Tower Hill facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Tower Hill |
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10 Trinity Square, Tower Hill |
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OS grid reference | TQ333806 |
• Charing Cross | 2 mi (3.2 km) W |
London borough | |
Ceremonial county | Greater London |
Region | |
Country | England |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Post town | LONDON |
Postcode district | EC3 |
Dialling code | 020 |
Police | Metropolitan |
Fire | London |
Ambulance | London |
EU Parliament | London |
UK Parliament |
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London Assembly | |
Tower Hill is infamous for the public execution of high status prisoners from the late 14th to the mid 18th century. The execution site on the higher ground north-west of the Tower of London moat is now occupied by Trinity Square Gardens.
Tower Hill also covers a wider area surrounding the Tower of London in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, rising from the north bank of the River Thames to reach a maximum height of 14.5 metres (48 ft) Ordnance Datum. The land was historically part of the Liberties of the Tower of London, an area the Tower authorities controlled to keep clear of any development which would reduce the defensibility of the Tower. Building has encroached to a degree, but a legacy of this control is that much of the hill is still open. The hill includes land on either side of the London Wall, a large remnant of which is visible.
History
Settlement
One of the oldest parts of London, archaeological evidence shows that there was a settlement on the hill in the Bronze Age and much later a Roman village that was burnt down during the Boudica uprising. A nearby church, All Hallows-by-the-Tower, is known for fragments of Romanesque architecture dating back to AD 680; the church itself dates from 675.
Local government
Great Tower Hill was an extra-parochial area within the Tower Liberty, under the direct administrative control of the Tower of London and outside the jurisdiction of the City of London and the county of Middlesex. In 1855 the area became part of the district of the Metropolitan Board of Works. The "District of Tower" became part of the Whitechapel District, under the authority of the Whitechapel District Board of Works. This was ambiguous and The Great Tower Hill Act 1869 was required to explicitly interpret it as Old Tower Without, including within it Great Tower Hill. The Tower Liberty was abolished in 1894 and incorporated into the County of London.
Executions
Public executions of high-profile traitors and criminals were often carried out on Tower Hill, including:
- 1381 – Simon Sudbury, Archbishop of Canterbury
- 1381 – Sir Robert Hales
- 1388 – Sir Simon de Burley
- 1388 – John de Beauchamp, 1st Baron Beauchamp (fourth creation)
- 1397 – Richard Fitzalan, 11th Earl of Arundel
- 1440 – Rev. Richard Wyche, Vicar of Deptford
- 1462 – John de Vere, 12th Earl of Oxford
- 1462 – Aubrey de Vere, eldest son and heir of John de Vere, 12th Earl of Oxford
- 1462 – Sir Thomas Tuddenham
- 1462 – William Tyrrell
- 1462 – John Montgomery
- 1470 – John Tiptoft, 1st Earl of Worcester
- 1495 – Sir William Stanley
- 1497 – James Tuchet, a commander of the Cornish Rebellion of 1497
- 1499 – Edward Plantagenet, 17th Earl of Warwick
- 1502 – James Tyrrell
- 1510 – Edmund Dudley
- 1510 – Sir Richard Empson
- 1521 – Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham
- 1535 – John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester
- 1535 – Sir Thomas More, ex-Lord Chancellor
- 1536 – George Boleyn, brother of Anne Boleyn
- 1537 – Thomas Darcy, 1st Baron Darcy de Darcy
- 1538 – Henry Courtenay, Earl of Devon
- 1538 – Edward Neville
- 1540 – Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex
- 1540 – Walter Hungerford, 1st Baron Hungerford of Heytesbury
- 1547 – Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey
- 1552 – Sir Ralph Vane
- 1552 – Sir Thomas Arundell of Wardour Castle
- 1552 – Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset
- 1554 – Sir Thomas Wyatt
- 1554 – Lord Guildford Dudley
- 1572 – Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk
- 1601 – Sir Christopher Blount
- 1615 – Sir Gervase Helwys
- 1631 – Mervyn Tuchet, 2nd Earl of Castlehaven
- 1641 – Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford
- 1645 – William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury
- 1651 - Christopher Love, Presbyterian minister
- 1662 – Sir Henry Vane
- 1683 – Col. Algernon Sidney
- 1685 – James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth
- 1716 – James Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Derwentwater
- 1746 – William Boyd, 4th Earl of Kilmarnock
- 1746 – Robert Boyd (of Clan Boyd)
- 1746 – Arthur Elphinstone, 6th Lord Balmerino
- 1747 – Simon Fraser, 11th Lord Lovat
Public transport
London Buses route 15 east to Blackwall and west to Trafalgar Square runs along Tower Hill. Tower Hill tube station is adjacent and Tower Gateway DLR station close by.
Images for kids
See also
In Spanish: Tower Hill para niños