Tower of London, the Historic Castle in the City of London
Standing on the northern bank of the River Thames and abutting the eastern edge of the City of London is the iconic Tower of London, instantly recognisable by its White Tower from whence it obtained its name. 900 years old, this castle and fortress is one of the most important historical sites in Britain. It has played a crucial role in British history throughout the centuries with tales of Kings and Queens, power & intrigue, treason, torture, execution and murder.
In the past, as well as being a fortress, it was one of the Royal residence of the Sovereign. It has also served as a prison, with the last person to be incarcerated there being the East End gangsters, Ronnie & Reggie Kray in 1952. Here too, protected by this military citadel used to be the Royal Mint, where the coins of the Realm were made and where the Crown Jewels were (and still are) kept securely. This protection was further guaranteed as the castle was also an armoury where weapons and military equipment were held and where troops were barracked. Important public records were also kept here and, strangely, the Tower of London also housed a menagerie – a collection of exotic animals. This zoo remained at the tower until 1835.
As the most secure castle in England, the Tower of London guarded royal possessions and even the Royal Family in times of war and rebellion. Today the Tower of London or, to give it its full and proper name: Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress of the Tower of London, is a World Heritage Site and is one of the most complete examples of an 11th century fortress palace that remains in Europe. It attracts more than 3 million visitors each year who marvel with wonder at the building, its historical significance and the strange customs that still take place, such as the Ceremony of the Keys – an ancient ritual which still takes place every evening.
Built towards the end of 1066 by William the Conqueror ( William the Duke of Normandy), the castle is a very typical example of Norman military architecture. Deliberately designed to intimidate and subdue the population, its initial use was as a military stronghold and weapons store. As an attacker that seized the Crown from the defeated Anglo-Saxon King Harold II, William’s position was not a stable one and, very aware of a future rebellion, the massive stone fortress was built not only to defend his power but also to proclaim it.
William the Conqueror incorporated part of the huge defensive Roman wall, known as London Wall, in the design of the Tower. Initially, for speed, a wooden castle was erected and work began on the stone structure around 1075. The building took around 20 years to build and craftsmen such as Masons came from Normandy, bringing with them their favoured, local, creamy coloured limestone from Caen. Much of the actual labour and construction work however was carried out by Englishmen.
The Tower of London was built around the massive Keep (now known as the White Tower after King Henry III had it whitewashed in the 13th century). This keep, or donjon, is the strongest structure in the centre of the complex and contained the living quarters of William and his representatives. Throughout history, the Tower has been adapted and developed to defend and control the nation. The inner enclosure which encircles the White Tower was added by Richard I between 1189 and 1199. Edward I further fortified this with the addition of a third enclosure , adding huge ‘curtain’ (defensive) walls with a series of smaller towers and enlarging the moat. The general layout of the castle we see today has not changed much since Edward I completed extensions and additions to it in 1285. This final alteration transformed it into England’s largest and strongest concentric castle, with one ring of defences inside another. The main building material is a hard grey limestone called Kentish rag-stone, which had been used in London and south east England since Roman times when the Kent quarries played a crucial part in the construction of London. In parts, local mudstone was used, a kind of sedimentary rock dredged from the Thames. The Caen stone that the Norman masons brought with them was used to provide decorative details to the facing of the Tower. However, much of this stone was replaced with Portland stone in the 17th and 18th century and many of the Tower’s windows were also enlarged at this time. The entrance to the keep was via a wooden staircase situated above ground level. This again was typical of Norman fortresses whereby the staircase could be removed if the castle came under attack.
In all, the castle is sited on almost 12 acres of land and a further 6 acres around this constitute what is known as Tower Liberties, to ensure that there will always be an open area around the Tower that guarantees that it can be defended.
For around 250 years after its construction in 1066 the Tower was expanded. Inside the complex, the medieval kings built magnificent royal lodgings. Although not there today, there used to be a luxurious royal palace sited just to the south of the White Tower. Henry VIII modernised the chambers in preparation for the coronation of Anne Boleyn in 1533.
