Banqueting House, Whitehall should be the "biggest palace in Christendom", a place befitting his newly created status as the Supreme Head of the Church of England. All evidence of the disgraced Wolsey was eliminated and the building rechristened the "Palace of Whitehall". During Henry's reign, the palace had no designated banqueting house, the King preferring to banquet in a temporary structure purpose-built in the gardens. The Keeper of the Banqueting House was a position enhanced by Queen Mary I by designating it in relation to a building of the same name at Nonsuch Palace, near the south edge of Greater London, which has
Whitehall, Cheam Nonsuch Palace, built nearby by King Henry VIII and pulled down in the 1680s. In the garden there is a medieval well which served an earlier building on the site. It is said once to have been called "The Council House," owing to its use by Queen Elizabeth I, for holding an impromptu council meeting for signing papers while on a hunting expedition from Nonsuch Palace. The oldest private school in the country, The Cheam School, was founded at Whitehall in Cheam in 1645. It is believed that the house was the residence of the merchant, lawyer and philosopher, James