The Tower of London: how to plan the perfect trip

The Tower of London

The Tower of London has featured large in 

recent television portrayals of the reign 

of Henry VIII in programmes 

like 'The Tudors', 'Wolf Hall' , et al 

Pat Keenan visited the Tower 

and tells you how to plan the perfect trip 

through time from as far back as the 11th century, 

on through those Tudor times... and to the present day

Map and photos by Pat Keenan

1   Tower Hill Trinity Square Gardens

     Between 1388 and 1747 over 100 people were beheaded here. The site of the actual scaffold is marked by a paving stone in the west of the garden. The paving stone is actually a memorial to two Jacobites, both victims to the axe. They were the William Boyd, 4th Earl of Kilmarnock and Arthur Elphinstone, 6th Lord Balmerino, both beheaded in 1746. The Jacobites were the supporters of the Royal House of Stuarts after the defeat of James II at the Battle of the Boyne in Ireland. At the root of it all was James II 's conversion to Catholicism and the so-called ‘Popish Plot’ to place him on the throne. 

Over 100 people were beheaded here: Trinity Square Gardens,  Tower Hill                                  Photo: Pat Keenan

    The last person to be beheaded here in public was the eight year old Jacobite, Lord Simon Fraser Lovatt in 1747. On the day of that execution in 1747 the platform erected for the viewing public collapsed killing, we are told, 'many people'. This was also the last time an axe was used for executions in Britain. The very first execution here in 1388 was the execution of Simon DeBurley, the tutor of Richard II, impeached by the Commons for treason.
Others executed here:
•  Sir Thomas Moore in 1535 was canonised a saint in 1935. When Henry VIII asked Moore to arrange a dissolution of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon he resigned as Chancellor. Henry had him arrested and imprisoned in the Tower (see also 2 The Bell Tower)
•  Thomas Cromwell also fell victim to Henry VIII. He was made Earl of Essex for arranging Henrys marriage to Ann of Cleves. The marriage failed and Cromwell became a public liability. Cromwell was executed here in 1540
•  Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset was a brother of Henry VIIIs ??th wife Jane Seymour. He was axed here in 1552.
•  Archbishop William Laud was beheaded here in 1645. His attempt to rid Scotland of Presbyterianism and England of Calvinism led to what became known as the ‘Bishops War’
•  The English rebel leader James Scott, Duke of Monmouth carried a black box with him claiming it contained proof he was heir to the throne. When a plot to have King Charles II assassinated and have Mommouth succeed was discovered he fled to Holland. On his return he was captured after his small peasant army was defeated. He was executed here in 1685. The conspiracy to kill Charles II was called the Rye House Plot.
•  Another arrested after its discovery was Algernon Sidney who was executed here in 1683 following a suspect trial by the infamous Judge Jeffreys, His name was cleared six years later.

2   Imprisoned in the Bell Tower
Those imprisoned here in the Bell Tower included:
•  Sir Thomas More (photo)was held here for treason before his execution on the Hill (see 3) (see also Westminster Hall)
•  Bishop and Saint John Fisher was imprisoned here after opposing HenryVIII’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon. While here Pope PaulIII made him a cardinal He was beheaded and in 1935 the Vatican canonized him a saint of the Roman Catholic Church.
•  ElizabethI, daughter of HenryVIII and Ann Boleyn was imprisoned here for 19 years by her half sister MaryI, Catherine of Aragon’s daughter. In all those years Elizabeths only exercise was the walk between here and the Beauchamp Tower (11) This section is known as ‘Elizabeths Walk’
• The Duke of Monmouth, John Scott was taken here after his defeat at Sedgemoor in 1685. He was beheaded on the Hill (3)

3   St. Thomas Tower and Traitors Gate

• During the first World War Sir Roger Casement was imprisoned here  at St. Thomas Tower and Traitors Gate for treason. Returning from Germany in 1916 in a submarine he was captured by British forces in Ireland. He was hanged and buried in Pentonville. In 1965 his body was returned to Ireland where he received a state funeral.

• Sir Thomas More was also held here for a time (see also 6 the Bell Tower)

• The second wife of HenryVIII Anne Boleyn was also imprisoned here (see 8, 10, 12)

• HenryVIII’s fifth wife Catherine Howard was sent here accused of adultery with Francis Dereham. She was incidentally related to Anne Boleyn. (see12)

4   The Bloody Tower

• Two young princes were murdered here in the Bloody Tower by their uncle. One was EdwardV, made king under the guardianship of his uncle Richard Duke of Gloucester. The other was his brother Richard Duke of York. Their bones were found in a box near the present entrance to the White Tower (?) Over the past 500 years there have been many sightings of the ghosts of the two princes here in the Bloody Tower.

