The Bloody Tower...Day 5x

Originally known as the Garden Tower, the Bloody Tower was another river entrance to the Tower of London.  But life happened (well, er, death that is) and it became known as the Bloody Tower.




                                                                                        
During the reign of Queen Mary I (Bloody Mary) several (ok, quite a few) Protestant martyrs were charged with heresy and condemned to death.Archbishop Thomas Cranmer (who got no special treatment, even though he was archbishop under her own father, King Henry XIII--I am pretty sure he wasn't expecting any favors because he had favored Henry's divorce of Mary's mother and she was just waiting to get back at him for all those years, probably) Bishop Nicholas Ridley and Bishop Hugh Latimer:  all were burned at the stake in the mid 1500's.  There's actually a pretty gruesome story about Cranmer's execution. He had converted to Catholicism in obedience to Queen Mary but for some reason, maybe because of some vestiges of bitterness or an attempt to wreak revenge upon him, she didn't believe his conversion was sincere. So he was sentenced to be burned at the stake and on the day set for his execution, Cranmer recanted his conversion to Catholicism and stated: "I have sinned, in that I signed with my hand what I did not believe with my heart. When the flames are lit, this hand shall be the first to burn".   The soldiers lit the fire and, true to his word, Cranmer stuck his right hand directly into the flames and left it there. Before he succumbed to the flame, Cranmer  said, "This hand hath offended...I see the heavens open and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."

Sir Walter Raleigh was a favored courtier of Queen Elizabeth I until he entered in an unauthorized relationship that concluded with marriage to one of the Queen's ladies in waiting. (I think the queen was a bit jealous...)  (there are some historians who would agree with me)   Both Sir Walter and his wife spent some time in the Tower before they were once again in her favor.  She went back to the Queen's court and he went gallivanting around the New World, searching for El Dorado and any other cities of gold that he might come across. 



                                                Sir Walter Raleigh's quarters in the Bloody Tower

During his explorations, he found trouble when he attacked some Spanish settlements, in defiance of the king's orders. Of course, Spain was outraged as well and demanded he be punished, if not for his unnecessary acts of war, then for the original charge of treason against King James I. By this time, his luck had run out and  James I sent him back to the Tower, where he lived in the Bloody Tower with his wife for more than a decade. He spent his time in the Tower building his family (his second son Carew was born during this incarceration) and writing his book, History of the World, which was published in 1614, a mere four years before he was beheaded.

Of the axe that was to dispatch him to the next world, he reflected  "This is a sharp Medicine, but it is a Physician for all diseases and miseries." Then he laid his head on the block, waiting for the axe to separate his head from his body and uttered his final words "Strike, man, strike!"