St. James's Palace

Before this site became a palace, it was a hospital dedicated to Saint James the Less, founded in the twelfth century to care for women suffering from leprosy. At that time, the location was intentionally isolated from the main parts of London to distance the patients from the rest of the population. By the time Henry the Eighth ordered the construction of the current red-brick palace in the fifteen thirties, the hospital had been suppressed and only a few residents remained. Henry viewed this project as a quiet retreat, a place where he could escape the formal life of his larger palace at Whitehall.