Ghosts of the Tower of London (6 page)

This incident gave rise to much speculation, following as it did, an occurrence two months or so earlier when, at 4.15 a.m. on the morning of 24 April 1980, two patrolling sentries saw what they described as ‘a tall dark figure’ at the east end of the Waterloo Block. They immediately gave chase, pursuing the figure down the stone steps leading to the Casemates, the area between the two encircling walls, but found no trace of an intruder. Another sentry had also heard suspicious noises at that time and so the guard was called out and a thorough search made of the area, but with no positive results.

To ascertain the possible significance of these occurrences, whether linked or not, we must go back to the seventeenth century. Prior to 1694, the year in which the Grand Storehouse was built there, most of that area was the cemetery of the Royal Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula which is situated immediately to the west. The Storehouse, an imposing three storied building, was a vast depository of weapons sufficient to arm 60,000 men, together with thousands of historic artifacts, banners, drums, arrays of bayonets and pistols; even the surviving instruments of torture were displayed there. But on Saturday 30 October 1841 a devastating fire broke out in a small tower immediately behind it, a conflagration which eventually enveloped the Storehouse itself despite all the efforts of the Tower’s fire brigade and those of the City. Thousands of Londoners lined the edge of the moat to watch the pall of smoke, the flames leaping high into the air, the collapsing roof and walls, and when dawn came there was little to see other than smouldering ruins.

The site was cleared completely and in preparing the foundations for a new building on the site, the remains of many bodies, including, it is believed, those of the alleged lovers of Queen Anne Boleyn, were found. As mentioned in another chapter, more remains were discovered in later years, all being re-interred in the Crypt.

The new building was the present Waterloo Block which, when completed in 1845, was called the Waterloo Barracks, its main use being to house the Tower’s garrison of soldiers; it also contains offices, store rooms and as previously mentioned, accommodation for members of staff. Currently of course the Jewel House is also situated therein.

The building being so comparatively recent, the spectral ‘crouching figure’ and the knocking on the doors – if indeed they were supernatural occurrences -could possibly be attributed to eternally wandering spirits of long-dead medieval corpses still mouldering beneath the foundations although they would have hardly appeared as the man wearing a war-time type pointed trilby! On the other hand, all the reported phenomena could conceivably have been caused by the latter apparition, and the vital clue in this connection is that there was a prisoner actually held in the Waterloo Block, as recently as the Second World War. He was a German spy, Josef Jakobs, who was confined in a room in the upper floor at the east end of the Block – the same floor and in close proximity to where the ‘man in the trilby’ was sighted!

Josef Jakobs was born 30 June 1898 and on enlisting in the German Army, rose to the rank of sergeant, attached to the Meteorological Branch. Selected as an espionage agent because of his knowledge of the English language, he was issued with the civilian clothing necessary to pass without suspicion in England, wireless transmitting equipment with which to communicate with his German base headquarters, and an identity card identifying him as James Rymer. He was given sufficient funds in English currency to enable him to pay for accommodation and purchase food and drink, and was also supplied with a bottle of brandy in the event of emergencies. For immediate sustenance on arrival, should that be necessary, he was given an item of food designed to evoke instant nostalgia – a traditional German sausage!

On the night of 31 January 1941, wearing a parachute, he boarded an aircraft which then took off and headed for southern England. Once over the estuary of the River Thames, the pilot navigated by following the course of the river as far as Gravesend and Greenhithe, then turned due north to drop his passenger over North Stifford, Essex. On descending, Jakobs, doubtless in trying to avoid dropping into the tree tops of a wood, made a heavy landing in a field nearby, breaking an ankle. Incapacitated, unable even to bury his parachute and flying kit with the small spade he carried, he was helpless to avoid capture by the Army personnel patrolling in the vicinity.

It being obvious from the equipment he carried that he was on a subversive mission, he was taken to Brixton Gaol where he received medical attention to his injured ankle. He was then interrogated by officers belonging to the counter-espionage branch and it soon became apparent that such was his loyalty and sense of patriotism, there was no question of him defecting and becoming a double agent. Seven months after his capture, on 4 August 1941, he faced a Court-Martial, and after hearing all the evidence, Jakobs was found guilty and sentenced to death.

He was taken to the Tower of London and, as stated above, was lodged in the Waterloo Block, guarded by soldiers of the Scots Guards. Early in the morning of 14 August 1941, he was escorted to the miniature rifle range which before its demolition stood only yards from the author’s apartment in the Tower. There, seated in a chair (because of his injured ankle) he was executed by an eight man firing squad under the command of Major P D Waters M.C., five bullets piercing the circle of lint positioned over his heart. His body was taken to the Tower mortuary, a room situated in the outer wall of the east moat, beneath the approach road to Tower Bridge, where a post mortem was carried out, after which it was conveyed to St Mary’s Roman Catholic Cemetery at Kensal Green and there, after the appropriate funeral service, interred in a common grave.

The chair on which the spy sat when executed – note missing rung torn away by bullets.

Was he – could he have been – the ‘man in a trilby’ seen by the yeoman warder? The fact that words were spoken did not necessarily preclude ‘him’ from being an apparition; phantoms are sometimes quite vocal; unmistakeable screams have on occasion been heard emanating late at night from the execution site on Tower Green, and ghostly moans have also been reported from other places over the years. Were the knocks on the doors his appeals for help in escaping his prison? Was he the ‘crouching man’ at the Waterloo Block door who, on seeing an ‘enemy’ soldier through the window, turned away and disappeared? Could he have been the ‘tall dark figure’ seen by the two sentries vanishing down the steps to the Casemates – the route which led to the site of the rifle range? And does his spirit frequent that area as well? In 1979 a poodle owned by a yeoman warder’s family living opposite, took to staring at the place where the range once stood, barking and growling as if witnessing something only it could see. Whether the apparition was that of Josef Jakob or not, may he, a brave and loyal soldier who died for his country, find eternal peace.

