Although this pub is not a listed building, it is on the London Regional Inventory, where the description is as follows: “Now very much an upmarket place for a drink and a meal, this was once a simple back-street boozer. It was built about 1830 to serve the needs of the staff from the neighbouring mansions and also thirsty guards from a barracks that was located to the west from about 1762 and around 1835. The pub was originally known as the Guardsman. The plain, three-storey Georgian frontage appears much as it did when originally built (apart from the thoroughly unnecessary application of white paint) with stairs up to the main entrance and a door on the side. The two doors suggest that, small as the pub is, it would have had a couple of separate drinking areas. The fittings are simple and basic as befits what was once an artisan pub – a matchboarded dado round the walls and matchboarded bar counter. The latter has intriguing traces in the centre part that suggest that panels were removable. At some later stage a pewter top has been placed on the counter. The two rear rooms have been brought into use in relatively recent years. The left-hand one is dominated by a huge mirror advertising ‘Mann, Crossman & Paulin Ltd Old and Mild Ales and Stout’ – a reminder of beer styles that in London have now been largely consigned to history.

History in the area: Belgravia was originally called the Five Fields when it was a rural area. In the 1820s it was developed by the Grosvenor family and named Belgrave after one of their country properties. Belgrave Square was mainly designed by Thomas Cubitt in 1826 but some of the terraces and villas were designed by other architects including Sir Robert Smirke. The mews houses were inhabited by coachmen, grooms and their families. Many famous people have lived in Belgravia and it is also home to many embassies.”

The Grenadier featured on the Evening Crawl of Belgravia in September 2002, the Cavaliers and Grenadiers; Evening Crawl of Knightsbridge and Belgravia in August 2009, and the Mews and Booze: Evening Crawl of Belgravia and Knightsbridge in September 2012.