Two young princes murdered: The Bloody Tower                                              Photo: Pat Keenan

• Sir Walter Raleigh was imprisoned here for 16 years during which time he wrote History of the World. The territory that would become the the present US state of Virginia was named by him in honour of Queen Elizabeth I. Today that state’s capital is the city of Raleigh. It was Raleigh who first introduced new produce from America including potatoes and tobacco. A charge of conspiricy against James I  led to his incarseration here. On his release he set sail again, this time in an unsucessful attempt to fine gold in Guiana. He was arrested again on his return and executed outside Westminster.

During his imprisonment: Sir Walter Raleigh's writing desk                       Photo: Pat Keenan

• Another in the court of JamesI was Robert Carr who fell in love with the Countess of Essex Frances Howard. They planned to marry but she would first have to get her marriage annulled. Carr’s private secretary Sir Thomas Overbury opposed the marriage and as a result ended up a prisoner here. Frances however wanted Overbury dead and arranged a gift for him of cakes and pies, all laced with poison. Overbury died here and shirtly after both Carr and Frances Howard were on trial for his murder, during which they also were held here at the Tower for a time and then released. Ann turner who made the cakes and Sir Gervaise Elwes, the keeper of the Tower who allowed the cakes into Overbury’s cell were both executed. Carr and Howard went free.

• The notorious Judge Jeffreys died here in 1689. He condemned more than 300 people to death and more sold into slavery when he presided over the Bloody Assizes, the infamous trials following the defeat of the Mommouth Rebellion.

• Archbishop Thomas Cranmer was imprisoned here before his death by burning at the stake in Oxford  in 1556. 

• Another Archbishop, William Laud was incarsurated here before his beheading in 1645 on Tower Hill (1). From  a window here in 1641 the Archbishop blessed the Earl of Strafford, Sir Thomas Wentworth on his way past to the scaffold at Tower Hill (1).

5   Wakefield Tower

• At the entrance to Wakefield Tower here, on the floor, a plaque marks the spot where in 1471 Henry VI was assassinated while kneeling in prayer. Throughout the War of the Roses Henry was merely a puppet having lost his sanity. He was deposed by Edward IV, his army defeated at Barnet and imprisoned. He was murdered here by students of Eton College and Kings College Cambridge.

Henry VI assassinated, here, while kneeling in prayer                                                       Photos: Pat Keenan

6   Queen’s House

• Lord Nithsdale, William Maxwell on the eve of his execution was smuggled our of the Queen’s House, here,  dressed as a woman by his wife Winifred. They both escaped to Rome where they lived for thirty-three years. This is perhaps the most audacious escape ever made from the Tower. The day after the escape two Jacobite sympatisers were executed. They were Robert Earl of Kenmure and the Earl of Derwentwater, both captured in Preston after the 1715 Jacobite Rebellion.
• A more recent prisoner was Adolf Hitler’s deputy in the Nazi Party, Rudolf Hess. In 1941, on the eve of war with the Soviet Union, Hess flew to Scotland in an attempt to negotiate peace, but was arrested. He was a prisoner here for two days. He died aged 93 on August 17, 1987 while under Four Power imprisonment at Spandau Prison in Berlin. He was found in a "summer house" of the prison with an electrical cord around his neck. His death was ruled a suicide.

Queen’s House: the most audacious escape ever made from the Tower  Photos: Pat Keenan

7   Yeoman Gaolers House

Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII's second wife was imprisoned here in the last days before her execution in 1536,
Lady Jane Grey through a window here saw the body of her husband, Lord Guilford Dudley, return from the scaffold.
In the Council chamber here Guy Fawkes was tortured and interrogated about his plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament. The day he was arrested November 5, 1605 is commemorated in Britain every year with the burning of his effigy.

8   Beauchamp Tower

Beauchamp Tower is named after Thomas Beauchamp who was imprisoned here by RichardII between 1397 and 1399. On the walls of the first floor room the names prisoners scratched on the walls can still be seen. Over the fireplace, the name of Philip Howard Earl of Arundel is carved and on the right is theornate inscription with roses of John Dudley, his father and four brothers, all prisoners here.   Ambrose, Earl of Warwick with oak leaves, Robert, Earl of Leicester, one of the plotters to make Lady Jane Grey Queen of England, with gilly flowers, Lord Guilford, husband of Lady Jane Grey and with thehoneysuckle, Henry. On the north wall of the room the name Jane is inscribed. This Jane was Lady Jane Grey Queen of England who reigned for just 10 days.

