The Bocardo Prison in Oxford, England existed until 1771. Its origins were medieval, and its most famous prisoners were the Protestant Oxford martyrs (Thomas Cranmer, Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley) in 1555.[1] Other prisoners included a number of Quakers, like Elizabeth Fletcher, among the first preachers of the Friends to come to Oxford in 1654.[2]
It was located near the church of St Michael at the North Gate; the prison consisted in fact of rooms in a watchtower by Oxford's North Gate, the tower being attributed to Robert D'Oyly, a Norman of the eleventh century,[3] though also said to be originally a Saxon construction of c. 1000–50;[4] the gate itself was called also Bocardo Gate.[5] The rooms were over the gate, and there was a box in the church for charitable contributions to the prisoners.[6]