William Dalderby

William Dalderby was one of the most influential citizens of 14th century Lincoln. His father was one of the city’s leading wool merchants, who invested the profits of trade in property and thus became a prominent rentier as well. William was still a child when his father drew up his will in January 1363, but the latter none the less made handsome provision for the boy, leaving him four tenements, a solar, a garden and farmland in Lincoln, together with the reversion of all the other estates which had been settled upon his elder brother, Roger, should he die without issue.

William was of age and in possession of all his late father’s property and goods by April 1377, when a royal pardon was accorded to him as ‘son and heir of Robert Dalderby of Lincoln’. Soon, he began to prosper through the wool trade and was one of the large group of merchants who advanced the government a loan of £10,000 in September 1377, and who, by way of repayment, were allowed to export wool to Calais free of custom.

William had rich civic career and was mayor of Lincoln in 1382 and 1384, mayor of the Boston Staple in 1389, and a Member of Parliament in 1383 and in 1404.