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The Tower of London has been the setting for many great events during
its 900-year history as a royal palace and fortress, prison and place of
execution, arsenal, mint, menagerie and jewel house. This timeline shows
some of the most significant events that took place here.
The Tower of London is by far one of the most famous and well preserved
historical buildings in the world. From its earliest structural
beginnings by its founder William I of England better known as William
the Conqueror 1066-87, the Great Tower or White Tower as it later came
to be called was fast becoming the most talked-about building in
England. The White Tower was also the most awe inspiring, and
frightening structure to the Anglo-Saxon people who were trying to get
used to the rule of their new Norman king, the destroyer of their own
ruler, Harold II, at the in 1066. Within three months of his victory
William the Conqueror had begun to build a castle on the north bank of
the river Thames in London.
Beginning life as a simple timber and earth enclosure tucked in the
south-east angle formed by the joining of the original east and south
stone walls of the old Roman town of Londinium Augusta, the original
structure was completed by the addition of a ditch and palisade along
the north and west sides.
This enclosure then received a huge structure of stone which in time
came to be called The Great Tower and eventually as it is known today
The White Tower. This formed the basis of a residential palace and
fortress ideally suited for a king or queen and as history has shown, to
its regal occupants the Tower of London became the perfect all purpose
complex. Since the first foundations were laid more than 900 years ago
the castle has been constantly improved and extended by the addition of
other smaller towers, extra buildings, walls and walkways, gradually
evolving into the splendid example of castle, fortress, prison, palace
and finally museum that it proudly represents today.
The development of the Tower
The Tower of London was begun in the reign of William the Conqueror
(1066-87) and remained unchanged for over a century. Then, between 1190
and 1285, the White Tower was encircled by two towered curtain walls and
a great moat. The only important enlargement of the Tower after that
time was the building of the wharf, begun by Edward III (1327-77) and
completed under Richard II (1377-99).
Today the medieval defences remain relatively unchanged, except at the
western entrance.
The Tower in the 20th century
The First World War (1914-18) left the Tower largely untouched; the only
bomb to fall on the fortress landed in the moat. However, the war
brought the Tower of London back into use as a prison for the first time
since the early 19th century and between 1914 and 1916 eleven spies were
held and subsequently executed in the Tower.
Bomb damage to the Old Hospital Block, recorded by the war artist
Alastair Stewart in 1941.
The Tower s role as a place of imprisonment and execution effectively
came to an end during the Second World War (1939-45) with the
confinement of Rudolf Hess, Hitler s Deputy Reichsführer, in the
Queen s House for four days in May 1941, and the execution of the spy
Joseph Jakobs on 14 August. Bomb damage to the Tower during the Second
World War was much greater: a number of buildings were severely damaged
or destroyed including the mid-19th century North Bastion, which
received a direct hit on 5 October 1940, and the Hospital Block which
was partly destroyed during an air raid in the same year. Incendiaries
also destroyed the Main Guard, a late 19th-century building to the south
west of the White Tower.
During the Second World War the Tower was closed to the public. The
moat, which had been drained and filled in 1843, was used as allotments
for vegetable growing and the Crown Jewels were removed from the Tower
and taken to a place of safety, the location of which has never been
disclosed. After the war, the Tower of London reopened its gates and
resumed life as one of the world s major tourist attractions; today,
over 2.5 million visitors a year come to discover its long and eventful
history, its buildings, ceremonies and traditions.
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