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Travel Adventures: The Tower of London

Mention of the infamous Tower of London conjurs up all kinds of images of beheadings, political prisoners and general Tudor nastiness.  Among it’s most famous prisoners were Anne Boleyn and St.Thomas More, both of whom lost their heads when King Henry VIII decided they were on the inconvenient side.  But the tower served as a prison and execution spot for hundreds of politically inconvenient people during the reign of the Tudor dynasty.  Most prisoners were executed outside of the main walls of the Tower and the occasion was generally treated as a holiday by the mobs of people who gathered to witness the grisly execution of those unfavored by the monarch.  The severed heads were generally placed on a pike and displayed as an example to the populace.

Prisoners of more royal stature were generally spared the mob and were granted their execution on a scaffold erected inside the tower’s walls on a place called the tower green.  Such is where the likes of Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard met their end.  Afterward, their bodies (and heads) were gathered up and transported the short distance inside the tower walls to the chapel of St Peter Vinculis, where great stone floor slabs were lifted and the bodies deposited, sprinkled with quick lime and buried, unmarked and intentionally forgotten.  Being an active church, photographs were not permitted, so I cannot show you here.

In its day, the Tower of London was a fairly good hike from London and generally only accessible by boat on the river Thames.  That is the way that prisoners arrived, anyway.  Their (often) one way passage into the tower, through what is today known as Traitor’s gate was by boat, and their residence was taken up in the Bloody Tower while they waited a grisly death at the hands of the headsman.

The site of the Tower of London, which is really a castle consisting of many buildings added over the centuries, has been occupied since Roman times.  The oldest surviving building on the site is the Norman period White Tower, which was the principle castle of the ruling Normans at the time.  Today it serves as a museum containing an extensive collection of weapons and armaments, including the jousting armour of Henry VIII.  Other buildings on the site have been added since making the Tower of London a fairly extensive compound by the year 1350.

The Tower of London has hosted various roles as a prison, palace, military barracks, zoo, museum, mint, and tourist attraction (the earliest visitors paying to see the Tower were in the 1590s).  In this course of time it saw many periods of building and additions.  During victorian times it was restored to a medieval appearance.  Today it attracts over two million visitors a year.

Two of the most famous attractions at the Tower are the Crown Jewels and the Yeoman Warders, or beefeaters as they are popularly known.  The Crown Jewels first went on display when they were restored by Charles II in 1660.  Photography of the Crown Jewels is not permitted.  Fortunately, photography of the beefeaters is allowed.

The Yeomen are part of a group of 34 men and one woman: The Chief Yeoman Warder, his second in command the Yeoman Gaoler, five Yeoman Sarjeants and 28 Yeoman Warders.  Yeoman Warders need to have 22 years of distinguished military service, reached the rank of warrant officer, need to have been awarded the long service and good conduct medal and be between the ages of 40 and 55 years on appointment.  They are given apartments and a pension and serve as guides and watchmen.  The Yeoman Warder that gave us our tour was extremely entertaining and regaled us with stories about the history of the Tower of London.  Someone else has recorded one of his stories on YouTube and it can be found here.

Should you ever have the opportunity to visit London, please do yourself a favour and visit the Tower of London.  We spent only half a day there and saw quite a lot, but there is much that could keep you occupied over an entire day should you choose.

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Posted on Friday, February 3rd, 2012 at 10:00 am. Filed under: Travel Photography Tags: England, history, Tower of London, Travel photography RSS 2.0 feed.