Beauchamp Tower: names scratched on the walls by prisoners can still be seen.                                 Photo: Pat Keenan

9   Where the scaffold stood

This is the spot where the scaffold stood, where many a royal and noble head rolled. This site was used almost exclusively for the royal execution.
• 1536,  Anne Boleyn was beheaded, not by an axe, but with a sword. Her ghost has been reported seen walking about here.
• 1541  The Countess of Salisbury
• 1542  The  Countess of Rochford
• 1542  Catherine Howard, Henry VIII’s fifth wife.
• 1554  Lady Jane Grey
• 1601 Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex

The scaffold: where many a royal and noble head rolled.                     Photo: Pat Keenan

10   White Tower

The White Tower was the first building constructed at the Tower of London started in 1077 by William I the Conqueror and completed by his son ‘Rufus’ William II  in 1097. William the Conqueror was the illeggitmate son of Robert, Duke of Normandy, known as’The Devil’ William claimed the English throne on the basis of a promice he got from his cousin Edward the Confessor. He invaded England and on October 14, 1066 won the Battle of Hastings. Harold was killed in the battle and william was crowned King of England. He may have won the battle but the resistance went on until 1070. He died, fighting the Freach in a horse riding accident. His son ‘Rufus’ ( because of his red hair) also died accidentally. While hunting in the New Forest his friend Walter Tirel shot him by mistake.
Bishop Ranulf Flambard was first person to be imprisoned at the Tower and, ironically, he was also the first to escape. Imprisoned by Henry I in 1100 at the White Tower, Flambard threw a party for his guards and when they were all drunk enough hr slipped away. The Bishop using a rope lowered himself down the outside wall of the tower and escaped by boat down the river.
In the basement there is a display of17th century  Stuart armour. This was where Guy Fawkes was streached on the rack in an effort to extract why he attempted to blow up the Housea of Parliament ( see11)

The White Tower: first building constructed at the Tower of London           Photo: Pat Keenan

St Johns Chapel on the first floor is where in 1381 rebel, followers of Wat Tyler, captured Archbishop Sudbury, took him to Tower Hall and executed him. This was part of the Peasants Revolt against serfdom and a poll tax. There was three days and nights of violent protest. During the revolt Tyler was killed in a fight.
Also in this chapel in 1554 Mary I married PhilipII of Spain by proxy causing her to loose popular support. It also prompted a rebellion against her by Sir Thomas Wyatt. The revolt failed but so did the marriage with Philip leaving the country in 1555. The persecutions that followed the restoration of Roman supremacy lead to her better known name - ‘Bloody Mary’
On January 24, 1885 the Fenians, an Irish Republican society with American connections, planted a bomb here on the second floor. The explosions seriously injured many people. Two men are sentenced to penal servitude for life as a result.. In 1866 the Fenians launched a failed invasion of Canada from the United States of America, The following year 1867 they failed in a rising against English rule in Ireland.
In a German air raid in the Second World War two bombs exploded here exposing tunnels dating back to the time of CharlesII. During that raid five people were killed.
In the Mortar room on July 17, 1974 one person was killed and 35 injured in a terrorist bomb attack. A plaque marks the spot.

11   The Chapel Royal of St.Peter ad Vincula

Two of HenryVIII’s wifes are buried here, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard. An officer on sentry duty here one night noticed the lights were on in the chapel. Looking through the window he saw a woman lead a procession down the aisle He watched for several minutes as the assembly, all dressed in period costume began to fade leaving the chapel in darkness. They say the woman was Anne Boleyn. Another lady said to haunt the chapel is Lady Jane Grey, the senenteen year old ‘queen for a day’ - it was actually ten days. Sir Thomas More (photo)was buried here but his body was removed and is buried in Chelsea Old Church(photo) and his head is at Canterbury.
Also buried here: •Lady Jane Grey’s father-in-law John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland in 1553, •Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset in 1552, • Bishop John Fisher was interred in the crypt in 1553, • Robert Devereaux, Earl of Essex in 1601

The Chapel Royal of St.Peter ad Vincula                                          Photo: Pat Keenan

12   Devereaux Tower

Robert Devereaux, 2nd Earl of Essex was confined here prior to his execution for treason. he was a handsome man renouned for his clarm and good looks, a favourite on and off of Queen Elizabeth I Off when he married, on again with his attack on the Spanish at Cádiz, off when, in an angry exchange of words, he remarked that some of her views were ‘as crooked as her carcass.’ That was going too far and she sent him packing to Ireland as Lord Lieutenent. When he returned, without permission, he was arrested, taken here and beheaded at the Tower’s scaffold(13). Incidentally his son, also Robert, the 3rd. Earl of Essex married Frances Howard who after the marriage failed took a lover Robert Carr and went on to arrange the murder of Sor Thomas Overbury (9)

