Dowgate

City (EC4) An ancient wharf, or port of the Saxons. (Reference: Jesse's London, vol. II, p. 234) The hall of the Skinners' Company is on Dowgate Hill. The company was incorporated in the year 1327, and is of great note in the annals of London. Close by Dowgate was a place called the Tower Royal, supposed to have been founded by Henry I, and inhabited, according to Stow, by King Stephen. It must have been a place of great strength, for when the rebels under Wat Tyler had made themselves masters of the Tower, and forced from thence the Archbishop of Canterbury and every other victim to their barbarity, this place remained secure. (Reference: Smith's Streets of London, p. 380)