Gatehouse Prison was a prison

Prison

A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...

 in Westminster

Westminster

Westminster is an area of central London, within the City of Westminster, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, southwest of the City of London and southwest of Charing Cross...

, built in 1370 as the gatehouse of Westminster Abbey

Westminster Abbey

The Collegiate Church of St Peter at Westminster, popularly known as Westminster Abbey, is a large, mainly Gothic church, in the City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom, located just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English,...

 and first used as a prison by the Abbot, a powerful churchman who held considerable power over the precincts and sanctuary. It was one of the prisons which supplied the Old Bailey

Old Bailey

The Central Criminal Court in England and Wales, commonly known as the Old Bailey from the street in which it stands, is a court building in central London, one of a number of buildings housing the Crown Court...

 with information on former prisoners (such as their identity or prior criminal records) for making indictments against criminals

Richard Lovelace

Richard Lovelace

Richard Lovelace was an English poet in the seventeenth century. He was a cavalier poet who fought on behalf of the king during the Civil war. His best known works are To Althea, from Prison, and To Lucasta, Going to the Warres....

 wrote

"Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage"

while he was imprisoned in the Gatehouse for petitioning to have the Clergy Act 1640 annulled.

The Gatehouse prison was torn down in 1776. At its site, in front of the Abbey's Great West Door, is the Westminster scholars' Crimean War Memorial.

Notable inmates

Giles Wigginton

Giles Wigginton

Giles Wigginton was an English clergyman who became a fringe religious activist towards the end of the sixteenth century.-Life:...

, Puritan cleric and controversialist, was imprisoned for 2 months around 1584, for refusing to take an oath.
Sir Walter Raleigh

Walter Raleigh

Sir Walter Raleigh was an English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer. He is also well known for popularising tobacco in England....

 was held here the night before he was beheaded in Old Palace Yard, Westminster on 29 October 1618. .
Throughout the 17th century, the Gatehouse prison held many famous dissenters and those charged with treasonous crimes, including Laurence Voux, Christopher Holywood

Christopher Holywood

Christopher Holywood was an Irish Jesuit of the Counter Reformation. The origin of the Nag's Head Fable has been traced to him.-Roman Catholic and Irish:...

, Richard Lovelace

Richard Lovelace

Richard Lovelace was an English poet in the seventeenth century. He was a cavalier poet who fought on behalf of the king during the Civil war. His best known works are To Althea, from Prison, and To Lucasta, Going to the Warres....

, Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys FRS, MP, JP, was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament who is now most famous for the diary he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man...

, and Henry Savile.

Further reading

• Forsythe, James Neild. State of the Prisons in England, Scotland, and Wales, Not for the Debtor Only, But for Felons Also, and Other Less Criminal Offenders. London: Routledge, 2000. ISBN 0-415-23127-2
• Tanner, Lawrence Edward. Westminster School, Its Buildings and Their Associations. P. Allan, 1923.