13   Old Waterloo Barracks

The notorious gangland Kray twins, Reggie and Ronnie Kray started their National Servive here in 1952 at the headquarters of the Royal Fusilers. Two years later they returned to the EastEnd to organise their criminal empire

Old Waterloo Barracks   Photo: Pat Keenan

14   Bower Tower

George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence was imprisoned here in the Tower charged with communicating with the dead in an attempt to foretell the future. In William Shakspear's Richard III he describes how, in this tower, the Duke was drowned in a vat of Malmsay wine. People, less poetic, say this is more accurately interpreted as meaning he drank himself to death.

15   Martin Tower

In 1671, Anglo-Irishman Colonel Thomas Blood (born in Co.Clare, Ireland) managed to steal the Crown Jewels from the Martin Tower. He was apprehended but later received a pardon from Charles II.  Before this escapade he had been involved in a foiled attempt to storm Dublin Castle, and kidnap James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, for ransom. Blood evaded arrest by hiding with his co-conspiritors in the Dublin mountains, from where he managed to escape to the Netherlands. A few of Blood's collaborators were captured and executed.
On his return to England, he made a second attempt, this time with the intention killing Ormonde.  On the night of December 6, 1670, Blood and his accomplices dragged Ormonde from his coach in St James's Street. Bound and tied he was taken on horseback along Piccadilly to Tyburn (now MarbleArch) where they intended hanging him. Ormonde somehow freed himself and escaped. So secret was the plot, Blood was never suspected of the crime.

16   Miniature Rifle Range: in moat between Martin and Constable Towers
      The last person to be executed at the Tower of London was during World War 2 when Josef Jakobs, a German spy, was shot by a military firing squad here in August 1941.
 Shortly after he landed by parachute at Huntingdonshire, Britain, he was captured by the local Home Guard, Later he was convicted of espionage by by a military tribunal. Jakobs was shot by a military firing squad at the miniature rifle range in the grounds of the Tower of London. He was not hanged because he was captured as an enemy combatant and not by the civilian police service.
During the two world wars many German spies died here by firing squad - in the Second World War alone, eleven German spies were executed.

17   Salt Tower/ 18  Cradle Tower
Jesuit priest Father John Gerard was imprisoned here in the Salt Tower in April 1587. He corresponded with a number of people, sending letters with secret information written in orange juice, invisible until treated.  One of the recipients was a fellow Tower prisoner, John Arden, in the Cradle Tower opposite the Salt Tower. They formulated a plan of escape and on October 5 1587, in collaboration with people outside, they descended the Cradle Tower, swung across the moat escaped by a boat that was waiting for them.

Travel File:
By Air
Aer Lingus www.aerlingus.com from Belfast, Cork, Dublin, Knock, Shannon.
Ryanair www.ryanair.com Cork, Dublin, Knock, Shannon
CityJet  www.cityjet.com/London from Dublin to London City Airport
EasyJet www.easyjet.com from Belfast

By Tour Operators
www.abbeytravel.ie/travel-deals/city-breaks.aspx
www.budgettravel.ie/cheap-sun-holidays/.../london-holidays.aspx
www.clickandgo.com/City-Break-Deals
www.clubtravel.ie/city-breaks/city-breaks.aspx
www.ebookers.ie/deals/city-break-deals/
www.lastminute.ie/city-breaks/
www.lowcostholidays.ie/london-deals.htm
www.trivago.ie/Short-London-Breaks‎

By Trains
Tower Hill is the nearest Underground station and I connected to the Tower by an underpass. The DLR will take you to Tower Gateway 
By Bus
A vintage Routemaster No 15 from Charing Cross to Tower Hill
or the RV1, from Aldwych to south the River Thames and back over Tower Bridge. For routes, check out www.tfl.gov.uk
By Boat 
To Tower Millennium Pier from Greenwich, passing through Tower Bridge, or from the City of Westminster. 
From Embankment to Tower Millennium Pier by Thames Clippers www.thamesclippers.com
City Cruises  www.citycruises.com offer combined River Cruise and Tower of London entry.

Admission
The Tower of London www.hrp.org.uk/TowerOfLondon opens in winter 9.00 am to 4.30pm Tuesday to Saturday and 10am to 4.30pm Sunday and Monday; from March 1 it will stay open for an additional hour in the afternoon and entry prices rise slightly. Tickets cost £22 for adults (£20.90 when booked online), £11 (£10.45) for children ages 5-15, £18.70 (£17.60) for concessions.