TALES
FROM THE
TOWER OF
LONDON
TALES
FROM THE
TOWER OF
LONDON
DANIEL DIEHL & MARK P. DONNELLY
First published in 2004
This edition first published in 2006
The History Press
The Mill, Brimscombe Port
Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG
www.thehistorypress.co.uk
This ebook edition first published in 2012
All rights reserved
© Daniel Diehl and Mark P. Donnelly, 2004, 2006, 2012
The right of Daniel Diehl and Mark P. Donnelly, to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
EPUB ISBN 978 0 7524 7378 9
MOBI ISBN 978 0 7524 7377 2
Original typesetting by The History Press
CONTENTS
Introduction
Plans of the Tower of London, twelfth to twentieth century
Part I: Building a Castle and a Kingdom (1066–1485)
1 The Axe, the Arrow and the Wailing Monk: William the Conqueror and Brother Gundulf
2 Dangerous Liaisons: Wat Tyler and the Peasants’ Revolt
3 A Family Affair: The Princes in the Tower
Part II: State Prison of the Tudors (1485–1603)
4 The Warden, the Wolf and the Woman: John Wolfe and Alice Tankerville
5 Treason in the Bedroom: Queen Katherine Howard
6 Nine Days a Queen: Lady Jane Grey
7 The Devil’s Dancing Bear: Bishop Edmund Bonner and Cuthbert Symson
8 The Spymaster: Francis Walsingham and Anthony Babington
Part III: Turmoil and Treason (1603–1800)
9 Gunpowder, Treason and Plot: Guy ‘Guido’ Fawkes
10 A Right Royal Heist: Colonel Thomas Blood
11 The Bloody Assizes: The Duke of Monmouth and Judge Jeffreys
12 The King Over the Water: William and Winifred Maxwell Lord and Lady Nithsdale
13 The American (P)Resident: Henry Laurens
Part IV: A Home for Spies and Tourists (1900–1950)
14 The Black Book: Sir Roger Casement
15 The Weatherman: Josef Jakobs
Bibliography
INTRODUCTION
There are only a handful of buildings in the world that are universally recognisable by both their name and location. The Eiffel Tower, the Colosseum, Britain’s Houses of Parliament (and their accompanying clock, Big Ben), China’s Great Wall, the White House (thanks primarily to television news), the pyramids and their neighbouring Sphinx, the Empire State Building, Notre Dame, the Taj Mahal and the Tower of London. Even the great temple complex at Ankor Wat and Moscow’s Kremlin are only partially recognisable; the first by its distinctive architecture, but not by location (Cambodia) and the second only by the presence of the magnificent cathedral of St Basil. Of all these wonderful monuments to architectural creativity the Tower of London is unquestionably the most drawn, painted and photographed. No occupied building in the world is, or has been, more often represented on paper.
Amazingly, as universally popular as medieval castles are with the public, of all the buildings listed above only the Tower of London is a castle and, with the exception of the White House, the only one ever used as a private residence. Having been in constant use since the 1080s, the Tower can also lay claim to being the oldest living community in Europe, if not the world. These factors alone qualify it as a site worth studying.
Building of the Tower of London was begun in 1078 by command of William the Conqueror, but its initial form was a far cry from that which we see today. The only original buildings still remaining are the White Tower, which dominates the complex, and a few sections of the old Roman city wall that remain embedded in the curtain wall and scattered around the inner yard. The rest of the original buildings, and their surrounding fortification, were constructed of wood and have long since disappeared.
Through most of its nine and a half centuries, the Tower was a place where the monarchs of England could house their private army, seek refuge in times of trouble and use as a base of operations. More than one of these periods of strife are dealt with in depth in this book. Curiously, the Tower was not originally intended to protect the city of London, but rather to protect the occupying Normans from what William the Conqueror called ‘the vast and furious population’ of England. The idea was to build a castle so massive and so terrifying that the indigenous Anglo-Saxons would think twice before challenging their Norman overlords. To that end, it worked magnificently.
In the centuries since the Normans first began construction of the Tower, it has undergone massive (and until the mid-nineteenth century) almost constant change. Old buildings and towers were routinely torn down and new ones erected in their place. Sometimes these changes were brought about by purely practical needs and other times to repair the destruction brought about by the occasional fire, siege, or bombing (both during the Second World War and during 1970s terrorist attacks). Existing buildings were also frequently converted from one use to another to suit changing social demands and political reality. As one monarch after another remodelled the complex to suit their individual needs, the names of some existing towers and buildings also changed. What is now known as the Bloody Tower was originally called the Garden Tower because of its proximity to the complex’s kitchen garden. We have tried to reflect these changes in the text of our stories.