There are two Chapels Royal within the Tower: St. John’s chapel in the White Tower and St. Peter Ad Vincula Chapel. During medieval times the monarch spent much of their time travelling around the country staying in their countless palaces and castle around the realm. As such, they took their chapel with them, which included the priests, the vestments, the plate, the books and the musicians. By the middle of the 16th century this was not the case and the Court and the Royal Family tended to stay longer in one place. This is when the concept of a ‘chapel royal’ began to be used to identify a church building within a royal palace or castle. The Chapel Royal of St. John the Evangelist was built around 1078 and, although now not very grandiose, it was for the prime use of the Sovereign and the Court. At more than 900 years old, it is considered to be one of the oldest churches in England. During the time of Henry III it was decorated and adorned in a much more befitting style for a King. Exclusive use by the monarch and the Court continued throughout the medieval times.
The Chapel Royal of St Peter ad Vincula was built some time before 1200. It too was restored and embellished by King Henry III and was used for the garrison and the staff of the Tower, which during the Middle Ages could have been around one thousand souls. It has been rebuilt several times over the centuries with much of the current chapel dating from the reconstruction carried out in 16th century by Henry VIII. The Chapel is infamously known as being the burial place of some of the famous prisoners of the Tower which include Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, wives of Henry VIII, who were both executed within the Tower. In 1876 the Chapel underwent restoration work and the remains of these queens, and other victims of execution, were exhumed and reburied beneath a marble pavement showing their names and coats of arms.
In 1235 a menagerie was established within the tower by King Henry III. This began when monarchs from different countries around the world began exchanging rare and strange animals as gifts. King Henry had received three ‘leopards’ (or more probably, lions) from the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II. This reflected the Plantagenet crest of Henry of three lions. This collection of beasts was joined later by a bear and an elephant, which was seen as the weirdest of all God’s creatures
Also during the 13th century the production of coins was set up within the Tower. This was implemented by Edward I who needed to ensure that the wealth of his realm was secure at all times. The tradition of keeping the Crown Jewels in the Tower of London also dates from this century and was probably begun during the reign of Henry III. At around the same time as the Royal Mint was established, the Tower also became the location for the storage of Public Records of government. Previously, these records had travelled around the country with the reigning monarch but, as these records increased, it was necessary to find a more permanent and secure site for them.
Popular fiction implies that the Tower of London had a permanent torture chamber. However, this is not the case, although the basement of the White Tower used to contain a torture devise named as The Rack, which stretched the victim, causing excruciating pain and permanent disability.
Although the original function of the tower was a fortress, over time this usage began to be obsolete. This was especially the case when the existence of cannons as a means of warfare began to be adopted in Europe. In the 17th century new gun platforms were erected and, again in the 1860s, during a time when an invasion by France was feared and so heavy guns were positioned near the Tower to defend the capital. Although the Tower of London gradually fell out of favour as a royal residence it remained a major part of London’s and the nation’s defence – due partly to its central location where both arms, ammunition and troops could be manoeuvred to fight in the many European battles of the Middle Ages. Later, in the middle of the 19th century, The Duke of Wellington (who was constable of the Tower of London) dismantled much of the non-military functions inside the tower, this included closing the menagerie and dispatching some of the animals to a new location in Regent’s Park (today’s London Zoo) whilst selling the remainder to other zoos or travelling circuses. He built the Waterloo Block as new accommodation for the garrison billeted there and today this is where the Crown Jewels are held.
Some guards still reside in the Tower of London. The Tower of London is still home to the Yeomen Warders and their families, the Resident Governor, and a garrison of soldiers. There is a doctor and a chaplain. And there is even a pub!
Prisoners in The Bloody Tower
The Bloody Tower constitutes part of the extension of the Tower of London carried out in the early 1220s by King Henry III. During his reign Henry was in many disputes with his barons and he felt it prudent to increase the defences of the Tower of London complex. Amongst other things. this work consisted of constructing a stronger rampant and extending it on the three sides not bordering the Thames. Several towers were built along this rampart bound by a circular pathway This extended the fortress way beyond the old Roman border on the western side and into fields on the eastern side. Further protection was created by building ditches all around this enclose.
