dray was to come before it into St. Katherine’s unless the brethren
paid a fine to the constable, was, in 1549, Galleyman, and in 1641,
Iron Gate Tower. Until recently it was a powder-magazine, and not to be
entered with a light. These conditions are not favourable to the study
of its interior. It is a long rectangular tower, 18 feet by 32 feet,
and built wholly in the ditch, one end being applied to the face of
the curtain, so that it projects like a buttress from the south end of
the east curtain, while its south side is a prolongation of the river
front. The exterior has been partially cased, but it is evidently old,
and in substance as originally built. Its basement is solid, but about
10 feet above the ditch is a line of loops on the north and south, or
two longer faces. There has been an upper story, the walls of which
remain, but seem later than the lower. At this level, in the east face,
is the outline of a door, which, if a postern, opened 20 feet above the
ditch. The view of 1597 shows a double wall, probably an embattled dam
serving as a bridge, extending from this tower across the ditch, and
crowned on the counterscarp by a small work, called the “Iron Gate.” If
this drawing be correct, the roadway was through the basement chamber,
and the upper floor led to the rampart of the wall. This gate led into
the precinct of St. Katherine’s. The tower is probably the work of
Henry III., and connected with an original dam for keeping up the water
of the ditch. Forty feet west of Develin is Well Tower.
[Illustration: WELL TOWER.]
Well Tower, also rectangular, forms a part of the curtain, and has a
projection into the ditch 10 feet by 16 feet wide. Its basement, below
the present level of the inner ward, and scarcely above the water level
of the ditch, contains a chamber, 14 feet by 10 feet, vaulted at a high
pitch in two unequal bays, the north the larger, parted by a transverse
rib. Each bay is vaulted in four cells, with four hip-ribs meeting in
a plain mitred joint. There is a half or wall-rib in the gable of each
cell. The ribs are 7½ inches broad by 6¾ inches deep, with a plain
chamfer, and spring from four corner and two intermediate circular bell
corbels, the tops of which are 3 feet 4 inches from the floor. The
height of the chamber is 11 feet 6 inches. There are four loops, one
pointing northwards into the ward, and the rest opening towards the
ditch. All are under drop arches. In the west side is a door of 3 feet,
opening in a drop-arched recess, which may have led into a mural cell
in the curtain, or have been an entrance from the ward. On the east
side a rectangular appendage, entered by a square-headed door, contains
a well-stair of 6 feet 3 inches diameter, looped upon the inner face
of the curtain and the ditch. This stair leads to an upper room on the
rampart level, not vaulted, 15 feet by 10 feet, looped to the field and
upon the face of the west curtain. In its north wall an original door,
2 feet 3 inches wide, opens on the rampart. The second floor is modern.
Well Tower is a good example of the early English style.
Well Tower stands due south of Salt Tower, and a short curtain, with a
gateway, connected them. Part of it remains, 12 feet high and 6 feet
thick, pierced with loops at the ground level, and embattled against an
attack on the east. This rampart was reached from Well Tower, and did
not communicate with Salt Tower. A similar cross curtain connected Salt
Tower with the outer ward wall westward. This also was looped, had a
central gate, and was embattled for defence from a south attack. These
two curtains thus enclosed the approach to the Iron Gate postern, and
prevented either part of the outer ward from being entered by surprise.
These arrangements are evidently as early as the time of Henry III.,
and are shown in the view of 1597.
[Illustration: CRADLE TOWER.—BASEMENT.]
Cradle Tower comes next west, at 118 feet distant. It stands on the
outer wall, and projects 9 feet into the ditch, with a breadth of 16
feet. It is a gatehouse, and though of small dimension very complete in
its design, and of excellent construction. It stood nearly in front of
the bye-gate of the royal quarter, and allowed a direct passage thence
to the quay.
[Illustration: CRADLE TOWER, WINDOW.]
It is in plan T-shaped, the portal running through the main limb,
which projects into the ditch, and the lateral wings, each containing
a lodge, forming a gorge or main front of 26 feet width, and flanked
by two diagonal buttresses, which cap the angles and project into
the ward. Between these is the doorway, and on each side of it a
small lancet window, cinquefoil-headed. One of these windows is quite
unaltered.
