Tower Hill

Tower Hill

North and west of the Tower, west from the Minories and south to Tower Bridge (P.O. Directory). In Portsoken Ward in its original extent (S. 125), now in the Tower Liberties.

Earliest mention: "Tourhulle," 16 Ed. III. (Anc. Deeds, B. 2322).

Called "Great Tower Hill" from Trinity Square south to Thames Street (Lockie, 1810–1912).

The Abbey of St. Mary Graces was on Tower Hill and the Abbot was called sometimes the "Abbot of Tourhill" (Arnold's Chr.).

Encroached on in Stow's time by garden plots and houses (S. 131).

Separated from the jurisdiction of the City by Letters Patent, Jas. II. (Britton and Brayley, p. 196).

Place of execution. Scaffold removed about the middle of the 18th century.

Widened and extended under Met. Streets Improvement Act, 1883, completed 1887.

George Street absorbed into it Dec., 1911.

See Little Tower Hill and Tower Liberty.

Remains of the old Roman Wall have been discovered here to the north of the Tower 110 ft. long and 25 ft. in height from the old surface level.

Tower hill, a spacious place extending round the W. and N. parts of the Tower, where are many good new Buildings mostly inhabited by Gentry and Merchants. Upon this Hill such Persons as are committed to the Tower, and found guilty of High Treason, are commonly executed: and Stow says (the Scaffolds were built at the Charge of the City) but in the Reign of Edw. IV. the same was erected at the Charge of the King's Officers, and that many Controversies have been between the City and Lieutenant of the Tower, touching their Liberties. Sir John Fenwick, Bar. was the last Person beheaded here, by Virtue of an Act made 8 W. 3. for High Treason.

Tower Hill ... is greatly diminished, by building of Tenements and Garden Plots, &c. so it is of late, to wit, in the Year of Christ 1593. on the North Side thereof, and at the West End of Hog Street [or Hog Lane] beautified by certain fair Almshouses there, strongly builded of Brick and Timber, and covered with Slate for the poor by the Merchant Taylors of London, in place of some small Cottages, given to them by Richard Hills, some time a Master of that Company * certain Timber for that use, being also given by Anthony Radcliffe, of the same Society, Alderman.

Merchant Taylors Almshouses. at the Tower Hill. R. Hills. * One hundred Loads 2d Edit.

Tower hill, a very spacious area to the north, east and west of the Tower ditch, divided into Great and Little Tower hill. The west end extending much farther to the north is called by the former name, and the east end, in which is the victualling office, by the latter. It must be confessed that Tower hill has many handsome buildings, particularly among the row of houses which bound it to the west; but though this great area might be rendered extremely beautiful, it is quite the reverse, in almost every other part besides that just mentioned, we find it ill built, and the ground a mere dunghill; particularly in little Towerhill, where we fee either the backs of the houses next this fine area, or mean edifices in ruins. But as the hill is now improved and rendered more safe by placing strong wooden rails on the outside of the ditch, it is to be hoped that the ground will be completely levelled, and laid out to greater advantage, and that some care will be taken to rebuild the houses that are falling down, particularly as this is a place visited by all strangers.

Tower-Hill (Great),—the open space on the N.W. side of the Tower.

Tower Hill, Great, is the open space on the north-west side of the Tower.—[See Trinity-Square.

Tower Hill, the high ground to the north-west of the Tower.

From and without the Tower ditch west and north is the Tower Hill, sometime a large plot of ground, now greatly straitened by encroachments (unlawfully made and suffered) for gardens and houses. ... Upon this Hill is always readily prepared, at the charges of the City, a large scaffold and gallows of timber, for the execution of such traitors or transgressors as are delivered out of the Tower, or otherwise, to the sheriffs of London, by writ, there to be executed.—Stow, p. 49.

When we came upon the Hill, the first object that more particularly affected us, was that emblem of destruction, the scaffold.—Ned Ward's London Spy, pt. 13.

The scaffold was removed about the middle of the last century.

In 1543 Marillac the French Ambassador lived on Tower Hill, and the Duke of Norfolk (son of the victor of Flodden) and his brother, Lord William Howard, frequently paid him "mysterious midnight visits."¹ Lady Raleigh lodged on Tower Hill while her husband was a prisoner in the Tower.