The Bloody Tower is one of 21 towers and its original intention was to control the main river entrance to the Tower. However, the further construction of the outer defensive walls left this tower landlocked which meant that a different use was needed for it. It then became the main access gate from the inner to the outer enclosures and the lower rooms of the tower became superior lodgings. Its upper storey opened onto part of the soldiers parade ground which used to be the Constable’s garden. Originally it was known as the Garden Tower. King Edward III in the 14th century largely rebuilt the upper rooms to this tower. The name ‘Bloody Tower’ is thought to have begun in 1632 after Henry Percy, 8th Earl of Northumberland, committed suicide in one of the chambers. He was imprisoned on suspicion of complicity in the Gunpowder Plot to blow up the House of Lords. His remains are buried in the Royal Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula.
Henry Percy however was not the first nor the last to have met an untimely death within the walls of the Bloody Tower. The whole complex has been the infamous setting for stories of royal tragedy, plotting, death and executions with most victims being incarcerated either in the Bloody Tower, or elsewhere in the Tower of London, before meeting their end. For over 800 years, some 8,000 men and women were incarcerated within its walls for crimes ranging from treason and conspiracy to murder, debt and sorcery. Some stayed for only a few days, others many years and, still others, ended their days by losing their heads on the block
During the Wars of the Roses, in 1471, Henry VI was murdered in the Wakefield Tower – one of the towers that Henry III added to the fortress. He was replaced by Edward IV and shortly after his death in 1483 his two young sons, the 12 year old, uncrowned Edward V and his younger brother Richard, Duke of York, mysteriously disappeared within the walls of the Tower. It is traditionally accepted that they were murdered by their uncle, Richard Duke of Gloucester in order that he could claim the throne as the next in line after the two young princess. Certainly, it is known that the Duke of Gloucester kept them in the tower, to all intents and purposes for their protection. However, they were never seen again and exactly what happened can never be really known now. Some historians argue that they were murdered under instructions from the Duke but others dispute this saying there were many others who had a vested interest in seeing the young boys’ dead.
One thing that is known however is that, in 1674, two skeletons of two young boys of around aged 12 and 10 years old were discovered at the tower. It came about during the demolition of what remained of the royal palace to the south of the White Tower. When a turret was razed and beneath the foundations of a staircase, the skeletons were found in a wooden chest. The reigning monarch at that time was Charles II and he had the skeletons interred in Westminster Abbey, where they continue to rest. In 1933 the bones were exhumed temporarily for examination by forensic anthropologists which provided compelling evidence to support the theory that they were indeed the remains of the two ‘Princes in the Tower’.
Although the above tale of the Plantagenet period was gruesome, it was during the Tudor period the tower experienced the most victims of royal wrath and revenge. This was the era when an astounding number of preeminent statesmen, clergy and members of royalty, that included queens, were imprisoned and executed at the Tower. The most famous of these was Henry VIII’s second queen, Anne Boleyn, who was plotted against and finally brought to her downfall by the notorious Thomas Cromwell, the King’s Chief Minister. Cromwell had managed to persuade the King that Anne was conducting many adulterous affairs, including one with her brother, George Boleyn.
Anne was arrested at Hampton Court on 2nd May 1536, taken by barge down the River Thames to the Tower of London. She was held prisoner in the same apartments that had been renovated and decorated for her coronation three years earlier. From the windows of these apartments she witnessed the execution of her brother and the others accused of infidelity with her. Two days later she too was taken to the executioner’s block and met her death by decapitation.
Henry VIII’s fifth wife , Catherine Howard, met a similar fate to Anne Boleyn. She was married to the king on 28 July 1540 when she was a mere 17 years old and he a middle-aged man of 49. Quite soon after the marriage rumours began to be whispered in Court that Catherine had had a sexual relationship with one Francis Dereham, a secretary of her stepmother, Agnes Howard, the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk, with whom she lived after the death of her mother in 1528. Furthermore, a letter or letters were discovered written by Catherine to Henry VIII’s favourite courtier, Thomas Culpeper, which seemed to imply that Catherine was having an adulterous affair with him whilst married to the king. In November 1541, she was stripped of her royal title as Queen of England and taken to the Tower where, three months later, she was beheaded. Both Dereham and Culpeper were also executed at Tyburn – where Marble Arch now stands.
