Portland Place

The real thing. Not to be confused with that bit of property speculation in north London financed by the Dukes of Portland. Proper aristocrats, or at least they became such after the restoration.

I have it in my mind that these Portlands made their money out of coal, although they did not care to be thought of as coal merchants. However, I have failed to confirm this allegation and the websites I have turned up talk of large houses in both town and country, large landed estates, large social lives and connections to all the great and the good of their times.

My otherwise interesting memoir from the sixth Duke of Portland (reference 1) includes no entry for coal in the index. There is a great deal about Welbeck Abbey, and there was coal at Welbeck, although it was not worked until the 20th century - so that does not help much.

I have also failed to establish any connection between Portland Bill and the Portlands. Were these last stone merchants as well as coal merchants?

Reference 1: Men, Women and Things - Sixth Duke of Portland - 1937. A chap who, inter alia, entertained the Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Welbeck a year or so before he was assassinated at Sarajevo in 1914.

Reference 2: https://psmv2.blogspot.com/2015/06/bloomsbury.html. Previous notice of the book previous.