CRANE, William.
Gentleman of the Chapel Royal from 1509 until his death in 1546 (LP I, 20 and II, 707; HCR &c.) He was Master of the Children of the Chapel from the death of Cornyshe in 1523 until 1545 (HCR), when he was succeeded by Richard Bower. He died the following year; his will is PCC 7 Alen. He had close contacts with the City; he was a clerk in the Bede Roll of the Fraternity of St Nicholas in 1506 (GPC), and, by direction of the King, he was made a freeman of the Mercers’ Company in 1525 (LMC). He lived at Greenwich but he also held property in the City at St Helen's Bishops gate which he left to his wife Margaret (FLI). He also owned lands at Wickham, near Plumstead, Kent, for which he paid an annual quit-rent of 13s. 4d. to the Dean and Chapter of St Paul's in 1534 (VE). His membership of the Mercers’ Company was appropriate; like others of the Chapel (e.g. John Lloyd) Crane was an active merchant; in October, 1512, together with a London merchant named Hugh Clopton, he was granted a licence to export 600 sacks of wool (LP I, /1462/7), and this was one of many similar licences. Earlier in his life Crane had been granted another tenement in the City, in Mark Lane (August, 1511), but no doubt he relinquished it by the time of his death (LP I, 857/14). See, generally, C.W. Wallace, The Evolution of the English Drama to Shakespeare (1912).
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