Editing Hove (section)

=== Regency and Victorian developments ===
The census of 1801 recorded only 101 residents to Brighton's 7,339. By 1821, the year the Prince Regent was crowned [[George IV]], the population had risen to 312,<ref name="Middleton J. 1983">Middleton J. (1983) Hove in old picture postcards, introduction</ref> Brighton's too had trebled to 24,429 <ref>The National Cyclopaedia of Useful Knowledge, Vol III, (1847), London, Charles Knight, p.&nbsp;809.</ref> with the dwellings still clustered on Hove Street, surrounded by an otherwise empty landscape of open farmland. This relative isolated location of Hove, compared to Brighton, was ideal for smuggling and there was considerable illicit activity. Hove smugglers became notorious, with contraband often being stored in the now partially repaired St. Andrew's Church. Tradition has it that The Ship Inn was a favourite rendezvous for the smugglers, and in 1794 soldiers were billeted there. In 1818 there was a pitched battle on Hove beach between revenue men and smugglers, from which the latter emerged as the victors. As part of the concerted drive by Parliament to combat smuggling, a coastguard station was opened at the southern end of Hove Street in 1831, next to The Ship Inn.

[[Bull-baiting]] took place on [[Saint Andrew's Day]] and on the Tuesday after Easter Sunday, but the practice ceased after 1810 when a bull broke free and ran through the crowd. The [[bullring]] was between the coast road and the beach, southwest of Hove Street,<ref name="Middleton3">{{Harvnb|Middleton|1979|p=3.}}</ref> and the fights were promoted by the Ship Inn—which also organised cockfighting matches, even after this activity was made illegal.<ref name="EncH&Pv13p44">{{Harvnb|Middleton|2002|loc=Vol. 13, p. 44.}}</ref>

In the years following the Coronation of 1821 the [[Brunswick (Hove)|Brunswick estate]] of large [[Regency architecture|Regency]] houses with a theatre, riding schools and their own police was developed on the seafront near the boundary with Brighton. Although within Hove parish the residents of these elegant houses avoided the name of the impoverished village a mile to the west as an address.{{citation needed|date=March 2023}} Straggling development along the coast loosely connected the estate to fashionable Brighton, so that name was used instead.

Dating from 1822, the Brighton to Shoreham turnpike crossed the north of Hove parish along the route of the present Old Shoreham Road.

The Brighton and Hove Gas Company was established in 1825 and built a gasworks next to [[St Andrew's Church, Church Road, Hove|St Andrew's Church]] in 1832. Houses in Brunswick Terrace were the first to be lit by gas. Production moved to a new gasworks at Portslade in 1871 and the Hove works became a storage facility. The site at Portslade was close to Shoreham Harbour, so coal could be transported to it directly. Increasing demand for gas meant a new {{convert|154|x|40|ft|m}} gasholder, one of the largest in Sussex, was built on the Hove site in 1877. Of novel construction for the time, it was used until September 1994.<ref name="EncH&Pv6p4">{{Harvnb|Middleton|2002|loc=Vol. 6, p. 4.}}</ref>

By 1831 the development of the eastern end of the parish had increased the population to 1,360 <ref name="Middleton J. 1983"/> but this brought few economic benefits to Hove village itself, with the historian Thomas Horsfield describing it in 1835 as 'a mean and insignificant assemblage of huts'.

[[St Andrew's Church, Church Road, Hove|St Andrew's Church]] was reconstructed and enlarged to its present form in 1836, to the design of the architect [[George Basevi]] (1794–1845), and features prominently in the background of paintings of the period.<ref name="EncH&Pv12p24-25">{{Harvnb|Middleton|2002|loc=Vol. 12, pp. 24–25.}}</ref> About this time, a very substantial and tall wall was built between the churchyard and adjoining gasworks, remaining in place to this day.

The flat coastal plain was useful for sport as from 1848 to 1871 England's oldest county club, [[Sussex County Cricket Club]], used the [[Royal Brunswick Ground]] in Hove, situated roughly on the site of present-day Third and Fourth Avenues. In 1872 the club moved to the present [[County Cricket Ground, Hove]].

Two further large estates were developed between Hove village and Brunswick, and both avoided using the name Hove: Cliftonville was designed, laid out and initially developed under [[Frederick Banister]] from the late 1840s;<ref name="Federick Dale Banister">{{cite web|url=http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Frederick_Dale_Banister|title=Federick Dale Banister|publisher=GracesGuide.co.uk|access-date=10 February 2013|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130927154258/http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Frederick_Dale_Banister|archive-date=27 September 2013}}</ref> and West Brighton Estate in the 1870s.

West of Brunswick, the seafront of West Brighton Estate forms the end of a series of avenues, in numerical order beginning with First Avenue, mostly composed of fine [[Victorian architecture|Victorian]] villas built as another well-integrated housing scheme featuring mews for artisans and service buildings. Grand Avenue, The Drive, and the numbered avenues were developed through the 1870s and 1880s, with many of the buildings constructed by [[William Willett]].

Hove's wide boulevards contrast with the bustle of Brighton, although many of the grand Regency and Victorian mansions have been converted into flats. Marlborough Court was once the residence of the [[Consuelo Vanderbilt|Duchess of Marlborough]], aunt of [[Winston Churchill]]. The Irish nationalist leader and Home Rule MP [[Charles Stewart Parnell]] used to visit his lover, the already married [[Katharine O'Shea|Kitty O'Shea]] at the house she rented in 1883 in Medina Villas, Hove. In the subsequent divorce action the cook alleged that Captain O’Shea returned home unexpectedly and Parnell beat a hasty retreat by climbing over the balcony and down a rope ladder.<ref name="Middleton J. 1983 p.37">Middleton J. (1983) Hove in old picture postcards, p.37</ref> Parnell died at Hove in 1891 after marrying Kitty following her divorce.

The [[Hove Club]], a private members' club located at 28 Fourth Avenue, was founded in 1882.<ref name="The Hove Club: About Us">{{cite web|url=http://www.thehoveclub.com/about-us-1/|title=The Hove Club - About Us|website=thehoveclub.com|access-date=2 May 2018|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171015200045/http://www.thehoveclub.com/about-us-1/|archive-date=15 October 2017}}</ref><ref name="The Hove Club: Contact Us">[http://www.thehoveclub.com/contact-us/ The Hove Club: Contact Us] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131110142240/http://www.thehoveclub.com/contact-us/ |date=10 November 2013 }}</ref>