The doorway is 7 feet 2 inches broad, with a drop arch and light
chamfer moulding. Two feet in is a portcullis groove, succeeded by a
doorway of 5 feet opening, of which the valves move inwards. The wall
is 4 feet 7 inches thick. The passage is a chamber of two squares, 7
feet broad, and 12 feet 6 inches high. It is vaulted in two equal bays,
parted by a transverse rib. Each bay has four hip-ribs, and a straight
rib takes the crown line of each vaulting cell, so that eight ribs
meet in the centre of each bay, the point of junction being a hollow
circle. There is besides a wall-rib in each gable. The rib parting
the two bays, and the longitudinal rib, have a plain mitred junction.
The rib and circle-mouldings are the same. They are light and bold,
5 inches broad and 7 inches deep. The base of the rib has a hollow
chamfer, and its apex is an ogee. The ribs spring from four corner and
two intermediate corbels, the tops of which are 7 feet from the ground.
These are octagonal and embattled. The bracket below is much defaced.
The doorway in the south end, of 4 feet 6 inches opening, had gates
opening inwards, and outside them is a second portcullis groove.
The lodges open from the central passage close to the ward entrance,
by doors, 2 feet 10 inches wide, one of which has the remains of the
cusps of a cinquefoil in the head. They are 12 feet broad by 8 feet
9 inches long and 12 feet high, having the small windows already
noticed towards the ward. They are hip-vaulted in chalk, with four
cells, having four ribs 7 inches broad by 7 inches deep, springing from
corbels, now knocked off, but the tops of which were 7 feet above the
floor. There are no wall ribs. The portal arches of the main passage
are drop in recesses, of which one is so low as to be nearly, and the
other is quite, segmental. The vault-arches are equilateral, or nearly
so.
On each side of the part of this tower that projects into the ditch,
on the outside, is a recess, on the west face 4 feet 6 inches, and on
the east face 3 feet broad, and 1 foot 4 inches deep. Possibly these
were the shoots of garderobes from the upper floor and battlements, now
removed. On each side, at the old water level, is a half-arch admitting
the water of the ditch below the drawbridge or cradle.
[Illustration: TRAITORS’ GATE.
ST. THOMAS’S TOWER.—BASEMENT.]
In the curtain, close west of this tower, is a well-stair, leading from
the west lodge to the roof.
The superstructure of Cradle Tower is said to have formed a part of the
palace quarter, and the view of 1597 shows it as a water-gate, with
a square turret on its west flank, where was the supposed staircase.
It shows also, west of this, a considerable tower extending across
the ward, here very narrow, to the Lanthorn Tower, and which no doubt
contained the Lanthorn Gate.
The details of Cradle Tower are rather Decorated than early English;
and if, as is historically probable, it be the work of Henry III., it
must be late in his reign, and was perhaps completed by his son. Owing
to the cumbrous character of the sluices and gates of St. Thomas’s
Tower, state prisoners were sometimes admitted by this gate, then
fitted with a cradle or drawbridge.
St. Thomas’s Tower, better known from its ancient function as Traitors’
Gate, is the water-gate of the Tower, and also contained and commanded
the communication between the Thames and the main ditch. It is, in
fact, a barbican, and a very singular one, placed astride upon the
ditch, here 40 feet broad, and perforated by a passage leading from the
river. It stands considerably west of the south front, being in advance
of the Bloody Tower 30 feet, the breadth, at this point, of the outer
ward.
The quay, in front of this tower, is traversed by a channel, 28 feet
broad and 13 feet 6 inches deep, partly arched over and newly lined
with granite, which opens from the Thames, through an archway 21 feet
broad, into a rectangular basin or pool, 66 feet by 40 feet, and 18
feet deep, lined and paved with stone, and containing, when the gates
are opened, about 8 feet of water at high water. A flight of steps
from the water, on the inner or north side of this basin, landed the
prisoner within 30 feet of the gateway of the inner ward.
The tower proper is placed above the outer 18 feet of this basin, but
its side walls are prolonged backwards, so that both the front and
sides of the basin are protected. The south wall, 9 feet thick, is
pierced below by a low-browed water portal, already mentioned, beneath
a drop arch, ribbed and chamfered. Between the ribs is a groove, 6
inches broad, for an iron sluice or portcullis, worked in the building
above; and in the jambs are two holes, 6 inches diameter, lined with
iron, for the passage of a chain. Within this, on the inner face of the
portal, were folding gates opening inwards.
[Illustration: ST. THOMAS’S TOWER.
DETAIL OF RING STONES.]
