Old and New London, Volume I / A Narrative of Its History, Its People, and Its Places

by Walter Thornbury

Henry III., indeed, seems to have been chronically troubled by the London mayors, for in 1264, on the mayor and aldermen doing fealty to the king in St. Paul's, the mayor, with blunt honesty, dared to say to the weak monarch, "My lord, so long as you unto us will be a good lord and king, we will be faithful and duteous unto you."

These were bold words in a reign when the heading block was always kept ready near a throne. In 1265, the same monarch seized and imprisoned the mayor and chief aldermen for fortifying the City in favour of the barons, and for four years the tyrannical king appointed custodes. The City again recovered its liberties and retained them till 1285 (Edward I.), when Sir Gregory Rokesley refusing to go out of the City to appear before the king's justices at the Tower, the mayoralty was again suspended and custodes appointed till the year 1298, when Henry Wallein was elected mayor. Edward II. also held a tight hand on the mayoralty till he appointed the great goldsmith, Sir Nicholas Farindon, mayor "as long as it pleased him." Farindon gave the title to Farringdon Ward, which had been in his family eighty-two years, the consideration being twenty marks as a fine, and one clove or a slip of gillyflower at the feast of Easter. He was a warden of the Goldsmiths, and was buried at St. Peter-le-Chepe, a church that before the Great Fire stood where the plane-tree now waves at the corner of Wood Street. He left money for a light to burn before our Lady the Virgin in St. Peter-le-Chepe for ever.

The mayoralty of Andrew Aubrey, Grocer (1339), was rather warlike; for the mayor and two of his officers being assaulted in a tumult, two of the ringleaders were beheaded at once in Chepe. In 1356, Henry Picard, mayor of London, was an honoured man, for he had the glory of feasting Edward III. of England, the Black Prince, John King of Austria, the King of Cyprus, and David of Scotland, and afterwards opened his hall to all comers at cards and dice, his wife inviting the court ladies.

Sir William Walworth, a fishmonger, who was mayor in 1374 (Edward III.) and 1380 (Richard II.), was that prompt and choleric man who somewhat basely slew the Kentish rebel, Wat Tyler, when he was invited to a parley by the young king. It was long supposed that the dagger in the City arms was added in commemoration of this foul blow, but Stow has clearly shown that it was intended to represent the sword of St. Paul, the patron saint of the Corporation of London. The manor of Walworth belonged to the family of this mayor, who was buried in the Church of St. Michael, Crooked Lane, the parish where he had resided. Some antiquaries, says Mr. Timbs, think the prefix of "Lord" is traceable to 1378 (1st Richard II.), when there was a general assessment for a war subsidy. The question was where was the mayor to come. "Have him among the earls," was the suggestion; so the right worshipful had to pay £4, about £100 of our present money.

And now we come to a mayor greater even in City story and legend than even Walworth himself, even the renowned Richard Whittington, the hero of our nursery days. He was the son of a Gloucestershire knight, who had fallen into poverty. The industrious son, born in 1350 (Edward III.), on coming to London, was apprenticed to Hugh Fitzwarren, a mercer. Disgusted with the drudgery, he ran away; but while resting by a stone cross at the foot of Highgate Hill, he is said to have heard in the sound of Bow Bells the voice of his good angel, "Turn again, Whittington, thrice Lord Mayor of London." What a charm there is still in the old story! As for the cat that made his fortune by catching all the mice in Barbary, we fear we must throw him overboard, even though Stow tells a true story of a man and a cat that greatly resembles that told of Whittington. Whittington married his master's daughter, and became a wealthy merchant. He supplied the wedding trousseau of the Princess Blanche, eldest daughter of Henry IV., when she married the son of the King of the Romans, and also the pearls and cloth of gold for the marriage of the Princess Philippa. He became the court banker, and lent large sums of money to our lavish monarchs, especially to the chivalrous Henry V. for carrying on the siege of Harfleur, a siege celebrated by Shakespeare. It is said that in his last mayoralty King Henry V. and Queen Catherine dined with him in the City, when Whittington caused a fire to be lighted of precious woods, mixed with cinnamon and other spices; and then taking all the bonds given him by the king for money lent, amounting to no less than £60,000, he threw them into the fire and burnt them, thereby freeing his sovereign from his debts. The king, astonished at such a proceeding, exclaimed, "Surely, never had king such a subject;" to which Whittington, with court gallantry, replied, "Surely, sire, never had subject such a king."

