A very old tradition, dating certainly as far back as the reign of Elizabeth, gives the epithet of “bloody” to this tower. It has always been known as the place where the sons of Edward IV. were murdered by their uncle Richard in 1483. Although there is no historical evidence to prove that this was the scene of that event, local tradition in a place like the Tower is not a factor to be despised, for the story of the crime and its _locale_ cannot have been handed down at an interval of less than a hundred years from the time of the occurrence. Until the reign of Elizabeth the Bloody Tower was called the Garden Tower, from a garden which lay on its western side, belonging to the Constable’s House or Lodging, to give its old style, the building now known as the King’s or Governor’s House; this garden has long ceased to exist. [Illustration: _The Bloody Tower._ _looking towards Traitor’s Gate._] The Bloody Tower is a building of three storeys, with an elevation of 47 feet. Worthy of notice is the portcullis which, like that of the Byward Tower, is still in working order: these two are said to be the only remaining portcullises in England still capable of being used. Mrs Hutchinson, the wife of the Parliamentary Colonel, refers to this portcullis. She shared her husband’s imprisonment here in 1663, “in a room,” she writes, “where it was said the two young princes, Edward V. and his brother, were murdered; the room that led to it was a great dark room with no window, where the portcullis to one of the inner gates was drawn up and let down.” Among other prisoners who have lingered in the Bloody Tower were Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, Jane Grey’s father-in-law, Archbishop Cranmer, Sir Walter Raleigh, and Sir Thomas Overbury, who was slowly poisoned. It was from the window over the gateway on the north side that Archbishop Laud, himself a prisoner, gave Strafford his supreme blessing as the great Earl was led out to die; and in this tower the brutal Judge Jeffreys died of delirium caused by drink and despair. The only prisoner here now is a small bird whose cage hangs from out a window of this gloomy gaol.