Many of Catherine’s relatives were also incarcerated at the Tower, tried and found guilty of concealing treason and sentenced to life imprisonment and forfeiture of their goods. Henry VIII also had a number of dissenting religious figures detained at the Tower and later killed, including his former counsellor, Thomas More, and Thomas Cromwell who had brought about the downfall of Anne Boleyn
Others who were imprisoned or executed in the Bloody Tower included the ecclesiastical Tudor Protestant martyrs who were condemned to death for heresy. One of these was the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, who had been instrumental in building the case that enabled Henry VIII to obtain an annulment of his marriage to Katherine of Aragon. When the Catholic Queen Mary I briefly ascended the throne on the death of her father (Henry VIII) Cranmer was imprisoned in the Bloody Tower before being burned at the stake in Oxford in 1553.
One Protestant martyr included Anne Askew who challenged the oppression of the church and fought against male control. She was also the first Englishwoman to demand a divorce on spiritual grounds. She was arrested and imprisoned and tortured at the Tower before being burned at the stake at Smithfield in 1546. Her crime was heresy and her torture was to twice be stretched on the rack to force her to reveal the names of fellow Protestant preachers. Even though her torture was brutal in the extreme, resulting in her shoulders and hips being pulled from their sockets and her elbows and knees becoming dislocated, causing her to faint from the excruciating pain, she refused to give up their names.
The death of Henry VIII’s daughter, Elizabeth I, in 1603 saw the end of the Tudor dynasty, but the Tower of London maintained its reputation for terror, imprisonment and execution. The new Stuart king, James I, reignited the culture of religious intolerance which led to what has come to be known as The Gunpowder Plot, an attempt to blow up the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament on 5th November 1605.
The mastermind behind the plot was Robert Catesby, with Guy Fawkes a supporting member and the one actually in charge of executing the attack. Ultimately, the strategy of this attack, if successful, would theoretically help stop the governmental persecution of Roman Catholics in England. Had they been successful, the bombing would have killed King James I, as well as any other members of Parliament in the building. The plan was only foiled, because of an anonymous letter that was sent to a brother-in-law of one of the conspirators, which warned him to stay away from the House of Lords that day. Suspicious, he raised the alarm and the plot was discovered.
Catesby and some of the other conspirators, apart from Guy Fawkes, managed to escape and were on the run until tracked down some days later, with Catesby dying in the ensuing battle between them and 200 government men. Guy Fawkes, however, had been discovered in the cellars of the House of Lords, along with 36 barrels of gunpowder. He, and the remaining conspirators, were arrested and taken immediately to the Tower of London where they underwent interrogation. After suffering the agony of the rack, Fawkes eventually confessed and was sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered. This barbaric execution involved hanging the prisoner by the neck until almost dead, then cutting them down and disembowelling them. This excruciating torture usually killed the victim. Nevertheless, the prisoner would then have their arms and legs pulled from their torso and their heads cut off. Fawkes, however, escaped this grisly fate as just before the execution was to be carried out, he fell (or jumped) from the scaffold, broke his neck and died instantly.
Sir Walter Raleigh, the celebrated soldier, hero of land and sea and responsible for the first English colonies in the New World, spent a considerable amount of time locked up in the Tower of London. The first time was in 1592, during the reign of Elizabeth I. This was because he had secretly married his lover who was also a lady-in-waiting to the Queen. Elizabeth I was angry because they had not confided in her, nor sought her permission – which was the protocol of the day. Both Raleigh and his new wife were imprisoned at the Tower for a short while. On his release he regained his favoured position in Court and this continued until Elizabeth I’s death. With the accession to the throne of James I things were quite different. As a Catholic, King James I was attempting a reconciliation with Spain, against whom Raleigh had been an arch enemy. Raleigh was falsely implicated in a plot to depose the king and he was imprisoned in the Tower for a total of 13 years. Conditions for him were not as onerous as those outlined above however. Whilst there he was given two rooms on the second floor of the Bloody Tower and resided there with Bess, his wife – their son was conceived at there. He also wrote his great tome, History of the World. He was eventually pardoned and allowed to travel to Guyana with the hope of discovering gold. It is quite likely that this was the main reason that the pardon was given. Unfortunately, whilst on this quest, a detachment of his men attacked a Spanish outpost and on his return he was arrested again and the death sentence passed. He was beheaded on 29th October 1618 in the Old Palace Yard at the Palace of Westminster.
