Built as a square tower and originally known as Browne's Castle, the site became a tavern and was in use as a prison from at least the 17th century.

[4] In the 17th century the senior Aldermen of the city and other members of the Dublin Corporation were given power to run the prisons.

These functionaries were accustomed to commit the entire management of this department of their offices to clerks, who paid their employers a percentage on all fees received.

The House of Commons of Ireland decided that "John Hawkins, Keeper of His Majesty's gaol of Newgate, and Sheriff's Marshalsea of the city of Dublin, had been guilty of the most notorious extortion, great corruption, and other high crimes and misdemeanors, in the execution of his said offices; had arbitrarily and unlawfully kept in prison, and loaded with irons, persons not duly committed by any magistrate, till they had complied with the most exorbitant demands; and had put into dungeons and endangered the lives of many prisoners for debt under his care, treating them, and all others in his custody, with the utmost insolence, cruelty, and barbarity, in high violation and contempt of the laws of this kingdom."

His spirit haunted the jail and caused several gruesome deaths in the vicinity in the guise of a demon or wild beast.