Building    To 1777

Newgate

Categories: London Wall

Newgate was the western exit through the Roman London Wall. In later years the gate house was about 100 feet wide. Part of this building was used, from at least the 12th century, as a prison and thus began the use of the site, and extensions to the south, that continued through until the last prison was closed in 1902, demolished in 1904 and replaced with the Old Bailey.

2018: From Ian Visits: Warwick Passage runs under the Old Bailey and at the far end in a small garden are four columns reclaimed from the 1907 Central Criminal Court building when it was expanded in 1972.

2019: Thackeray's title character Henry Esmond, having been imprisoned with some friends relates (p168): "Our rooms were the three in the gate {sic} over Newgate - on the second storey, looking up Newgate Street towards Cheapside and Paul's Church. And we had leave to walk on the roof and could see thence Smithfield and the Bluecoat Boys' School, Gardens and the Chartreux, where as {I} remembered {two friends} had had their schooling."

See Cripplegate for the full list of 8 gates of old London.

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This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
Newgate

Commemorated ati

Newgate

Site of Newgate, demolished 1777. The Corporation of the City of London

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Other Subjects

Bishopsgate

Bishopsgate

Originally Roman, rebuilt in 1471, again in 1735 and then demolished in 1760. See British History On-line for a drawing of the last gate). See Cripplegate for the full list of 8 gates of old London.

Building, London Wall

1 memorial
Aldersgate

Aldersgate

Sometimes used as a prison and to display the remains of gruesomely executed traitors. Taken down and rebuilt in 1617, damaged in the Great Fire of 1666 but not finally removed until 1761, to impro...

Building, London Wall

1 memorial
Moor Gate

Moor Gate

This gate was made in the London Wall early in the 15th century to allow access to Moor Fields, marshy moor-land outside the wall. By 1606 the area had been improved and became London's first publi...

Building, London Wall

1 memorial
Medieval bastion

Medieval bastion

First conserved in 1959 by the Ministry of Works when it was in the basement of the then new General Post Office.  The picture source is a report by the developers of the current building. 

Building, London Wall

1 memorial
Cripplegate

Cripplegate

Cripplegate was originally the northern entrance to the Roman fort, built c.AD120. This Roman gate probably remained in use until at least the late Saxon period when it is mentioned in 10th and 11t...

Building, London Wall

1 memorial