Get Aldgate Pro’s

Aldgate is a district inside the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and partly the City of London. It was the eastern-most gateway by way of the London Wall leading from the City of London to Whitechapel and also the East End of London. It gave its name to a City ward bounded by White Kennet Street within the north and Crutched Friars in the south. The district’s name was 1st recorded in 1052 as ‘East gate’, but became Alegate by 1108. In the sixteenth century, John Stow derived the name from ‘Old Gate’. But Henry Harben, writing in 1918, said that this was incorrect and that documents show another variation written prior to 1486-7. Other meanings include ‘Ale Gate’, in association with an ale-house or ‘All Gate’, which means the gate was free to everybody. It is thought that a gate at Aldgate spanned the road to Colchester during the Roman period, when London Wall was constructed. The gateway stood in the corner of the modern Duke’s palace on the east side of the city. It was rebuilt in between 1108 and 1147, and again in 1215. It was reconstructed entirely between 1607 and 1609 in a more classical style. Like the other London gates, Aldgate was chained in 1377 as a consequence of concerns about attacks from the French. The gate was finally removed in 1761 and temporarily re-erected in Bethnal Green.