X-Nico

45 unusual facts about Tower of London


Alexander Radcliffe

He was later committed to the Tower of London by Parliament for assisting the Earl of Derby in the Siege of Manchester.

Aliona Doletskaya

In this role, she has successfully managed several cultural projects, including an exhibition of The Royal Academy «Living Bridges» in the Tretyakov Gallery and in a joint exhibition in the Kremlin and the Tower of London "Treasures of the Tower".

Antonio Bonvisi

Sir Thomas More, in one of his last letters from the Tower of London, speaks of himself as having been for nearly forty years 'not a guest, but a continual nursling of the house of Bonvisi,' and styles Antonio the most faithful of his friends.

Apple Pope

On 3 November 2011 The annual RLIF Awards dinner was held at the Tower of London and Pope was named the United States player of the year.

Blois family

Lady Catherine Grey, sister of Lady Jane Grey, was imprisoned at Cockfield Hall in 1567 to recover from her privations in the Tower of London but died shortly after her arrival and was buried in the Cockfield Chapel in Yoxford church.

Bruton Abbey

The abbot, Ely, was the subject of criminal accusations and even plots against his life, and later in the year became a prisoner in the Tower of London.

Coster Diamonds

They were responsible for the creation of a few historical masterpieces, like the re-polishing of the Koh i Noor, mounted in the Crown of Queen Mary, to be admired in the Tower of London, amongst the other Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom and the Dresden Green Diamond, which belongs to the Saxon dynasty.

Council Learned in the Law

In the Tower, Dudley confessed to having issued harsher penalties than lawful in several cases, a statement which has given the Council a strongly negative connotation.

Dafydd ap Llywelyn

Henry thereby gained what could have been a useful weapon against Dafydd, with the possibility of setting Gruffydd up as a rival to Dafydd in Gwynedd, but Gruffydd died trying to escape from the Tower of London by climbing down a knotted sheet, and fell to his death in March 1244.

Defence of the True and Catholic Doctrine of the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ

During the summer and autumn of 1550, during which Gardiner was in the Tower of London, he wrote a retort which was presented to Cranmer at the conclusion of his trial in 1551.

Edward Brackenbury

Brackenbury, a direct descendant from Sir Robert Brackenbury, lieutenant of the Tower of London in the time of Richard III, was second son of Richard Brackenbury, of Aswardby, Lincolnshire, by his wife Janetta, daughter of George Gunn of Edinburgh.

Furnace, Argyll

The Tower of London’s first female Beefeater, Moira Cameron, appointed in 2007, is from Furnace, living above the village at Goatfield.

George Leyburn

Shortly before the English Civil War broke out, he returned to England, and in 1644 he was a prisoner in the Tower of London; there he met George Monck, and foretold that he would be a general in the north, and would eventually command the three kingdoms.

George Sondes, 1st Earl of Feversham

As a result, he suffered greatly in his estate, and was imprisoned from 1645, first in Upnor Castle and then in the Tower of London.

Grosmont, Monmouthshire

They fell on them and defeated the Welsh, killing 800 to 1,000 men and capturing Owen ap Gruffydd ap Rhisiant, Glyndwr's Secretary and John Hanmer, Glyndwr's brother in law, who both survived the battle but were imprisoned in the Tower of London.

Heeg

The Hegemers could thereby free use of the Dutch Mooring (Dutch landing) at the Thames, not far from the Tower of London.

Henry Stafford, 1st Earl of Wiltshire

At the accession of Henry VIII on 21 April 1509 Stafford was imprisoned in the Tower on suspicion of treason, but was released without charge.

Hill Samuel

In 1832, Marcus Samuel founded a company near the Tower of London to import goods from the Far East.

Innocent Traitor

Thinking Mary will be kind to her, Jane is not worried, even though she is confined to the Tower of London; she had spent her brief "reign" there, and the main change is that she is no longer living in the royal apartments.

