The Tower of London has a long history with executions, torture and brutality.
The last person to be executed at the Tower of London was Josef Jakob’s who was executed
during the Second World War as a spy inside a firing range at the Tower.
But it is during the Tudor Period that the Tower’s brutal reputation really developed,
with three Queens of England being beheaded inside the walls of the Tower.
But what was it like to witness an execution inside the walls of the Tower of London?
It varied a significant degree depending on who was being beheaded, but there were a number
of customs that were adhered to.
Join us today as we look at, ‘Witnessing a Tudor Execution at the Tower of London.’
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Most of the prisoners who were held inside the Tower of London as prisoners if they were
due to be executed were held only in the Tower and were not executed inside the walls.
They would be transported from their cells on their day of execution to be then taken
outside the Tower to be taken to either Tyburn to be hanged, drawn and quartered, Smithfield
to be burned, or a short distance away at Tower Hill to be beheaded.
Tower Hill was the site where famous Tudor figures such as Thomas Cromwell and Thomas
More were beheaded, and they were killed on the public beheading spot.
But inside the Tower, there was a rule that executions that occured inside were performed
in private.
Someone with permission from the King or Queen who was of such high status, even royal blood
could only be granted a private execution.
When we use the phrase private execution too, there were often dozens and if not hundreds
of witnesses, but they were spared the thousands of commoners watching them as their head was
struck from their shoulders.
The first execution inside the Tower was of William Hastings, the 1st Baron Hastings who’s
execution was only witnessed by a few people.
During a meeting with Richard IIII, he was dragged out of the room and was then beheaded
in rough fashion on the cobbled pavements within the Tower of London’s walls.
But it was during the Tudor period that the executions inside the Tower were the most
significant, including those of Anne Boleyns.
Anne Boleyn’s execution would be very different to that of the rest who were beheaded inside
the walls.
Anne was a Queen of England, and the order to kill her after she was found guilty of
treason, adultery and incest was incredibly shocking.
She was led out of the Queen’s House where she had been imprisoned and as she approached
the scaffold she was flanked by her ladies in waiting and a number of guards.
Now Anne was granted the clemency of a private execution by her husband, King Henry VIII,
and she was also allowed a French Swordsman to perform the office to take her head clean
off.
But witnessing her execution would have meant a few things, those who were there to watch
inside the Tower were incredibly important and were noble.
There were roughly 200 inside the Tower to see the proceedings, including Thomas Cromwell
the man who had arranged her downfall and masterminded it.
Also present was Henry VIII’s illegitimate son Henry Fitzroy, who despite being young
was there to witness his father’s bloody wrath.
At the time, Fitzroy was considered a possible contender to succeed his father, and it’s
likely that Henry sent him to witness the execution of Anne as a way of dealing with
problems as a King, and how ruthless being a King was.
Anne would have approached the Tower’s scaffold that had been created.
It was said that the Scaffold where the executions took place was on the North side of the White
Tower, which would place it just before the Waterloo Barracks that today house the Crown
Jewels.
The walk from the Queen’s House to here is a short one, and along the way Anne would
have passed the faces of the witnesses.
Now Anne’s execution was different as the scaffold had been covered in a beautiful material
fit for a Queen, and the scaffold site today it’s considered was on Tower Green, the
small patch of grass near to the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula.
As customary, those who were executed were allowed to make a speech to the witnesses
and crowd, and then say their final words to their attendants including priests.
One bizarre custom is that witnessing the execution, you would notice the executioner
fall to his knees and to beg forgiveness from the person he was about to kill.
This was done to relinquish him of his sin of killing legally, and he was then paid handsomely
by the person being executed for the job.
So not only was someone losing their head, they were also losing a significant amount
of cash.
Anne’s execution was different as whilst she was kneeling and a handkerchief was around
her eyes preventing her from seeing what would happen next.
But the executioner then unveiled his sword from his cloak, to a great gasp in the crowd
before he then quickly struck Anne’s head clean off.
Witnessing Anne’s execution would have been incredibly shocking.
After the bloody act had happened, her ladies in waiting then gathered her head and corpse
and placed it inside a wooden chest before it was carried inside the Tower’s chapel.
But witnessing this execution would have been different to the other executions carried
out inside the Tower of London.
But watching the proceedings that sorry day, you would have glanced around and noticed
the White Tower overlooking the proceedings, and the walls sheltering the public’s prying
eyes.
Also its likely that other prisoners from towers such as the Beauchamp Tower would be
watching the proceedings.
The next head to roll would be that of Margaret Pole’s, who was the Countess of Salisbury.
She was an elderly lady and had been imprisoned for a significant amount of time, a couple
of years and was accused of being a traitor.
