Bloody Tales of the Tower

Bloody Tales of the Tower The terrible cries of tortured traitors have given the Tower of London a particularly grisly place in the history of the capital of England. Brave a trip to the Tower with investigator Joe Crowley and Tudor historian Dr Suzannah Lipscomb, as this gruesome series explores its infamous blood-spattered past.

Traitors
All executions at the Tower and nearby Tower Hill were horrific, but a particularly unpleasant end awaited those who betrayed the Crown. In the first episode discover the contrasting fates of three very different traitors, including the case of the last person killed at the Tower by firing squad.

Executions
Despite its reputation as the home of expert execution, accounts of the time suggest that being put to death in the Tower could be a messy business. Was it a faulty axe or executioner's anxiety which caused the botched beheading of the Duke of Monmouth, who finally lost his head at the fifth blow?!

Scandal
Some say love is a losing game - and in the reign of Henry VIII, the stakes were higher than ever as Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard found to their peril. Examine how two of the promiscuous monarch's wives lost their lives in the Tower following accusations of amorous affairs. Were they victims of a cruel conspiracy?