James Cecil, 4th Earl of Salisbury

Salisbury was already imprisoned in the Tower of London, and the Lords ordered that "his lady, friends and servants" were to have access to him.

Afterwards he was imprisoned in the Tower of London for some twenty-two months, eventually being charged with high treason.

Johan Anders Jägerhorn

After two years’ imprisonment (1799–1801) in the Tower of London, he returned to Finland and was instrumental in shaping the constitution of newly autonomous Finland.

John de la Pole, 2nd Duke of Suffolk

William was kept in the Tower of London, his date of death is generally regarded as being during late 1539, either October or November.

John Holland, 2nd Duke of Exeter

There is an effigy of this John Holland in the Chapel of St. Peter de Vincula in the Tower of London.

Over the next five years he held various important commands with the English forces in France and in 1420 was made Constable of the Tower of London.

John Leyburn

Both prelates were committed to prison, Leyburn being sent to the Tower of London.

Lord Thomas Howard

He is chiefly known for his affair with Lady Margaret Douglas (1515–1578), the daughter of Henry VIII's sister, Margaret Tudor, for which he was imprisoned in the Tower, where he died on 31 October 1537.

Both Lord Howard and Lady Margaret were committed to the Tower, and on 18 July 1536 an Act of Attainder accusing Lord Howard of attempting to 'interrupt ympedyte and lett the seid Succession of the Crowne' was passed in both houses of Parliament.

Mermaid Tavern

based on a note by John Aubrey, but Raleigh was imprisoned in the Tower of London from 19 July of that year until 1616, and it is hardly likely that someone of Raleigh's status and temperament would preside over tavern meetings.

Nicholas Tufton, 3rd Earl of Thanet

He was imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1655 and again from 1656 to 1658, for allegedly conspiring to capture Charles II.

One If by Clam, Two If by Sea

Lois states that she hopes that Nigel is punished, and he is hanged at the Tower of London while Eliza gets sent to an orphanage.

Patrick Macnee's Ghost Stories

The series include such explorations as the legends of The Black Hope Horror, The Tower of London, Harriet’s Ghost and many more.

Phyllis Shand Allfrey

Imprisoned in the Tower of London, he was permitted to migrate to the West Indies.

Richard Creagh

Twice he escaped, but he was retaken and in 1567 lodged in the Tower of London, and kept there till his death.

Robert Phillip

Later he was committed to the Tower of London for refusing to be sworn on the Anglican Bible on 2 November 1641, when he had been summoned by the House of Lords committee to be examined touching State matters.

Sackville Tufton, 9th Earl of Thanet

On 10 June he was sentenced to a year's imprisonment in the Tower of London and a fine of £1,000, and on his release he was ordered to give security for his good behaviour for seven years to the amount of £20,000.

Thomas Aufield

He was imprisoned in the Tower of London, where he was tortured and apostatised, returning to Protestantism.

Thomas de Beauchamp, 12th Earl of Warwick

He was imprisoned in the Tower of London (in what is now known as the "Beauchamp Tower"), pleaded guilty and threw himself on the mercy of the king.

Thomas Somerset

Thomas Somerset (born about 1530; died in the Tower of London, 27 May 1587) was an English Roman Catholic layman, kept imprisoned for long periods by Elizabeth I of England.

Tower of London Range

The range is named for the Tower of London, with its subsidiary peaks are named for towers and buildings within the Tower.

Valentine Lawless, 2nd Baron Cloncurry

Valentine was imprisoned in June 1798 on suspicion of treason in London, released, re-arrested and held in the Tower of London until March 1801.

Werner Lott

One of the incidents involving Lott happened while a prisoner of war in the Tower of London.

William Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings

Affairs changed dramatically on 13 June 1483 during a council meeting at the Tower of London: Richard, supported by the Duke of Buckingham, accused Hastings and other council members, of having conspired against his life with the Woodvilles, with Hastings's mistress Jane Shore (formerly also mistress to Edward IV and Dorset), acting as a go-between.

