Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-10-23
LONOON'S OLD TOWER
Recent Strange and Interesting Discoveries
in the Ancient Pile.
All Persons Condemned to Imprfson-
ment Therein Must Have
Died Very Soon.


| From the London Graphic.
| The building of the new guard room in the
| inner bailey of the tower of London has led
| to strange and interesting discovery, and
enhanced the mystery and romance which
have gathered for centuries around its gray
walls and battlements. The new guard room
| occupies the space between the bloody
tower and the white tower upon the right
as you enter the inner ward, and N prepar-
Ing its foundations a subterranean passage
was discovered (or to be accurate, redis
covered for Its existence was known be-
fore), extending from the moat near the
| traitors gate beneath St. Thomas tower,
| in the direction of the southwest angle of
the white tower. The passage is lined
| throughout with Norman masonry and has
a level floor: 1t was evident at once there
| fore, that it was not drain cuvert, for
| in that case it would have had rounded
bottom; and it became q matter of inter-
est to follow IL both ways toward the moat
and toward the white tower, for the pur-
pose of ascertaining whether it communl-
Gated directly with the interior of the white
tower. forming, thus. an outlet to the moat
from the lower portion of the keep where
the dungeons are situated. 1t seemed most
likely that this should be the case. but ex
pectation has been disappointed The pas
sage loes, indeed, lead to a dungeon, and
most horrible one, but there is no communi-
cation with the White tower. 1t runs
straight from the moat into the dungeon,
but the dungeon is completely isolated from
all parts of the fortress, and its commune
cation with the upper air is by a shaft
which descends into the passage.
By permission of the office of works a
representative of the Daily Graphic was al
lowed to descend the shaft and inspect the
passage and the dungeon under the guild
ance of Mr. May, the clerk of the works.
Arriving at the tower and presenting his
no pfSn of M hat IL
man first exhibited to his visitor in the
little yard behind his office the objects dis
covered In clearing out the shaft and pas
sage These consist mainly of masses of
green-glazed ware such as was common
throughout the middle ages; several broken
brown jugs, known as bellarmines, and
pieces of colored delft and Fulham ware
all, no doubt, fragments of the broken
utensils of the garrison. thrown down the
shaft after the dungeon lad ceased to be
used in Elfzabethan times and later. More
interesting than these relics are numbers
OF cannon balls, of stone and of iron, which
were found in the excavation. Some of the
iron balls have marks on them. One has
been found marked with the letter r.
10 others pieces of bone and timber are
still adhering. 1t is believed. with great
probability, that some at least of these
round shot were fired at the tower by the
Protestant rebels under Sir Thomas Wyatt.
The r. mark on one of the balls may be
that of the arsenal at Rochester, to which
the rebels had access before advancing on
London.
Wyatt, as is we'll known. headed a re-
bellion of kentish men when the fear
spread that the Spaniards were coming to
conquer the realm after the queen had set
her heart on the marriage with Philip of
Spain The stirring tale is briefly told by
Green.
The ships in the Thames submitted to
be seized by the insurgents A party of
the train bands of London, who marched
under the Duke of Norfolk against them.
deserted to the rebels in a mass, with
shouts of A Wyatt, a Wyatt, We are all
Englishmen.' Had the insurgents moved
quickly on the capital its gates would have
been flung open and success would have
been assured. But in the critical moment
Mary was saved by her queenly courage.
Riding boldly to the Guild Hall she appeal
cd, with mans voice, to the loyalty of
the citizens, and when Wyatt appeared on
the Southwark bank the bridge was Sc
cured Wyatt pushed on up the river
crossed at Kingston, turned back on Lon
don, and was finally defeated and made
prisoner at Temple Bar. II have kept
touch" he cried at the gate, but his adj
herents within were unable to make the
promised diversion in his favor and Wyatt
was sent to the tower and beheaded. 1t
seems probable that the cannon balls now
discovered were fired either by the ships
in the river or from the other side by the
artillery which Wyatt had with him on
his march. But the tower even on its
most vulnerable side, the river front, was
1mpregnable to any force of foot or artil-
lery which Wyatt could bring against it.
The bones which adhere to some of the
cannon shot seem to tell of some execution
done-ghastly relics. may be, of some of
the garrison who fell in the bombardment
One of the most interesting finds was a
mass of Roman cement in which was imbed-
ded three of the well-known tiles with which
the Roman architects banded their walls.
The cement is, as usual, of extreme hard
ness. With this were portions of the fues
of hypocauSt and a broken vessel OF Roman
earthenware. There never was any real
doubt that Roman fortress existed on the
site of the tower; tradition has been con-
slant to that effect. The Roman wall of
London touched the river at the point
where the tower stands, and Roman ma
sorry undoubtedly lies at the base of some
of the existing medieval walls. The dis
covery of these Roman remains close to the
White tower is interesting, as showing that
1t was there probably that one of the prin-
cfpal dwellings of the Roman garrison
stood Another Interesting object is the
wooden handle of dagger of the fifteenth
century, of the type which has lobe
each side of the guard.
These relics inspected, the passage and
dungeon were next visited. Mr.. Mays
workmen having lighted the interior with
candles, some idea could be formed of it's
size and aspect The bottom of the sub
terranean passage is seventeen feet beneath
the level of the ground, and the shaft by
which access to it is gained, and by which,
no doubt, the prisoner who was doomed to
suffer in 1t was lowered, de9csndS straight
into it. Toward the moat the passage was
closed by a strong iron grille firmly ini-
bedded in the masonry; at its other end is
the dungeon, a horrible black cell, oval in
shape, originally vaulted, and measuring
about seven feet across. When the opening
OF the shaft above was closed no ray of
light could penetrate into this terrible pris-
save that which came-if indeed even
that could come-from the opening far
away in the moat. The exploration of the
passage has revealed the fact that another
subterranean passage leads into It at right
10 TrojtnrS' hat Ia
probable that a prisoner brought into the
tower by water through that gate could
have been put into the passage without set
ting foot on the ground. However this may
be, 1T is certain that no man condemned to
the oubliette of the tower-for such this
dungeon was-could have lived long. The
damp darkness, and the rats must have
made short work of him.