William Hewett (Lord Mayor)

Sir William Hewett (also Huett, Hewet, etc.) (?c.1505-1567) was a prominent merchant of Tudor London, a founding member and later Master of the Worshipful Company of Clothworkers of London as incorporated in 1528, and the first of that Company to be Lord Mayor of London, which he became in the first year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. His career arched across the first four decades of the Company's history, and drew him inexorably, if sometimes reluctantly, into the great public affairs of the age.

William, and his brother Thomas Hewett (died 1576), were born in the hamlet of Wales, in Laughton-en-le-Morthen, South Yorkshire, the sons of Edmund Hewett. The family was strongly associated with the neighbouring parish of Killamarsh (Derbyshire), in the Rother Valley. Edmund was apparently one of several brothers: various Hewett cousins, notably the sons of Francis Hewett (died 1560), followed in the Clothworkers' Company of London. There was a near family relationship to the judge Sir Francis Rodes (son of John Rodes of Staveley and Attelina Hewett), who built Barlborough Hall, the lost Hickleton Palace and a hall at Great Haughton.

William got off to a flying start as one of the new men of the Guild or Fraternity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Clothworkers in the City of London, a livery company Incorporated by Charter of King Henry VIII in 1528 by the amalgamation of the two earlier Guilds or Mysteries of the Fullers and the Shearmen. Unless free by patrimony, his own apprenticeship was served in one of the parent Guilds. He took an apprentice of his own as early as 1529-30, and was Junior Warden in the Mastership of John Permeter, 1531-32. He served thereafter with the Company's Court of Assistants, sometimes auditing the accounts and performing other responsible duties. He obtained a substantial Company loan for his brother (also a citizen Clothworker, who assisted in his business) in February 1537/8, binding himself as security. He appears in litigation with the Merchant Taylor John Yorke.

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