Whittington was really four times mayor—twice in Richard II.'s reign, once in that of Henry IV., and once in that of Henry V. As a mayor Whittington was popular, and his justice and patriotism became proverbial. He vigorously opposed the admission of foreigners into the freedom of the City, and he fined the Brewers' Company £20 for selling bad ale and forestalling the market. His generosity was like a well-spring; and being childless, he spent his life in deeds of charity and generosity. He erected conduits at Cripplegate and Billingsgate; he founded a library at the Grey Friars' Monastery in Newgate Street (now Christ's Hospital); he procured the completion of the "Liber Albus," a book of City customs; and he gave largely towards the Guildhall library. He paved the Guildhall, restored the hospital of St. Bartholomew, and by his will left money to rebuild Newgate, and erect almshouses on College Hill (now removed to Highgate). He died in 1427 (Henry VI.). Nor should we forget that Whittington was also a great architect, and enlarged the nave of Westminster Abbey for his knightly master, Henry V. This large-minded and munificent man resided in a grand mansion in Hart Street, up a gateway a few doors from Mark Lane. A very curious old house in Sweedon's Passage, Grub Street, with an external winding staircase, used to be pointed out as Whittington's; and the splendid old mansion in Hart Street, Crutched Friars, pulled down in 1861, and replaced by offices and warehouses, was said to have cats'-heads for knockers, and cats'-heads (whose eyes seemed always turned on you) carved in the ceilings. The doorways, and the brackets of the long lines of projecting Tudor windows, were beautifully carved with grotesque figures.

In 1418 (Henry V.) Sir William de Sevenoke was mayor. This rich merchant had risen to the top of the tree by cleverness and diligence equal to that of Whittington, but we hear less of his charity. He was a foundling, brought up by charitable persons, and apprenticed to a grocer. He was knighted by Henry VI., and represented the City in Parliament. Dying in 1432, he was buried at St. Martin's, Ludgate.

In 1426 (Henry VI.) Sir John Rainewell, mayor, with a praiseworthy disgust at all dishonesty in trade, detecting Lombard merchants adulterating their wines, ordered 150 butts to be stove in and swilled down the kennels. How he might wash down London now with cheap sherry!

In 1445 (Henry VI.), Sir Simon Eyre. This very worthy mayor left 3,000 marks to the Company of Drapers, for prayers to be read to the market people by a priest in the chapel at Guildhall.

It is related that when it was proposed to Eyre at Guildhall that he should stand for sheriff, he would fain have excused himself, as he did not think his income was sufficient; but he was soon silenced by one of the aldermen observing "that no citizen could be more capable than the man who had openly asserted that he broke his fast every day on a table for which he would not take a thousand pounds." This assertion excited the curiosity of the then Lord Mayor and all present, in consequence of which his lordship and two of the aldermen, having invited themselves, accompanied him home to dinner. On their arrival Mr. Eyre desired his wife to "prepare the little table, and set some refreshment before the guests." This she would fain have refused, but finding he would take no excuse, she seated herself on a low stool, and, spreading a damask napkin over her lap, with a venison pasty thereon, Simon exclaimed to the astonished mayor and his brethren, "Behold the table which I would not take a thousand pounds for!" Soon after this Sir Simon was chosen Lord Mayor, on which occasion, remembering his former promise "at the conduit," he, on the following Shrove Tuesday, gave a pancake feast to all the 'prentices in London; on which occasion they went in procession to the Mansion House, where they met with a cordial reception from Sir Simon and his lady, who did the honours of the table on this memorable day, allowing their guests to want for neither ale nor wine.