GOLDSMITH, William, of Bridgnorth, Salop.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1386-1421, ed. J.S. Roskell, L. Clark, C. Rawcliffe., 1993
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

Oct. 1377
Jan. 1380
Nov. 1384
Sept. 1388

Family and Education

Offices Held

Bailiff, Bridgnorth Sept. 1370-1, 1372-3, 1378-9, 1380-1, 1386-7, 1394-5, 1396-7, 1406-7.1

Biography

The Goldsmiths had resided in Bridgnorth since the beginning of the 14th century and numbered among them the bailiffs of 1327-8 and 1331-3. Henry Goldsmith, a wealthy merchant, had been bailiff four times between 1354 and 1364 and MP twice (1354 and 1362).2 William may have been a son of the Nicholas and Juliana Goldsmith who in 1343 were living in Mill Street. The Bridgnorth MP of 1381, Thomas Goldsmith, was perhaps his brother.3

In September 1370 and February 1371, during his first term as a bailiff, Goldsmith acted as a juror at inquiries held in Bridgnorth concerning, respectively, the foundation of a chapel in St. Leonard’s church and a grant to the hospital of the Holy Trinity. At a later inquiry, in June 1387, a local jury alleged that he and his then fellow bailiff, Thomas Horde*, had carried away from Dudmaston and used to their own profit 80 ewes, 20 lambs, a newly made waggon and household utensils that should have escheated to the Crown. The escheator of Shropshire claimed that, although he had demanded the goods in the King’s name, the bailiffs had refused, so being guilty of contempt.4 Goldsmith again appeared as a juror in the town in 1392. Shortly after the end of his final bailiffship, in October 1407, he attended the borough parliamentary elections.5

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: L. S. Woodger

Notes

  • 1. Add. 28731, ff. 4d-5d; CIMisc. iv. 380; E372/240 m. 39d, 242 m. 40d, 252 m. 39d; KB27/613 rex m. 6; Shrewsbury Lib. deed 8863.
  • 2. His heiress Joan held at the time of her death in 1418 the manor of Oldbury near Bridgnorth: Add. 28731, f. 4: CAD, iii. C3459; Trans. Salop Arch. Soc. xlvi. 14; Harl. 5848, f. 42d.
  • 3. CAD, vi. C6178; CPR, 1385-9, p. 576; CP25(1)195/18/2.
  • 4. C143/373/13, 376/4; CIMisc. iv. 380.
  • 5. C146/3452; C145/251/2; C219/10/4. It is unlikely that it was this William Goldsmith (but doubtless a relative) who in 1416 exchanged two selions of land in ‘Sevarnefeld’, Bridgnorth, for two others belonging to the master of the hospital of the Holy Trinity, and who, in 1420-1, enfeoffed John Wynnesbury*, Hugh Harnage* and Hugh Cresset† of lands at Oldbury: CAD, vi. C3857, 4879; Trans. Salop Arch. Soc. xlvi. 14; Bodl. Blakeway ms, 11.