 9: Bound to Swansea, p. 568
Source scan(s): p. 0581