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Bridewell
City. (EC4) Name derived from a famous well which flowed in the vicinity of St. Bride's Church. The ancient Palace of Bridewell extended nearly from Fleet Street to the Thames at Blackfriars. The palace was much neglected until, upon the site of the old Tower of Mountifiquit, Henry VIII built "a stately and beautiful house thereupon, giving it to name Bridewell, of the parish and well there" (Stow) . Subsequently the King, taking a dislike to the palace, let it fall to decay. The "wide, large, empty house" was next presented to the City of London by King Edward VI, after a sermon by Bishop Ridley, who begged it of the King as a workhouse for the poor and a house of correction; the gift was made for "sturdy rogues" and as "the fittest hospital for those cripples whose legs are lame through their own laziness," This being the first prison of its kind, all other houses of correction, upon the same plan, were called Bridewells. The prison of Bridewell was taken down in 1863. (Reference: Timbs's Curiosities of London, pp. 62-3)
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