This tower was originally known as the Garden Tower. The Bloody Tower got its sinister reputation and name in the 16th century.

That Richard, Duke of Gloucester, sure kept himself busy! He sent the two princes, Edward V and his younger brother Richard, Duke of York, to live here in 1483. When Richard the Duke became Richard III the boys mysteriously disappeared. Legend has it that they were murdered on his instructions. One was suffocated and one was stabbed. They were initially buried in the basement, but later moved to an inknown location near the White Tower. It must be noted that there are many who believe that Henry Tudor (later Henry VII) was the murderer. The princes' mother, Elizabeth Woodville, widow of Edward IV, had sent them there under the assumption that 13 year old Edward was being prepared for his coronation. The legend was strengthened in 1674, when two skeletons were found beneath a staircase in The White Tower during renovations. It was generally thought that the two princes had been found at last, and the remains were given a royal burial in Westminster Abbey. But do they rest? Perhaps those skeletons were not those of the princes, since the sobbing ghosts of two boys, wearing nightgowns and clinging to each other in absolute dread, have been seen in the Bloody Tower where they "lived". Everyone who has seen these sorry souls has been moved to try and help them, only to see the boys back, trembling, towards the wall and then fading into it.

The Bloody Tower was also the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh for almost 13 years. His ghost has been reported here, in the rooms he was held in. He was beheaded in 1618 at Westminster.

Henry Percy died there in mysterious circumstances in 1585. Judge Jeffreys was also held here. Sir Thomas Overbury, poet and courtier, was a victim of court intrigue. He was poisoned.Legend has it that he had swallowed enough poison to have killed 20 men before he died in 1613.