The Tower has alternately, and often simultaneously, been used as a royal palace, a fortress, a zoo, a military garrison, the Royal Treasury, an arsenal, the Royal Mint, a state office building, a museum and the repository of the Crown Jewels. As late as the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, John Stow commented on the Tower’s multiple uses, stating that it was ‘a citadel to defend or command the city, a royal palace for assemblies or treaties, a prison of state for the most dangerous offenders; the only place of coinage for all England. . . . The armoury for warlike provision; the treasury of the ornaments and jewels of the crown; and general conserver of the records of the Queen’s courts of justice.’
The Tower complex’s architectural make-up as we see it today is, to a great extent, the result of Victorian ‘remodelling’, to make it more accessible to the public and appear more ‘appropriately medieval’. Since Queen Victoria first opened the Tower to tourists in 1837, the general public has come to think of it primarily as an awe-inspiring museum. While ‘wowing’ the tourists may only recently have become one of the Tower’s official functions, it has had that effect on visiting dignitaries since the Middle Ages. After all, as London’s most visible symbol of the monarchy it was the Tower’s job to impress, and impress it does.
The Tower of London is, quite literally, a town in a stone envelope tucked in the heart of London. Deep inside massive walls, the streets and alleys of the Tower complex twist, turn and double back on themselves like some bizarre stone maze. Nearly everything here, from the looming White Tower to the enclosure walls, road surfaces, walkways and smallest public toilet, are made of stone – the only relief is the occasional blank stare of a window or the narrow ribbo
n of sky appearing over the outer curtain walls.
Popular though they are, neither photograph nor drawing can impart the sheer mass of the place. Unless visitors constantly remind themselves that this is not some perfectly preserved medieval town, but a very real military base, the most thrilling aspect of the Tower experience will be lost amid the tourist-friendly splash.
As spectacular as the Tower is architecturally, chronicling its physical development is not the primary concern of this book. For nearly two centuries there have been dozens, if not hundreds, of books written about the tower’s physical history. Nearly all of them, from the simplest guidebook to the most lavish ‘coffee table’ volume, have attempted to give an overview of the old fortress’ development, changing uses, important prisoners and gory tortures that have all contributed to the rich tapestry of its history. Instead of reploughing this well-trodden field, we have limited ourselves to telling the stories of the lives, and too often the deaths, of a few of the individuals who have passed through the gates of the Tower over the centuries. Most of the people whose stories are told here are at least briefly mentioned in many of these earlier books, giving us tantalising glimpses into their lives, but seldom, if ever, telling their whole story as it relates to their time at the Tower. It is the stories of these individuals, stories of bravery, greed, lust, heroism and ambition that we endeavour to bring to light in this volume.
Some of the people you will meet in the following pages will be at least slightly familiar. Wat Tyler and the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, the disappearance of the Princes in the Tower, Henry VIII’s ill-fated fifth wife, Katherine Howard, and others, will be familiar, but hopefully we will add to your understanding of them. Others such as the foolhardy Colonel Blood, the tragic Alice Tankerville and the Nazi spy Josef Jakobs may well take you into unfamiliar territory.
The vast catalogue of adventures and adversities that people have faced in connection with the Tower of London is almost endless and it would be impossible to recount all, or even most, of them in a single volume. Practical limitations have forced us to omit many worthwhile, and often familiar, incidents of Tower history. Anne Boleyn, Sir Walter Raleigh and Scots patriot William Wallace are only a few of the people whose stories might have been told here, but space forced us to leave them out. But take heart dear reader; hopefully we will cover them in a future book.
We have approached each chapter in Tales from the Tower as a complete work in itself, capable of being read on its own and in no particular order. If you prefer not to read them in the chronological order in which they are presented, by all means do so. There are instances, however, where this might cause you to miss some revealing insights. In the chapter on Katherine Howard, you will find a seemingly benign mention of Bishop Edmond Bonner who performed the marriage ceremony between Katherine and Henry VIII. In the following chapter you will meet Bonner again, but in a far less pleasant capacity. However you choose to approach this book, rest assured that each chapter has been provided with sufficient background material to give you a sound historical ‘feel’ for the story, its characters and its setting in time and place.
Our book is not designed to be a weighty academic tome. We have tried to make every chapter an exciting, enjoyable read, free of excessive and superfluous detail. There are no footnotes or obscure references to bog you down. At the same time, we have gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure the historical accuracy of every name, date, place and incident you will come across in these pages. Often, in our research, we uncovered conflicting and contradicting accounts of individual incidents, or dates, or other information, and have checked and cross-checked to make certain our accounts are the most accurate version of the story possible. For instance, in the story of Lord and Lady Nithsdale, we found several different descriptions of the cloaks worn by Lady Nithsdale and her friends on their visit to the Tower. One account said they wore bright cloaks in a variety of different colours, while another insisted they all wore similar, brown cloaks. It was only when we discovered that one of the cloaks survived in the collection of the current Duchess of Norfolk that we could verify its colour; it is brown. This may seem a small detail, but we hope that knowing the information you uncover in these pages is not only enjoyable, but also historically accurate, will add to your reading pleasure.