Her execution was incredibly hastily arranged, to the point where it was claimed that the
block was just placed on the cobbled pavements of the Tower, rather than on the scaffold.
The decision to execute her came incredibly quickly.
Her execution was performed by a blundering axeman, some claim to have been a youth.
Margaret Pole’s execution would have looked more like a murder, as she refused to lay
her head on the block and she was forced onto it.
She was held down but struggled, and the executioner made a significant cut into her shoulder rather
than the neck, and it was said she then was chased around after leaping from the block,
being pursued by the executioner with his axe.
She was then held on the floor and was struck 11 times before she died and there were 150
people there to see the 68 year old’s grisly demise.
Witnessing her execution would have been incredibly sadistic, and it begs the question that it
would have been performed better if it had been better planned.
Following Pole’s execution, Tower Green became the site where the Tudor beheadings
took place.
Next to fall on the 13th February 1542 was another one of Henry VIII’s Queens Catherine
Howard, his fifth wife and Jane Boleyn, the Viscountess Rochford.
A scaffold was used for these, and witnessing these two executions would have been rather
distressing, especially the of Catherine Howard’s.
Catherine had been sentenced to death for allegedly having an affair with two men at
court, including the King’s close friend Thomas Culpepper.
These two to face the executioner had been granted the royal privilege of being executed
in private.
Henry had even passed a new law to ensure that Jane Boleyn was executed despite being
declare insane, ensuring that even those who lost their sanity could be condemned.
On Tower Green a small crowd assembled, and the scaffold was covered in just hay to absorb
the blood from the brutal beheadings.
Catherine was noted to have been pale as she lay her head on the block, but these two were
to be executed by Axeman.
They were not spared the luxury of having a swordsman perform the job, and both died
by the commoner’s axe.
They both made their speeches, before Catherine was executed first.
The blood was not even cleaned up before Jane Boleyn was brought out to suffer the same
fate, dying in a pool of her former friend’s blood.
Jane Boleyn’s execution inside the Tower was the final one of Henry VIII’s reign
to occur within the walls.
It was Lady Jane Grey the 9 day Queen who later was the Tower’s next victim.
She had been sentenced to death by Bloody Mary I, who deposed her as Queen and then
following the threat of rebellion ordered the young girls execution.
Witnessing Jane’s execution would have been very distressing.
She was just 16 or 17 when she was brought to the scaffold on Tower Hill where she made
a short speech.
She was a Queen which is why she was allowed to be killed inside the Tower’s walls, and
she told the executioner who was armed with his axe to take her head off quickly.
In one swift strike, the head of Lady Jane’s came off.
There were witnesses who saw the proceedings to ensure that word spread across the country
of the Queen’s brutal side and how she would deal with acts of treason or Protestants who
did not conform to her beliefs.
The execution by axe would have been very distressing to have seen, and it did have
a habit of taking more than one strike to perform the job.
Only the best executioners with the sharpest tools were able to take a head in one stroke,
and once done the blood would stream onto the scaffold and off the edges, with the head
being held up to the crowd to confirm death.
This was usually a distressing sight seeing someones head being bloodily paraded above
the parapet.
The final Tudor execution inside the walls of the Tower of London came in 1601 with Elizabeth
I’s former favourite Robert Devereux.
The Earl of Essex had been found guilty of treason, and was brought to the scaffold on
Tower Green where an axeman took his head off but it was not clean.
There were 100 people there to watch the proceedings, and it took three strikes of the axe to separate
his head from his body.
But witnessing the executions in the Tower was often a privilege and also a necessity.
The crown would want people seeing that justice in their eyes was being administered, and
at times the local public were allowed to come and witness the proceedings.
It would have been incredibly harrowing to have seen, but to people during the Tudor
Period, the art of execution was seen as almost entertainment and as a sport.
The Tower of London granted a degree of privacy for those of royal blood or high nobility
who had crossed the Crown.
It was beheadings that made the Tower notorious during the Tudor Period, many which were performed
poorly.
If they were performed badly, sometimes the crowd would turn into an angry mob against
the executioner who would become a target and was criticised for his work.
Going to the Tower of London to witness an execution usually required an invitation,
but what cannot be disputed is the status of those who were executed there during the
Tudor Period.
Queens were amongst the victims, and to see the deaths of these would have been very shocking.
The fact people flocked to see executions all up until the 1800s was rather shocking,
and seems rather a foreign concept for us in modern times.
The executions at the Tower of London followed a similar pattern during the Tudor Period.
They were beheadings taking place on Tower Green or the area nearby, performed by an
axe or swordsman.
They were also granted privacy, despite this hundreds of people were invited into the inner
sanctum to watch the will of the monarchy.
But each one would be disturbing to have seen, and it remained a site of execution even up
until the Second World War.
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