The History of Sir Richard Whittington | Page 6

1393, he is named as then chosen alderman of Broad Street ward; and on 21st September of the same year he was chosen by the mayor, William Staundon, one of the sheriffs for the ensuing year.[3]
When Adam Bamme died in the year 1397, during his mayoralty, Richard II. arbitrarily put Whittington in his place, and at the lord mayor's day of that year Whittington again filled the office, being then regularly elected.[4] From his will we find that this king, who was a member of the Mercers' Company, to which Whittington was apprenticed, was an especial patron of his. In 1400 he was excused from attending the Scottish wars, and in 1406 he was again elected mayor. He rebuilt his parish church, and Mr. Riley has printed in his valuable Memorials (p. 578) the grant by Whittington of land or the re-building of the church of St. Michael, Paternoster, "in the street called La Riole," called after the merchants of La Riole, a town near Bordeaux, who had established themselves there.
Whittington was knighted by Henry V., and in 1419 he was elected mayor for the fourth time. It was in this year that John Carpenter commenced the compilation of his famous Liber Albus. We see how highly this distinguished citizen was appreciated from the writings of such men as Grafton and Stow. Richard Grafton writes in his Chronicle (1569, p. 433)--
"This yere (1406) a worthie citizen of London, named Rychard Whittyngton, mercer and alderman, was elected maior of the sayde citie, and bare that office three tymes. This worshipfull man so bestowed his goodes and substaunce to the honor of God, to the reliefe of the pore, and to the benefite of the comon weale, that he hath right well deserved to be regestered in the boke of fame. First, he erected one house or church in London to be a house of prayer, and he named the same after his awne name Whittyngtons College, and so it remayneth to this day. And in the same church, besydes certeine priestes and clerkes, he placed a number of poore aged men and women and buylded for them houses and lodgyngs, and allowed unto them wood, cole, cloth, and weekly money to their great reliefe and comfort.... He also buylded for the ease of the maior of London and his brethren, and of the worshipfull citizens at the solempne dayes of their assemblye, a chapell adioining to the Guyldhall, to the entent they should euer before they entered into any of theyr affayrs first to go into the chappel, and by prayer to call upon God for assistaunce.... He also buylded a great part of the east ende of the Guildhall, besyde many other good workes that I knowe not. But among all other I will shewe unto you one very notable, which I receyved credibly by a writyng of his awne hande, which also he willed to be fixed as a schedule to his last will and testament, the contentes whereof was that he willed and commaunded his executors as they would aunswere before God at the day of the resurrection of all fleshe, that if they found any debtor of his that ought to him any money, that if he were not in their consciences well worth three tymes as much, and also out of the debt of other men, and well able to pay, that then they shoulde never demaund it, for he cleerely forgave it, and that they should put no man in sute for any debt due to him. Looke upon thys, ye aldermen, for it is a glorious glasse."
Stow writes as follows in his Survey of London on some of Whittington's good works:--
"Richard Whittington, mercer, three times mayor, in the year 1421 began the library of the grey friars in London, to the charge of four hundred pounds: his executors with his goods founded and built Whittington College, with almshouses for thirteen poor men, and divinity lectures to be read there for ever. They repaired St. Bartholomew's hospital in Smithfield; they bare half the charges of building the library there, and they built the west gate of London, of old time called Newgate," &c.[5]
"The 1st year of Henry VI. John Coventrie and John Carpenter, executors to Richard Whitington, gave towards the paving of this great hall twenty pounds, and the next year fifteen pounds more, to the said pavement, with hard stone of Purbeck; they also glazed some windows thereof, and of the mayor's court; on every which windows the arms of Richard Whitington are placed."[6]
Respecting the library at Guildhall, Stow, after relating how the Duke of Somerset, Lord Protector, borrowed the books and never returned them, writes:--"This library was built by the executors of Richard Whittington and by William Burie; the arms of Whittington are