William Sandys, 1st Baron Sandys

He became Lord Chamberlain in 1526 and Henry visited him three times at the Vyne, once with Anne Boleyn whom Sandys was later to escort to her imprisonment in the Tower.

Wynebald de Ballon

It was directly across the River Thames from the Tower of London, recently built by William I (1066–1087) as his principal seat.


1674 in England

Two skeletons of children are discovered at the White Tower (Tower of London) and believed at this time to be the remains of the Princes in the Tower.

Acton, Wrexham

In 1688 when James II fled the country, Jeffreys also tried to flee, but was arrested in Wapping and placed in the Tower of London "for his own safety", because the mob was outrageous against him.

Battle of Evesham

In February, Robert de Ferrers, Earl of Derby was arrested and imprisoned in the Tower.

Bigod's Rebellion

were drawn from the Tower of London to Tyburn, and there hanged, bowelled and quartered, and their heads set on London Bridge and divers gates in London.

Cowden

After the Restoration he was arrested and sentenced to death, but he was reprieved, imprisoned in Dover Castle and died, in 1682, in the Tower of London.

Dungeon

The Tower of London is famous as a prison for political detainees, and Pontefract Castle at various times held Thomas of Lancaster (1322), Richard II (1400), Earl Rivers (1483), Scrope, Archbishop of York (1405), James I of Scotland (1405–1424) and Charles, Duke of Orléans (1417–1430).

Gervais de La Rue

His first historical enterprise was interrupted by the French Revolution, which forced him to take refuge in England, where he took the opportunity of examining a vast mass of original documents in the Tower of London and elsewhere, and received much encouragement, from Sir Walter Scott among others.

James Bainham

According to Foxe, More imprisoned and flogged him in his house at Chelsea, and then sent him to the Tower of London to be racked, in the hope of discovering other heretics by his confession; this is doubted by later authors.

Jewel House

Although a treasury had been found in the Tower of London from the earliest times (as in the sub-crypt of St. John's Chapel in the White Tower), from 1255 there was a separate Jewel House for state crowns and regalia, though not older crowns and regalia, which remained at Westminster Abbey.

John Berkeley, 1st Baron Berkeley of Stratton

Next year he was accused in parliament of complicity in the Army Plots, expelled from the house, and committed to the Tower of London; he was subsequently bailed by Edward Sackville, 4th Earl of Dorset and Henry Grey, 1st Earl of Stamford in the sum of £10,000, but the outbreak of hostilities prevented any further steps being taken.

John Lesley

For this he was put under the charge of the bishop of London, and then of the bishop of Ely (in Holborn), and afterwards imprisoned in the Tower of London.

Kirby Muxloe Castle

Along with his younger brother Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, Edward V was one of the Princes in the Tower, who disappeared after being sent (ostensibly for their own safety) to the Tower of London.

Liam Devlin

Devlin, who is hiding in Lisbon and planning to escape to America, is persuaded by SD Gen. Walter Schellenberg to rescue Steiner from the Tower of London.

Nailsea Court

After being interviewed by King James, in the Tower of London, Major Wade was pardoned and returned home to Nailsea.

Queen's Colour Squadron

The unit has mounted the guard at Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle and The Tower of London on several occasions, and has formed guards of honour for various visiting heads of state at Heathrow Airport, near its former base of RAF Uxbridge and its current base of RAF Northolt.

Ronald Sinclair

Sinclair's feature credits include William Wellman's The Light That Failed, Tower of London, Alexander Korda's That Hamilton Woman and Raoul Walsh's Desperate Journey.

Sheffield Manor

The Duke of Norfolk, not long released from the Tower of London, was caught in collusion with the papal agent Roberto di Ridolfi plotting to bring about a Catholic uprising in England.

Thomas Perrot

In 1592 his father, Sir John Perrot, was convicted of treason and attainted, and died in the Tower of London, not without suspicion that he had been poisoned.