We hope you enjoy reading these stories as much as we enjoyed writing them, and should you ever be lucky enough to visit the Tower of London, we sincerely hope your experience there is happier than that of most of the people you will meet in the following pages.
PLANS OF THE TOWER OF LONDON, TWELFTH TO TWENTIETH CENTURY
The Tower of London, c. 1100.
Aerial view of the Tower of London, c. 1100.
Interior of the White Tower, c. 1100.
Aerial view of the Tower of London, c. 1200.
The Tower of London, c. 1300.
The Tower of London, c. 1490.
The Tower of London in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
PART I
Building a Castle and a Kingdom
1
THE AXE, THE ARROW AND THE WAILING MONK
William the Conqueror and Brother Gundulf 1066–80
King Edward, the great-great-great-grandson of King Alfred the Great, had reigned over Anglo-Saxon England for nearly a quarter of a century. With the exception of paying a massive annual tribute to the Viking Danes who controlled the northern half of England his reign had been a relatively peaceful one. The English channel had always been so effective at preventing any large-scale invasion of England that Edward had confidently devoted much of his later years to building churches and cathedrals rather than the massive stone fortresses which were appearing all over continental Europe.
The king was perceived as being so gentle and pious that his people respectfully dubbed him Edward the Confessor. The grandest monument to Edward’s earnest faith in God was the massive new church, the Abbey of Westminster, which stood just yards beyond Edward’s palace near London’s west gate. By the end of December 1065 the Abbey Minster was nearly finished, but so was Edward the Confessor. On 27 December the 63-year-old monarch suffered a stroke and drifted in and out of consciousness for days. Confused and near death, the king clutched at his bedclothes, mumbling incoherently about ‘devils that shall come through all the land with fire and sword and the havoc of war’.
For all his piety the dying king had good reason to worry about the future. He was leaving behind a kingdom with no direct heir to the throne, which amounted to a disaster of monumental proportions in the turbulent eleventh century. Over the years he had probably dangled the promise of the throne in front of many friends and enemies as a means of keeping them on his side. Now there was no time left to play politics. On 5 January, just hours before he died, Edward named his young brother-in-law, Harold Godwinson, Earl of Wessex, as his heir and successor. Even if there had been other legitimate contenders for the throne, in Anglo-Saxon England a deathbed request from the monarch had the strength of law. The following day, 6 January 1066, King Edward was laid to rest in his new cathedral at Westminster and Harold was crowned King of England.
If the coronation seemed rushed, there was more than ample reason for haste. The noblemen of England may have supported Edward’s choice of Harold, but there were others across the Channel who were less than pleased. Harold was not the late king’s only brother-in-law. Like his brother Harold, Tostig was also a brother of Edward’s widow Queen Edith – giving him equal claim to the crown. The fact that he had been stripped of his title as Earl of Northumbria and sent into exile only the year before didn’t seem to matter to Tostig.
Then there was Harald III Hardrada, King of Norway. As ruler of the Viking Confederation Harald had clawed his way to the throne through pure brute force. He now ruled Norway, Sweden and Denmark, and commanded vast portions of northern England known as the Danelaw. With no legitimate heir to the English throne, there was no reason why the rest of England should not come under Viking rule.
And Harald had an ally. Tostig knew he was not strong enough to seize the country alone, and so had thrown in his lot with that of Harald. Their combined armies posed a serious threat to the security of the British Isles.
Finally, there was William, ‘the bastard’ Duke of Normandy, who, at forty years of age, was as hard and strong as a younger man and a brutally determined master of military strategy. Not only did England and Normandy have strong political and blood ties, William insisted that he had personally been promised the throne of England. Depending on which story you believe, Edward the Confessor may indeed have promised it to William and then changed his mind shortly before he died. If he had promised the crown to William, it is also possible he had sent his brother-in-law Harold Godwinson (now King Harold) to Normandy with verbal confirmation of this promise. Or Harold may have been taken prisoner on the continent, been rescued by Duke William and, in a fit of gratitude, offered to lay aside all claim to the throne and support William when the time came. William insisted that one or more of these stories were the truth. Conversely, Harold argued that it was all rubbish and that even if it were not, the king’s deathbed request legally superseded all previous agreements.
Whatever the claims, whatever the truth, Tostig was unhappy, Harald Hardrada of Norway was unhappy, William of Normandy was unhappy and King Harold was in deep and immediate trouble.
Comprehending the full scope of the threat facing him and his kingdom, Harold immediately began assembling an army. The nobles were instructed to call into service every able-bodied man, and the navy was made ready for war. Then, just before Easter 1066, a strange and frightening omen appeared in the skies over northern Europe. Day and night a blazing ball of light ripped through the sky for more than a week. The cyclical nature of Haley’s Comet was not yet understood and its appearance seemed an ominous portent. The more superstitious spread tales about hails of fire and strange and unnatural births as rumours of impending disaster rumbled through England. Disregarding the fears of his credulous people, King Harold continued to prepare for war.
Tales From the Tower of London Page 1