Seventeen feet within this outer wall the basin is crossed by an arch,
supporting a light wall of brick and timber, which was the rear wall
of the tower. This arch is a very remarkable piece of construction. It
springs from two half-octagonal piers, and is segmental, of 61 feet
span and 15½ feet rise. The voussoirs form two ribs, and the inner
one is composed of seventy-five stones, united by a simple joggle or
rebate. The rectangular tower, which thus rises from the walls of the
outer half of the basin, is 86 feet east and west by 18 feet north and
south, and capped at its two Thames-ward angles by light cylindrical
turrets, three-quarters engaged, and rising above the parapet of the
tower. The side walls, prolonged backwards an additional 30 feet,
terminate in two square turrets, which occupy the northern angles, and
also rise above the battlements.
Two doors on the north faces of these turrets, on the ground level,
open into a mural gallery in each wall, looped on one face towards the
ditch and on the other towards the basin. These galleries communicate
with the southern turrets, and are continued within the south wall,
having each two loops towards the Thames and two towards the basin.
They do not meet, being stopped by the jambs of the sluice-gate. They
were also used to receive the slack of the chain when drawn up.
The floor of the tower, which is above the level of these galleries,
contained the machinery for lifting the sluice, which must have been
heavy. The walls of this floor are also pierced with loops, and contain
two garderobes. In the river-front are two early Decorated windows,
of two lights each. The two upper chambers in the south turrets open
into this floor, which is reached by a winding stair in the north-east
turret, and by an exterior stone stair in the north-west turret.
[Illustration: ST. THOMAS’S TOWER.—PISCINA.]
The four chambers in the two cylindrical turrets are of excellent
design and delicate workmanship, as may be seen from the plate in the
“Vetusta Monumenta.” They are in plan octagons, having slender columns,
with high bases and bell caps, all cylindrical, and slightly engaged,
in each angle, from each of which springs a light chamfered rib,
meeting in a plain joint at the centre. There are thus eight cells,
each with a lancet gable, supported by two half-ribs. Three of the
faces have windows or loops, and another is occupied by the door. In
the lower rooms the loops have chamfered recesses beneath drop arches.
In the upper, the loops are larger, but still square-headed, and their
recesses have an arch-rib with a hollow chamfer. The south-east upper
chamber was an oratory. The window-sills on each side the east windows
are Purbeck slabs, hollowed into bowls,—on the south for a piscina, on
the north for holy water. Both slabs projected, and have been broken
off when the walls were wainscoted.
There is a second floor, reached by a well-stair in the square turrets,
which ascend further to the roof, but it contains nothing of interest.
The well-stair in the north-east turret leads to a door that opens on
the north face, 20 feet from the ground, and which opened outwards,
and was barred on the outside. The meaning of this is only explicable
on the supposition that a bridge, or perhaps an embattled cross-wall,
connected this door with the corresponding opening in Wakefield Tower,
18 feet distant. By this means a person leaving St. Thomas’s Tower,
and barring the door behind him, would reach Wakefield Tower, and
therefore the palace, and cut off pursuit. In the second floor of St.
Thomas’s Tower is another door, above and similar to the first, which
in like manner communicated with the top floor of Wakefield Tower; so
that either there were two drawbridges, or a wall pierced by a mural
gallery at 20 feet high, and with a rampart walk at its summit.
St. Thomas’s Tower was, until lately, occupied by a water-engine,
to the great injury of its walls. The upper rooms were cut up into
lodgings by means of wainscot and lath and plaster. All has lately been
cleared out, and the tower restored in good taste.
St. Thomas’s Tower is attributed, and no doubt justly, to Henry III.;
but, although the octagon chambers have an early English aspect, the
grand arch, the staircase doors, and the windows towards the river
are decidedly Decorated, though probably early in that style. If,
therefore, this tower be of one date, it must be very late in the reign
of Henry, but more probably it was completed and the grand arch turned
in that of his son. The material is a rag-stone laid in uncoursed
rubble masonry, like Beauchamp and Salt Towers, with ashlar dressings.
The pool below was extensively repaired by Henry VIII. There is some
reason to suppose that this was the tower that fell twice while being
built.
The curtain along this front is original, though capped and patched in
modern times. It seems to have been about 20 feet high above the water,
and from 12 feet to 14 feet on the inner side. In parts it was 12 feet
thick; but the addition of brick casements in Tudor times, to enable
the ramparts to carry cannon, prevents an accurate examination. It is
no doubt the work of Henry III. From St. Thomas’s to Byward Tower is
160 feet.
Byward Tower is the great gatehouse of the outer ward, and is placed
upon the scarp of the west ditch, at its junction with the south ditch.
It is in plan rectangular, 50 feet broad by 24 feet deep, and its two
outward angles are capped by drum towers, 23 feet diameter, one quarter
engaged, which rise out of the moat. Between them is a curtain of 14
feet, pierced by the main entrance. The towers, below the roadway, are
solid; above it they are of three stages, and 49 feet high to the crest
of the parapet, which, with most of the casing, is modern.
