Biography of William Pickering 1517-1575

William de Morgan and his Wife Chapter 5. This Sir William (age 26), 'a Patron of the Arts,' however, whose fine tomb may be seen to-day in St. Helen's, Bishopsgate, had a remarkable career, to which space will not now permit us to do justice. His father was Knight-Marshal to Henry VII, and he early figured at Court, not always, according to history, in enviable fashion. For instance, in 1543, on the significant date of April I, we are told that he and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, were brought before the Council charged with the heinous offence of 'eating flesh in Lent ' and of 'walking about the streets of London at night breaking the windows of the houses with stones shot from cross-bows.' These misdeeds, which sound like the result of an inconvenient ebullition of youthful spirits, William at first denied, then confessed, and was forthwith imprisoned in the Tower. But later he acquitted himself with such credit as to erase the memory of that luckless 'All Fools' day, and after the accession of Queen Elizabeth, having amply proved his prowess both in the field and in the more subtle strife of the diplomatic world, he apparently designed to live quietly at his home, Pickering House, in the parish of St. Andrew Undershaft, London. Fate, however, was against his purpose, for we learn that, 'being a brave, wise and comely English gentleman,' he was seriously thought of as a suitor for Elizabeth's hand. The capricious Queen indeed showed him such marked preference that the ambitious courtiers with whom she was surrounded became alarmed. In 1559 we are told that 'the Earl of Arundel... was said to have sold his lands, and was ready to flee out of the kingdom because he could not abide in England if the Queen should marry Mr, Pickering, for they were enemies¹. Another chronicler with a note of venom relates that so imperious was the speech of Sir William, so overbearing his demeanour, and so lavish his expenditure on the rich dress with which he adorned his handsome person, that he thereby lent a handle to those who would fain have wrought his undoing. Nevertheless, although he excited much jealousy, he successfully avoided the pitfalls which beset his path owing to the too open admiration of the Queen, and eventually succeeded — no mean feat under the circumstances — in expiring peacefully with his comely head still intact on his shoulders and his neck unclasped by the hangman's rope. To Cecil he left his ' papers, antiquities, globes, compasses,' and his favourite horse.

Note 1. Cal. State Papers for For. Ser., 1559.