In 1613, Sir Thomas Overbury, a poet and courtier was poisoned whilst imprisoned in the Bloody Tower. He was a close friend and advisor of James I’s favourite Robert Carr, the Earl of Somerset. Overbury was arrested for refusing to carry out a diplomatic mission for the King. Robert Carr and his wife Frances Howard were tried and convicted of collusion in the murder. They were given a death sentence but eventually spared by the king. However, they remained prisoners in the Tower until their release in 1622.
George Jeffreys, 1st Baron Jeffreys PC was a Welsh judge in the latter half of the 17th century. Known as ‘the hanging judge’ and during the English Civil War had sentenced hundreds of men and women to be executed or transported to the colonies. Despite holding strong Protestant beliefs he had no problem in supporting Catholic James II. During the Glorious Revolution when the last Stuart king, James II, was forced to flee the country, Jeffreys remained in London until finally, on the approach of William II’s soldiers to London, decided to flee and join the King in exile in France. He disguised himself as a sailor, intending to join one of the ships moored on the Thames but was captured by William’s men in a public house in Wapping on the banks of the river. His reputation as a harsh, cruel, ruthless and unjust judge meant that he was a marked man. In terror of the public when dragged to the Lord Mayor, he was taken to the Tower not just for incarceration but also for his own safety where he would be protected from the mob. He died the following year in the Bloody Tower, not from capital punishment but from a rare kidney disease which had bedevilled him all his adult life.
In the late 18th and 19th centuries, the Tower was used less commonly for incarcerating prisoners. By the beginning of the 20th century it seemed that its function as a fortress and prison was consigned to history. However, during World War Two, Rudolf Hess, Adolf Hitler’s deputy, was captured in Scotland when his plane unexpectedly landed there. He was brought to the Tower where he was imprisoned, quite comfortably, in the Queen’s House for four days before being transferred to a series of safe houses.
The Tower of London was still being used as a high-security prison right up to the middle of the 20th century. The last known prisoners to be held there were the notorious Kray twins, Reggie and Ronnie Kray, who were leading perpetrators of organised crime in the East End of London from the 1950s until their arrest in 1967. There time at the Tower of London however was nothing to do with these crimes. They were held there for a few days in 1952 for failing to report for national service.
The Peasants’ Revolt
An ancient saying was that ‘he who held London held the Kingdom’. The Tower of London thus was the key to the capital and, for that reason, it was always the main target for rebels and invaders.
One of the most infamous was the Peasants’ Revolt on 1381 which came about after the introduction of a ‘poll tax’ by Richard II’s government. The revolt was led by Kentish man, Wat Tyler, who in June of that year marched with 20,000 rebels into London and headed straight to the Tower. The king agreed to meet with them but as soon as the gates were opened for him to come out, 400 rebels stormed the gates. Ransacking their way to the inner enclosures of the fortress, they reached the White Tower and burst into St. John’s Chapel where they dragged out the despised Archbishop of Canterbury, Simon Sudbury and butchered him and his companions on Tower Hill.
In the meantime, the rest of the mob had found their way to the king’s bedchamber and allegedly molested his mother and her ladies-in-waiting. The 14year-old King Richard II then rode out to meet the rebels again and faced down the leader Wat Tyler. Tyler was then attacked and killed by William Walworth, the Lord Mayor of London. Before the rebel army could retaliate for the loss of their leader, Richard stepped forward and promised to abolish serfdom. The peasants meekly accepted this promise and returned home. Later however, government troops toured the villages and hanged any men who had taken part in the Revolt.