The Lady Raleighe must understand his Ma^ts Expresse Will and commandment that she resort to her house on Tower Hill or elsewhere w^th her women and sonnes to remayne there, and not to lodge hereafter w^thin the Tower.—Orders concerning the Tower of London, to be observed by the Lieutenant (Sir W. Wade's Reg., 1605, 1611; Addit. MSS. Brit. Mus., No. 14,044).

William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, was born on Tower Hill, October 14, 1644.

Your late honoured father dwelt upon Great Tower Hill on the east side, within a court adjoining to London Wall.—P. Gibson to William Penn, the Quaker (Sir W. Penn's Life, vol. ii. p. 615).

At a public-house on Tower Hill, known by the sign of the Bull, whither he had withdrawn to avoid his creditors, Otway, the poet, died (it is said of want), April 14, 1685. In a cutler's shop on Tower Hill Felton bought the knife with which he stabbed the first Duke of Buckingham of the Villiers family; it was a broad, sharp, hunting knife, and cost one shilling. The second duke often repaired in disguise to the lodging of a poor person, "about Tower Hill," who professed skill in horoscopes.² Smith has engraved a view of a curious old house on Tower Hill, enriched with medallions evidently of the age of Henry VIII., and similar to those at old Whitehall and at Hampton Court.

Executions on Tower Hill.—Bishop Fisher, June 22, 1535; Sir Thomas More, July 6, 1535.

Going up the scaffold, which was so weak that it was ready to fall, he said hurriedly to the Lieutenant, "I pray you, Master Lieutenant, see me safe up, and for my coming down let me shift for myself."—Roper's Life.

Cromwell, Earl of Essex, July 28, 1540; Margaret, Countess of Shrewsbury, mother of Cardinal Pole, May 27, 1541; Earl of Surrey, the poet, January 21, 1547; Thomas, Lord Seymour of Sudeley, the Lord Admiral, beheaded March 20, 1549, by order of his brother the Protector Somerset; The Protector Somerset, January 22, 1552; Sir Thomas Wyatt, 1554; John Dudley, Earl of Warwick and Northumberland, 1553; Lord Guilford Dudley (husband of Lady Jane Grey), February 12, 1553–1554; Sir Gervase Elways or Helwys, Lieutenant of the Tower, hanged for his share in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury; Earl of Strafford, May 12, 1641; Archbishop Laud, January 10, 1644–1645; Sir Harry Vane, the younger, June 14, 1662; "The trumpets were brought under the scaffold that he might not be heard"³; William Howard, Lord Viscount Stafford, December 29, 1680, beheaded on the perjured evidence of Titus Oates and others; Algernon Sidney, December 7, 1683.

Algernon Sidney was beheaded this day; died very resolutely, and like a true rebel, and republican.—Duke of York to Prince of Orange, December 7, 1683.

Duke of Monmouth, July 15, 1685; Sir John Fenwick, January 28, 1697; Earl of Derwentwater and Lord Kenmuir, implicated in the Rebellion of 1715; Lords Kilmarnock and Balmerino, August 18, 1746.

Kilmarnock was executed first, and then the scaffold was immediately new strewn with sawdust, the block new covered, the executioner new dressed, and a new axe brought. Then old Balmerino appeared, treading the scaffold with the air of a general, and reading undisturbed the inscription on his coffin.—Walpole to Mann, August 21, 1746.

Simon, Lord Lovat, April 9, 1747. He was not only the last person beheaded on Tower Hill, but the last person beheaded in this country.

The Tribulation on Tower Hill, mentioned by Shakespeare, has puzzled his commentators; the reference seems to be to a Puritan congregation, but it is hard to see why they should be ready to endure "the youths that thunder at a playhouse."

Porter. These are the youths that thunder at a playhouse, and fight for bitten apples; that no audience but the Tribulation of Tower Hill, or the limbs of Limehouse, their dear brothers, are able to endure.—Shakespeare, Henry VIII., Act v. Sc. 3.

Among the miscellaneous titles of City ordinances in Book iv. of the Liber Albus is one of a "Grant of the Hermitage near the garden of his lordship the King upon Towrhille."⁴

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¹ Froude, vol. iv. p. 250.
² Clarendon's Autobiography, vol. iii. p. 27.
³ Pepys, June 14, 1662.
⁴ Liber Albus, p. 477.