WALTER, William

It is possible that this MP was related to William Walters†, the wealthy cloth merchant who had represented Salisbury in the Parliament of 1399 and subsequently served as mayor. He was long remembered as a benefactor of the city.1 The Commons 1386-1421, iv. 760. Walters bequeathed to the mayor and commonalty a capital messuage called ‘Pettes Corner’ in Winchester Street and another messuage in the market, together worth £5 p.a.: CIMisc. viii. 380; Wilts. Arch. Mag. xxxvii. 76. Walters did not mention any children in his will of 21 May 1417, and would appear to have left no surviving issue. Yet he did provide for the education of ‘William, my kinsman’ (no surname given) by stipulating that John Marcell, one of his executors, might have a tenement and two newly-built ‘mansions’ of his, in return for the payment of £50, from which instalments of four marks a year were to provide for William’s schooling. The boy was to be educated for a career in the Church if he wished, and if he behaved well under Marcell’s governance he was to have a further four marks a year for himself.2 Wilts. Hist. Centre, Salisbury city recs., Domesday bk. 2, G23/1/214, f. 32.

Yet even if this William was the future representative for Old Sarum, no firm details about his career have been discovered. Nor is there any evidence to identify him with the pouch-maker of London who before May 1444 married Joan, widow of John Wakefield, thereby acquiring for life property in London including an inn known as The Belle, and shops and other buildings in Lombard Street.3 CCR, 1441-7, p. 38; 1447-54, pp. 70, 173-4. That William Walter was still living in 1473.4 C241/254/179; CCR, 1468-76, no. 1112. Nor does he seem to have been William Walter, a yeoman of Chesham, Bucks. who was wrongfully arrested in London at the suit of John Wroughton* of Broad Hinton, Wilts.: C1/46/431.