The portal opens from the bridge by a low drop arch, 12 feet broad and
12 feet high, reduced by two deep chamfers to 10 feet opening, followed
by a broad jamb, in which are loop openings from the lodges. This is
succeeded by a 6-inch portcullis groove, with a chase of 16 inches
in the vault, to allow of the passage of a heavy wooden grate. Then
follows a heavy rib, pierced with three round holes, which slightly
converge, and are probably for the beams of a stockade, supposing the
gates to be forced; and behind is a rebate with hinges for the valves
of a door, opening inwards. The middle portion of the portal, which
begins here, has a flat timber roof, 18 feet high. In it is a second
portcullis groove, and the doors of the warders’ lodges. Finally is
the inner archway, without jambs, but with a bold triple rib forming
the arch.
The south lodge door enters a lobby, 8 feet by 4 feet, vaulted in
chalk, with a southern loop raking the postern. A pointed door on the
left or east face opens into a garderobe, with a loop to the east, now
closed. Opposite, a short passage, also vaulted, and with a cross rib,
leads into the south or warders’ lodge.
This is an octagon, 15 feet 9 inches from face to face. In each angle
is a slender octagonal pier, engaged on a face and two half-faces, with
a sort of bell-cap and stilted base, both octagonal. From each pier
spring a main rib and two half-ribs. The former meet in the centre in a
plain joint; the latter form lancet arches at the gable of each cell.
All are narrow and plainly chamfered. Of the eight vaulting cells the
ridge lines are horizontal, and have no ribs. The ribs and piers are of
freestone, the vaults of chalk. From the floor to the pier caps is 6
feet 11 inches. The total height is 17 feet.
[Illustration: BYWARD TOWER AND POSTERN.]
In each of the faces is a recess. That on the north-east is the
entrance. The south-east is occupied by a fireplace, no doubt
representing an original one; The other six are looped.
The north lodge is entered through a lobby, 7 feet 9 inches square,
and 15 feet high, vaulted in four cells, with four slender chamfered
hip-ribs, springing from octangular corbels, one at each angle. There
is no boss. Each cell has a profile half-rib in its gable.
In the east side is a long two-light window beneath a segmental
recess, which seems original. This window, and the proportions and
general elegance of this chamber, point to its possible use as an
oratory. Those who entered the Tower might well need to be met by
spiritual support on the threshold.
In its north wall is a small lancet doorway, leading to a well-stair,
but probably always closed. A west door leads through a short passage
into the lodge, now a police barrack. This lodge resembles closely
that on the south side, save that the east recess is closed up, and
the fireplace, the brackets of which are original, occupies the
north-east face. The upper part of this chamber, towards the ditch,
has been pierced, probably for musketry, so as to command the approach
from Tower Street. In the north-east angle of this gatehouse is a
well-stair, entered by a separate door from the east and outer side.
[Illustration: BYWARD TOWER.—FIRST FLOOR.]
The first floor contains two large octagonal chambers in the towers.
The staircase opens into one of these in the north-east angle, and a
chamber 8 feet square occupies the south-east angle. The rear wall
between these two turrets is wanting, so that this gatehouse, with its
portcullis chamber, was intended to be open in the rear, or was closed,
as now, by a lath-and-plaster brattice. There was a small window to the
west, over the entrance-gate, looking on the bridge.
The arrangements of the second floor are still more simple. The
staircase remains, and the two octagon chambers, but the small
south-east chamber is wanting. The rear is open.
At the battlement level the staircase and its turret cease. There is
now nothing above the parapet.
[Illustration]
In the rear of and attached to the south-east part of this gatehouse
is a low tower, of later date, intended to cover a postern bridge,
traversing the south ditch, and dropping on the quay. The tower is
rectangular in plan, 14 feet broad and 29 feet long, besides an acute
salient of 12 feet more, which projects into the south ditch, and
prevents it from being raked.
