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Sir Thomas White, Lord Mayor of London 1553 Sir Thomas White, Merchant Taylor, was involved in the foundation of the school as well as St John’s College, Oxford. Members of the Upper Thirds will be interested to know that he was knighted by Queen Mary in 1553 and had served on the commission that decided the fate of Lady Jane Grey. Another Merchant Taylor, Henry Machyn, was a leading diarist of the times (sadly overshadowed by the likes of John Evelyn and Samuel Pepys but no less valuable) and he wrote a vivid description of the installation of Sir Thomas White as Lord Mayor. “The same day the new lord mayor went toward Westminster, attended by all the crafts of London in their best livery, and … with trumpets blowing and the waits playing … a goodly pinnace trimmed with banners and guns … waiting of my lord mayor’s barge unto Westminster. And all the crafts’ barges with streamers and banners of every craft. And so

Concordia Winter 2022

Below: Building in Cloak Lane, City of London, referencing the dispute between the Merchant Taylors’ and the Skinners’.

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to the exchequer and so homeward. My lord mayor landed at Baynard Castle. And in St. Paul’s churchyard did every craft were set in array. First were two tallmen bearing two great streamers of the merchant tailors’ arms. Then came one with a drum and a flute playing and another with a great fife—all they in blue silk. And then came two great woodmen armed with two great clubs, all in green and with squibs burning, with great beards and side hair and two targets upon their back. And then came sixteen trumpeters blowing. And then came in blue gowns and capes and hose and blue silk sleeves and every man having a target and a javelin to the number of seventy. And then came a devil and after came the bachelors, all in livery and scarlet hoods. And then came the pageant of St. John the Baptist, gorgeously with goodly speeches. And then came all the King’s trumpeters blowing and every trumpeter

having scarlet capes and the waits capes and goodly banners. And then the crafts. And then the waits playing. And then my lord mayor’s officer and then my lord mayor and two goodly henchmen and then all the aldermen and the sheriffs. And so to dinner. And after dinner to Paul’s. And all them that bore targets did bear after staff torches, with all the trumpets and waits blowing through Paul’s, through round about the choir and the body of the church, blowing. And so home to my lord mayor’s house.” Credit should go to Sir Thomas White as he was able to negotiate the delicate religious politics of the time, with Elizabeth I not penalising his loyalty to her Catholic sister. This must surely reflect White’s philanthropy – he set up a multitude of schools and colleges – and his popularity with the citizens of London.