Tower: An Epic History of the Tower of London (75 page)

The Wizard Earl: Henry Percy, 9th Earl of Northumberland, as depicted by Anthony van Dyck. Nicknamed for his fondness for scientific experiments, the Earl converted the Martin Tower into a lab during his long incarceration for suspected involvement in the Gunpowder plot.

Yeomen of England: the Tower’s Yeoman Warders or ‘Beefeaters’ in their Tudor costumes on their way to search the cellars beneath Parliament. Now a picturesque ceremony, the ritual recalls the arrest here of Guy Fawkes while guarding the gunpowder intended to blow up King and Parliament.

Wicked lady: Frances Howard, Countess of Somerset, was the moving spirit behind the slow poisoning of Sir Robert Overbury in 1614, an infamous Tower crime which led to her own imprisonment in the fortress.

Restored: the Tower in 1660, the year of Charles II’s restoration. Engraving by Wenceslaus Hollar.

Bloody, bold and resolute: ‘Colonel’ Thomas Blood, the arch rogue who stole the Crown jewels from the Tower in May 1671: but was the heist an inside job?

Getaway: Blood and his gang make their escape with the loot.

Bloodproof? The Crown jewels as they appear today. Under armed guard and behind bullet proof glass, security is hopefully tighter than in Blood’s time.

Charles II in his coronation regalia, showing the Crown, orb and sceptre that Blood stole.

Heads you lose: after the bungled execution of the Duke of Monmouth following the bloody failure of his rebellion in 1685, his head was re-attached to his body so his handsome face could be immortalised in paint – possibly by court artist Sir Geoffrey Kneller. Monmouth’s peaceful features betray little hint of his agonising death.

Cross dresser: the bold and resourceful Lady Winifred Nithsdale escorts her disguised husband from his condemned cell in the Tower under the noses of his guards on the eve of his execution in February 1716. The Jacobite aristocrats spent the rest of their lives, poor but safe, in Rome.

Ugly old head: Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat, as engraved by William Hogarth en route south from Scotland after his arrest for taking part in the ’45 – Bonnie Prince Charlie’s 1745–46 Jacobite rebellion. Despite being in his 80th year, Lovat tried in vain to save his own skin by sacrificing his son. His ‘ugly old head’ came off on Tower Hill in May 1747 – the last execution there.

Smash and grab: in stark contrast to Blood, Metropolitan Police Superintendent Pierse smashed the glass and grabbed the Crown jewels – for entirely laudable reasons. Pierse was saving the jewels from the devastating Tower fire of 1841, and when he emerged his clothes were smouldering. George Cruickshank visited the scene to record his feat the next day.