Bridewell

a celebrated London prison or house of detention. The name has come down from an old "miraculous" well of St. Bride or St. Bridget. This well was in the vicinity of the monastery of the Black Friars. A royal residence was here in the reign of Henry III. Henry VIII rebuilt the palace for Catherine. It was a "castellated building of some pretension." The scene of Shakespeare's Henry VIII is laid in this palace. Wolsey spoke his "long farewell" to all his greatness in the king's antechamber. In 1553 Edward VI gave the palace of Bridewell to the city of London for a workhouse. Later it was used as a temporary prison or place of detention. The system of requiring prisoners to work out a short sentence was established here. The building was torn down in 1864. The bridewell is now a common term for a workhouse or house of detention.