Marshalsea

Marshalsea, the jail attached to the Marshalsea Court, originally established under the earl-marshal of England for the trial of servants of the royal household. Later on it came to be used as a prison for debtors and defaulters, as well as persons convicted of piracy or other offences on the high seas. It stood near the church of St George, Southwark, and existed in the reign of Edward III. It was abolished as the Palace Court in 1849. Bishop Bonner was confined here for nearly ten years, till his death in 1569, and George Wither in 1613; he obtained his release by his Satyre to the King's most excellent Majesty. But the Marshalsea will be longest remembered as the home of Dickens's Little Dorrit.