Guardians Of The Tower: The Beefeaters.
The famous Yeomen Warders or ‘Beefeaters’ are recognised as symbols of the Tower of London all over the world. They have been at the Tower since Tudor times, originally being part of the Yeomen of the Guard who travelled with the monarch as personal bodyguards. It was Henry VIII who decreed that 12 of the guards should stay to permanently guard the Tower after he moved his official London residence from the Tower of London in 1509. The title of this detachment of 12 guards then changed to that of Tower Warders which more accurately reflected their new role.
Today there are 37 Yeomen Warders and their main duties have changed considerably since the Tudor era. In principle they are responsible for the supervision and care of any prisoners held in the Tower and safeguarding the Crown Jewels. In practice there role is primarily ceremonial, welcoming and acting as guides for visitors and various ceremonial duties. They have become a tourist attraction in themselves with their Tudor uniforms of dark blue with red trimmings. On State occasions or if the Sovereign visits the Tower they then wear their Tudor State Dress of red and gold which is similar to the Yeomen of the Guard who guard Buckingham Palace. As part of their responsibility in looking after tourists, each Yeoman Warder has to learn ‘the story’ – which covers the 900 years of the Tower’s history. They must learn this by heart within six months of passing their probationary period and being sworn in.
It is not clear exactly why the Yeomen Warders are called ‘Beefeaters’. One explanation is that, in the early days, they were not paid in money but in food, especially beef, which was a luxury. Also, in the past, the post would be handed down through the family or sold. This practice continued until 1826, when the Constable of the Tower, The Duke of Wellington, ordered that in the future the post should only be occupied by worthy non-commissioned officers of the Household Cavalry, Foot Guards and Infantry of the Line. Today, all Yeomen Warders are retired members of the armed services. Until 2011 this excluded the Royal Navy as their oath is to the Admiralty rather than the Crown. This has now changed. All applicants must have served for at least 22 years and have earned the Long Service and Good Conduct Medal. The post currently pays £30,000 p.a. In 2007 a service woman became the first Yeoman warder in the history of the institution. Yeomen Warders live in tied accommodation within the Tower of London itself, paying both rent and council taxes, although they must also have a home outside the Tower for when they retire. Some of this accommodation dates back to the 13th century and, in many ways, the 150-strong community of Yeomen Warders and their families, the Resident Governor and officers, a chaplain and a doctor are like a small village within the fortress complete with a pub, The Yeoman Warders Club, exclusively for them and for their invited guests.
The Ceremony of the Keys.
Each night the Yeomen Warders take part in the Ceremony of the Keys. This involves the unlocking and locking of the outer gates of the fortress and the handing of the key to the Resident Governor who is the Monarch’s representative of the Tower of London. This ceremony, which occurs at 10pm every night, as not changed for 700 years, with the exception of the name of the reigning monarch.
The ceremony involves the sentry crying out ‘Halt, who comes there?’
The Yeoman Warder replies ‘The Keys’.
‘Whose keys?’
‘Queen Elizabeth’s keys’
‘Pass then, all’s well’.
Although the monarch no longer lives at the Tower of London, the Crown Jewels and many other valuable objects still are kept there so its importance is still relevant today.
Ghosts
With so many murders and executions in the Tower of London it is little wonder that it is deemed to be one of the most haunted places in London. Henry VI, who was Imprisoned in the Wakefield Tower of the Tower of London, and murdered at the altar in the King’s Private Chapel in 1471 close to midnight is believed to haunt the Wakefield Tower, appearing on the stroke of midnight. According to legend, the Bloody Tower is haunted by the ghosts of the two little princes. Guards in the late 15th century reported that on passing the Bloody Tower they saw two small figures in white nightshirts that glided down the stairs before then standing silently, holding hands, until fading back into the stone walls of the Tower.
