Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Henry VIII axed a couple of his ex-wives here (divorced readers can insert their own
cynical joke). Anne Boleyn was the appealing young woman Henry had fallen so hard for
that he broke with the Catholic Church in order to divorce his first wife and marry her. But
when Anne failed to produce a male heir, the court turned against her. She was locked up
in the Tower, tried in a kangaroo court, branded an adulteress and traitor, and decapitated.
Henry's fifth wife, teenage Catherine Howard, was beheaded and her body laid near
Anne's in the church. Jane Boleyn (Anne's sister-in-law) was also executed here for ar-
ranging Catherine's adulterous affair behind Henry's back. Next.
Henry even beheaded his friend Thomas More (a Catholic) because he refused to re-
cognize (Protestant) Henry as head of the Church of England. (Thomas died at the less-
prestigious Tower Hill site near the Tube stop.)
The most tragic victim was 17-year-old Lady Jane Grey, who was manipulated into
claiming the Crown for nine days during the scramble for power after Henry's death and
the six-year reign and death of his sickly young son, Edward VI. When Bloody Mary
(Mary I, Henry's daughter) took control, she forced her Protestant cousin Jane to kneel
before the executioner. Young Jane bravely blindfolded herself, but then couldn't find the
block. She crawled around the scaffolding pleading, “Where is it?!” (The scene is depic-
ted, beautifully if not entirely accurately, in sharp Pre-Raphaelite detail in one of the Na-
tional Gallery's most popular paintings; see here .)
Years ago, a Beefeater, tired of what he called “Hollywood coverage” of the Tower,
grabbed my manuscript, read it, and told me that in more than 900 years as a fortress,
palace, and prison, the place held 8,500 prisoners. But only 120 were executed, and, of
those, only six were executed inside it. Stressing the hospitality of the Tower, he added,
“Torture was actually quite rare here.”
• Overlooking the scaffold site is the...
Beauchamp Tower—Prisoners
The Beauchamp Tower (pronounced “BEECH-um”) was one of several places in the com-
plex that housed Very Important Prisoners. Climb upstairs to a room where the walls are
covered with dozens of final messages—graffiti carved into the stone by bored and des-
pondent inmates.
Picture Philip Howard, the Earl of Arundel (c. 1555-1595), warming himself by this
fireplace and glancing out at the execution site during his 10-year incarceration. Having
lived a devil-may-care life of pleasure in the court of Queen Elizabeth, the pro-Cathol-
ic Arundel was charged with treason by the Protestant government. He pleaded with the
queen—his former friend—to at least let him see his wife and young children. She re-
fused, unless he would renounce his faith. On June 22, 1587, he carved his family name
 
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