‘Whatever married man did not repent of his marriage, or quarrel in a year and a day after it, should go to his Priory and demand the promised flitch of bacon, on his swearing to the truth, kneeling on two stones in the church-yard’. That ancient tradition, still practised albeit rarely, dates back to the thirteenth century and was instituted by Lord Robert Fitzwalter. The prize was known as the Dunmow Flitch, the Priory in question being Dunmow Priory, situated in the Essex town of that name. Robert Fitzwalter was Lord of Dunmow, although he spent much of his time at his London address, Baynard’s Castle, in Surrey, now long since demolished. However one can be quite certain that he would not have considered his Sovereign, King John, to be eligible for such a philanthropic award, for John, although married to Queen Isabella of Angouleme, harboured lustful thoughts directed towards a beautiful damsel called Maud, or Matilda, the Fair – for she happened to be Fitzwalter’s daughter!

The King’s improper advances were spurned by that young lady, but so determined was the monarch that in the year 1212 he had her kidnapped from the family home in Dunmow and brought to the Tower of London, where she was imprisoned in the round turret of the White Tower. On hearing of the dastardly deed, her outraged father sought to raise the other barons in revolt against the monarch, but failing in his efforts, he was forced to flee to France, his estates then being forfeited to the Crown.

As the months went by, John continued to force his unwanted attentions on Maud, but she refused to speak to him or even the courtiers who conveyed his ardent pleas. Eventually, determined that if he could not have her, no-one else should, he arranged that her food should include a poisoned egg and Maud, unsuspecting his murderous intent, ate it and died. Her body was taken back to Dunmow and interred in the family vault there.

When the news of her murder reached France, Lord Fitzwalter returned to England, to find that the barons were now on the brink of rising up against King John and Robert, placing himself at their head, was thereby instrumental in forcing the King to sign (actually to make his mark) on the Magna Carta at Runnymeade. So it could be said that the Charter which gave us all our civic freedom originated with a poisoned egg eaten in the White Tower by Maud the Fair!

But does her spirit still haunt that ancient building? One afternoon in 1980 a London Tourist Board guide, conducting a party through the White Tower, reported that he had distinctly felt a hand grasp his shoulder and squeeze it twice. Assuming it was a tourist seeking his attention, he turned round immediately – to find no-one there, the members of his group being some yards away!

One man who actually did see ‘someone’ was an Armouries warden who, at five minutes past eight one morning in 1978, long before any visitors were admitted, was sweeping the floor in one of the rooms. As he was thus engaged he happened to look up and saw, through one of the glass display cases, a woman. Puzzled at her presence, he walked round the cabinet and saw her move through an archway and round the corner into the next room. On following her he saw that there was no-one there, and as the only way out was up the spiral stairs, he ascended them, only to find that the door at the top, leading into the Chapel Royal of St John, was locked and bolted. Summoning his colleagues, the whole area was searched, but no sign of the woman was ever found.

That episode, occurring as it did, in broad daylight, must have been disturbing enough, but the incident experienced by a night security guard on duty in the White Tower at 11.15 pm one night in September 1980 was enough to make his pulses race faster than usual, as he admitted to me when, on the following day, he described what happened. He had entered via an upper storey and then approached the spiral stairway which connects the various floors. As he started to go down he suddenly became aware, out of the corner of his eye, of a woman going up. She seemed to be leaning forward as she mounted the stairs, for the upper half of her body was obscured by the newel post, the thick stone centre pillar of the stairway, but he recalled that she was wearing a long black and grey skirt of some kind. Before he had really comprehended exactly what he had seen, he had taken a further two steps downwards, so he immediately turned back and ascended. Climbing as quickly as he could, his adrenalin flowing, and trying to see round each bend in the stairs before reaching there, eventually he reached the top – to find himself facing a locked door! He confessed afterwards that although completely mystified, he was relieved that the apparition had not turned round and come down again to meet him!

So could it have been the ghost of the young girl, so brutally murdered for refusing to yield to the King, who one morning had alarmed the warden sweeping the floor? Was it her hand that had touched the guide’s shoulder? Could it really have been Maud the Fair who in the dead of night was seen mounting the spiral stairs? It may have been – for beyond that locked door was the round turret!

Joining the Wakefield and the Lanthorn Towers on the south side of the Fortress is a forty-foot high crenellated wall approximately six feet wide, and access to the top of it can only be gained via the doorways in each of the two towers. At about 8.30 pm on the moonless night of 19 October 1978 the sentry patrolling between the inner and outer walls in that area suddenly became aware of small stones hitting his legs and boots. The security lights were on, and there was no-one in the vicinity. He continued his patrol, only to experience further stones, thrown singly, striking his legs. Mystified – and doubtless hoping to avoid further scratches on his highly polished boots! – he called to his colleague on the adjoining beat and asked him to change over; on doing so, he too was peppered with small stones. At that, the men decided to call out the guard and on their arrival, as usual, the area was scrupulously searched, with negative results. There was no wind whatsoever, so the stones could not have been blown from the top of the inner wall, the direction from which the stones came; the doors at both ends of the wall-walk were not only bolted and secured but also had additional barred gates locked across them. On inspecting the wall-walk nothing could be found to arouse suspicion and the dust on it lay undisturbed.