Anne Boleyn is said to stalk the site of her execution on Tower Green. 340 years after her death, a soldier reported seeing a light burning in the locked Chapel Royal of St. Peter ad Vincula, where she was laid to rest. He climbed up to look into a window and it is said that he saw a procession of knights and ladies, led by a headless Anne Boleyn. Like Anne Boleyn, the beheading of Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury took place on Tower Green, which lies to the west of the White Tower. Brought to the scaffold by Henry VIII for the crime of being the mother of Cardinal Pole who opposed Henry’s self-created position as Supreme Head of the Church of England, Margaret Pole was 67 at the time of her death. Eyewitnesses say the executioner on the fateful day in 1541 was a “wretched and blundering youth” who, unable to perform a clean execution with his axe, instead hacked at Margaret Pole’s head and shoulders. That eternal scream echoes through the towers today.
Known as the English queen with the shortest reign, protestant Lady Jane Grey became Queen after the death of King Edward VI, son of King Henry VIII. Edward named Lady Jane Grey as his heir in his last will, over his half-sister Mary. A pawn in Royal power games, the King’s protector John Dudley had arranged for the 16 year old Lady Jane Grey to marry his son, Lord Guildford Dudley. On Edward’s death on 6th July 1553, Lady Jane Grey became Queen, a title she was to hold for just 9 days before the council decreed that Catholic Mary was the true ruler of England. Lady Jane Grey, and her husband Dudley, were executed on the infamous Tower Green in 1554. The white figure of Jane is said to haunt the battlements of the Tower of London to this day. In 1864, Captain J.D Dundas observed a Yeoman attempting to charge a ‘whitish, female figure’ with his bayonet. Chillingly, this apparition appeared in the courtyard where Anne Boleyn was beheaded.
An often repeated ghost sighting at the Tower of London is that of Arabella Stuart, cousin to Elizabeth I. Arabella was imprisoned by James I for marrying William Seymour, nephew of Lady Jane Grey, without Royal consent. Seeing this match as a possible threat to his throne, James placed Arabella under arrest at the Tower, where she either refused to eat or was purposefully starved. Her ghost is thought to stalk the Queen’s House.
In 1957, Welsh Guardsman Johns was on sentry duty at the Salt Tower when he encountered a shapeless form with the face of a young woman, perhaps one of the many women who suffered a terrible fate at the Tower of London. Also, tales abound of hearing the sounds of monk’s footsteps on the stone floors of the Tower. Finally, the ghosts and ghouls are not just of the souls of departed people but also of animals. Yeomen Warders even tell a chilling tale of a huge bear who occasionally appears to frighten visitors to death, appearing from behind the door of the Jewel Room. Also, the ghost of a black bear is reported to have appeared in 1816 near the Martin Tower. Lastly, is the ‘nameless thing’, a petrifying spirit which follows the guards of the Tower as they walk their beat from the river’s Sally Portal entrance.
From repugnant smells, ice-cold rooms, mischievous poltergeists and death-heralding bears, stories of inexplicable Tower of London ghosts abound.
The Treasures
The Crown Jewels: Within the Tower of London, safely secured behind bomb-proof glass in the Jewel Tower, there are over 23,000 jewels, all of which belong to the Royal Family. The jewels are encrusted into over 140 items with a total value that is said to be more than £20 billion. The jewels include the crowns that are worn by the monarchs of the British Isles during the opening of Parliament and the Coronation. They are one of the most popular attractions at the Tower of London.
Using the Tower of London as a repository for royal treasure began in 1303 when a number of treasures were stolen from the Abbey of St. Peter in Westminster. The remaining treasures were brought to the tower, which was the most heavily fortified spot in London, for safekeeping. A new jewel house was built against the south side of the White Tower in 1508. However, most of the jewelled regalia that you can see today are only about 370 years old. The original pieces were melted down in the Tower Mint, under the orders of Oliver Cromwell, during the English Civil War. This was a time when Britain was a Republic, Charles I had been executed and the crown jewels were a potent symbol of royal power and had to be destroyed. Upon the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Charles II commissioned the sparkling new jewels that the Royal Family have used since then and which you see in the Jewel Tower. There are a few pieces that survived Cromwell’s desecration. The oldest piece is the 12th century golden Anointing Spoon that is used to anoint the Sovereign with holy oil. Also there are three steel coronation swords, the Swords of Temporal Justice, of Spiritual Justice and of Mercy which date from the Coronation of Charles I in 1626.
