London City

by Walter Besant

THE DRAPERS COMPANY

The association from which the Drapers Company derive their origin appears to have partaken of the nature of a social and religious as well as a commercial guild. The exact date of their foundation cannot be ascertained, but they undoubtedly existed as a brotherhood at a very early period. Madox (Hist. Exch. p. 391) mentions the Gilda Parariorum, whereof John Maur was alderman, among the adulterine guilds amerced in the 26 Henry II. (1180). The Company possess a certificate by William Camden, Clarencieux King-of-Arms, certifying the arms borne by Henry Fitz Alwin, Lord Mayor 1198-1212, and that he was a member of the Drapers Company.

The earliest charter of which the Company have any record is the Charter of Privileges of 38 Edward III.

The earliest ordinances of which the Company possess any record purport to be a revision of an earlier set made in 1322. The revised ordinances were made in 1418.

The earliest accounts in the possession of the Company are those of the wardens for the year 1415. In that year the number of members is shown to exceed 100, and quarterage was received from 83 persons, and due from 13 more.

The arms of the Company were first granted by Sir William Bruges, Garter King-of-Arms, March 10, 1439-40. This grant was confirmed with the addition of crest and supporters by William Harvey, Clarencieux, July 10, 1561, and again confirmed with a slight alteration by Sir William Segar, Garter, June 6, Jac. I. 1613.

In 1607 the Company obtained an entirely new charter (4 Jac. I., 19th January), incorporating them by their ancient style of “The Masters and Wardens and Brethren and Sisters of the Guild or Fraternity of the Blessed Mary the Virgin of the Mystery of Drapers of the City of London,” and vesting the government in the master, four wardens and assistants. Under this charter the government of the Company has been carried on down to the present day.

(1) The advantages incident to the position of a freeman of the Company consist of the eligibility to participate in the various charitable funds held by the Company in trust for their members, and to become liverymen of the Company.

(2) Liverymen of the Company, as such, have no pecuniary or other direct advantages, but they constitute the class from which the governing body is elected, and every liveryman, except in cases of special disqualification, is in his turn placed in nomination for the governing body.

(3) The master is entitled to, and is paid, certain small bequests which amount to £2 : 13 : 4 per annum.

The wardens are also entitled to certain bequests and allowances which amount on an average to £106 : 4 : 10 per annum. This sum is not paid to them, but goes towards the cost of the election dinner in August, which in ancient times was provided by the wardens.

The members of the governing body, as such, have no direct pecuniary or other advantages.

Freemen and liverymen of the Company receive no fees.

The fees paid to the master, wardens, and other members of the governing body, for their attendance at courts and committees during the last ten years, average £3225 : 12 : 6 per annum.

No pensions or donations are paid to liverymen. Liverymen who have become reduced in circumstances, and have applied for and received the return of their livery fine, are then eligible to receive charitable assistance as freemen.

Assistance by way of pension or donation is not granted to any member of the Company except on full inquiry into his circumstances, to ascertain that he is in need of assistance, and that his necessity is not occasioned by his own improvidence or misconduct.

The number of the livery of the Drapers is 300; their Corporate Income is £50,000; their Trust Income is £28,000.

The Drapers have had several places of meeting. The first is said to have been the Church of St. Mary Bethlehem outside Bishopsgate; the next, where Nos. 19 to 23 St. Swithin’s Lane now is. This was formerly the house of Sir John Hend, draper, Lord Mayor 1391 and 1404, who materially assisted towards the rebuilding of St. Swithin’s Church in 1420. In 1479 the Company’s annals have this entry respecting tithes: “Paid to the parson of St. Swithin for our place for a year VIs. VIIId.,” implying that it had now regularly passed into the Company’s hands. Herbert, in his History of the London Livery Companies, has sifted out information regarding this hall, which tells much concerning its apartments, and the brave feasts held therein on election days and other occasions. The great hall was strewed with rushes and hung mostly with tapestry, but the upper end, above the dais for the high table, with blue buckram. It must have been of large dimensions, capable of dining two to three hundred persons, and here assembled bishop and prior and parson, Lord Mayor and Mayoress, to feast with the master and wardens and brethren and sisters of the Drapers Company all seated at table in due order of rank. The sisters had a dining-room of their own, “the ladies’ chamber,” and there was a “chekker chamber” laid with mats and set apart for “maydens,” but both married and unmarried ladies usually dined in hall with the brothers of the fraternity. Besides the refectory, there was a large kitchen with its three fire-places, and there were buttery and pantry, a store-house for cloth, and “a scalding yard”; also a court-room, a “great chamber” or livery-room, and parlours hung with tapestry or painted green, and all contained beneath the shelter of leaded roofs. The Drapers continued to feast and transact their business here until 1541, when they bought the house in Throgmorton Street which had belonged to Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex.

The Earl had suffered attainder under Henry VIII. This estate formed the finest hall that any City Company had hitherto obtained. It contained, besides the buildings, a large garden at the back. This garden was still preserved until a few years ago, when the greater part of it was sold and converted into offices.

The hall, after the Fire, was rebuilt, but a hundred years afterwards, in 1774, it was greatly damaged by another fire. The present hall was altered and remodelled, with the addition of a screen, in 1866-70.

In February 1660 General Monk made Drapers’ Hall his headquarters. The Company point to many illustrious members. The Pulteneys, Earls of Bath; the Capels, Earls of Essex; the Brydges, Dukes of Chandos were descended from members of the Drapers Company.

What was said of the Mercers may be repeated of this Company. They administer their great Trust Income in the endowment of hospitals, schools, and almshouses; and they have large funds for purely charitable and philanthropic purposes. Of late the Drapers Company have taken up the cause of Technical Education; at the People’s Palace they have a Polytechnic attended by thousands of students, with classes of instruction in all the principal trades.

At the north end of Throgmorton Avenue, near London Wall, is the Carpenters’ Hall.