It is pierced north and south by a portal 6 feet 9 inches broad, which
commences by a square cell, vaulted, with a cross and longitudinal rib,
chamfered, and pierced at the intersection by an octagonal cavity. Two
door jambs then reduce the opening by a foot, and between them, in the
vault, is a hole 9 inches diameter, apparently intended for a chain
which passed out over the rib of the further door, and worked, still
within the tower, a light bridge, the recess for which is seen outside
the door. The chamber here widens by 3 feet, to allow space for those
defending the east wall. When this bridge was down, a way was opened to
a door in the west wall, outside which is a platform, whence a second
bridge dropped southwards across the ditch. The upper story of this
postern tower was one large chamber for working the inner bridge. A
door leads from it upon the rampart walk of the east curtain. Above
this were the battlements of the postern, two stages below that of the
contiguous tower. In the Tudor reigns these buildings were encumbered
with additions in brick, timber, and plaster, which still remain, and
much obscure the original details. This postern tower is Perpendicular,
perhaps the work of Richard II.
Besides the bulwarks and towers just described, the inner ward was
strengthened against surprise by several cross walls and gates,
breaking it up into independent sections. One of these gates crossed
from Bell to Byward Tower, and another, it is said, crossed north
of Beauchamp Tower. There were walls with gates across the ward, on
either side of Traitors’ Gate, so that prisoners could be brought in
by water and led across into the Bloody Tower gate, without any chance
of rescue in the outer ward, and indeed without being seen. Another
gateway of a stronger description, and with towers, extended from
Lanthorn to near Cradle Tower; and another also, already mentioned,
opened in the small curtain between Salt and Well Tower. There was at
least one more gateway in the short curtain east from Salt Tower. The
ward, between all these gates, must have been intended to be open; but,
at least since the Tudor reigns, it has been encumbered with private
houses. Here the operations of the Mint were carried on with much
inconvenience; and the north and west limbs of the ward still bear the
name of Mint Street, and the east limb, of Irish Mint Street.
The curtain or scarp wall of this ward was, no doubt, the work of Henry
III., and much of the wall is still original. In the west wall, near
Byward, below a modern battery of two guns, are six loops, probably
old, but lighting modern casemates, and beneath each an air-hole.
Also, on the north front, close west of the new bastion in the wall,
is a pointed arched door, long closed up, but probably an original
water-gate. West of this also is an original loop, no doubt marking the
place of a mural chamber not now accessible.
[Illustration: MIDDLE TOWER.]
The modern additions to this curtain consist in a line of casemates,
storehouses, canteens, magazines, and workshops, built against and
concealing its inner face, and giving a rampart or platform of 30 feet
width.
This exterior wall has been built with great care on a broad and deep
foundation, since it shows no sign of settlement, though built in what,
until recently, was a deep and muddy ditch. At one part indeed, close
south of Brass Mount, it has been strengthened by three very clumsy
buttresses of 12 feet in breadth and 22 feet projection. One covers
the internal angle of the bastion; the next is about 40 feet distant;
and the third, at about the same space, is in fact a rectangular mural
tower resembling Galleyman, and contains a small chamber having two
loops on each of its three free faces. Its parapet is new, and pierced
for two guns.
Middle Tower is the outwork of Byward Tower, and a barbican covering
the landward entrance to the fortress. It stands on the counterscarp
of the ditch, at the outer end of the bridge, and was originally
enveloped by a special ditch of its own, a loop from the main ditch of
the place, filled up in the eighteenth century. In design and execution
it resembles closely Byward Tower, though rather smaller, its breadth
being 40 feet, and its height 30 feet from the roadway. It is evidently
of the date of Byward, and like it was open at the rear. It also has
been cased with Portland stone. Its portal has a double portcullis,
gateway, vertical holes, side loops and lodges, and its central part
is ceiled with timber. In neither tower is there now any trace of
a drawbridge. The lodges are tolerably perfect; the stair in the
north-east angle is in use, and corresponds to the Byward oratory; and
in the south-east turret is a lobby and a garderobe, and above these
a chamber 7 feet by 8 feet 6 inches, and again on the leads another
chamber 7 feet 4 inches by 10 feet 10 inches.
[Illustration: MIDDLE TOWER.—FIRST FLOOR.]
Between the two gatehouses the ditch is traversed by a stone bridge,
130 feet long, and at the narrowest 20 feet wide. As the towers are
not precisely opposite, the line of the bridge is broken by a slight
zigzag. In the centre appears to have been an opening of 20 feet, now a
stone arch, once the place of a drawbridge, as shown in old drawings.
The Quay does not appear to have had any permanent parapet wall,
which indeed would have interfered with its uses. It was sufficiently
commanded by the defences of the outer ward. It was probably the work
of Henry III., in the twelfth of whose reign it is first mentioned,
and called “Kaia Regis”; and John de Crumbwell, custos 8–9 Edward
III., had then an order for 300 alder poles from Windsor forest for
repairing it. The quay is in length about 1,130 feet, that being the
full frontage of the Tower.