The tower also contains an impressive collection of armour, which is a treasure unto itself. Shown in an exhibit called the “Line of Kings,” a show at the tower that first started more than 300 years ago, it features such items as a life-size wooden horse carved about 1690 and a set of armour, gilded with gold, created for Charles I around 1612.
The Ravens
An Unkindness (flock) of Ravens have lived at the Tower of London for centuries and it is believed that if they should ever leave the White Tower then the monarchy and the entire kingdom would fall. Seven ravens live at the Tower today ( six specially-bred and a spare) and are looked after by a specially dedicated Yeoman Warder called the Ravenmaster. The superstition possibly dates back to the Victorian era but ravens have been there for much longer. Where they originally came from is not clear. It could be that the first ravens were given to the Tower of London by the Earls of Dunraven, possibly because of their association with the Celtic raven god, Bran. However, ravens were once a common site in London, especially around the meat markets such as Eastcheap and Smithfields, quite close to the Tower and so could have roosted there in earlier times. Alternatively, they are often associated with the scaffold which may suggest that the legend of the ravens, which are renowned for gathering at gallows, were used by Yeoman Warders to dramatise their stories of execution to tourists.
Charles II is said to have been the first monarch to insist they are protected, even though the Royal Astronomer, John Flamsteed, complained that they should go because they were fouling his telescope. Charles did not heed Flamsteed’s protests but merely moved the Royal Observatory to Greenwich!
The Ravenmaster currently employed to look after the seven raven residents lets them out every morning and buys their meat from the butchers at Smithfield Meat Market. They are named: Jubilee, Harris, Gripp, Rocky, Poppy, Erin and Georgie.
The tower remains very much a living fortress, adapting chameleon-like to its changed circumstances while preserving centuries of tradition. It is still home to the world-famous Yeoman Warders, or ‘Beefeaters’, as well as to the ravens .
In 2014, to mark the centenary of the beginning of the First World War, the tower’s moat was filled with 888,246 ceramic poppies, each one representing a British or colonial military fatality during the conflict. ‘Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red’ rapidly became one of the most iconic landmarks in London, visited by millions of people from across the globe.
Although no longer subject to bombardment from invaders, the tower is nevertheless prey to the steady encroachment of the city’s new high-rise buildings. Yet still it stands, a bastion of the past that is instantly recognisable across the world.
Today, the Tower of London is one of the most famous castles in the world and is now a World Heritage Site attracting more than 2 million visitors a year. The main threat to the site today is not rebels, foreign armies or falling bombs (bomb damage happened during World War II) but rather the exhaust of cars. It’s a problem that threatens to turn the White Tower into a yellow colour, something which none of the previous threats could ever do.
Visiting the Tower of London
Under Covid restrictions most people pre-book their tickets on-line in advance with a timed entry slot. However, it is possible to just arrive and, as long as the Tower is not too busy, tickets are sold at the door. With pre-booked tickets it is possible to arrive any time within the timeslot. Facemasks for visitors over the age of 11 years are expected to be worn in all the indoor spaces.
The Tower of London is open from Tuesday to Sunday between the hours of 10.00 to 16.30 with the last admission at 15.30 (the 14.00 timeslot). Ticket prices are £29.90 for an adult and £14.90 for a child.
Tickets for the Ceremony of the Keys must be pre-booked in advance, online only. It becomes fully booked very quickly. The e-ticket needs to be shown on arriving. Visitors will be admitted to the Tower under escort at 21:30 precisely. Late arrivals will not be admitted.
The ceremony concludes at 22:05 after which all visitors are escorted to the exit. There are no toilet or refreshment facilities available. The price is a nominal fee of £5.00 per ticket and can only be pre-booked online.
Regular Sunday Services are held for the public in both St John’s Chapel and St Peter ad Vincula Chapel. You do not need a ticket and entry is free. However, you only get access to the Tower for the duration of the service, plus 15 minutes, after which you should leave. You are not entitled to visit the rest of the Tower.