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 hinted whether he was actually what is called a ‘man of parts.’ The personal sketches of him in the ‘Memoirs of the Duchess Sophia’ and in the ‘Verney Papers’ are not respectful in tone; but his personal valour is as indisputable as his self-sacrificing magnanimity. He died unmarried on 9 April 1697, and was buried at Pinley, near Coventry, with his descendants, in the vault of the church. His earldom became extinct: his barony and estates descended to a collateral line. There are numerous portraits of him in the splendid collection at Combe Abbey, among them one by Honthorst, another by H. Stone, and a third by Princess Louisa, one of the queen of Bohemia's daughters. In most of these the ‘little Lord Craven,’ at whom the courtiers affected to laugh, appears in armour, and well becomes his martial accoutrements.

[Collins's Peerage of England, 2nd edit. 1741, iv. 185–91; Doyle's Official Baronage of England, i. 484–5; Miss Benger's Memoirs of Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia, 2 vols. London, 1825; Mrs. Everett Green's Lives of the Princesses of England, 2 vols. London, 1854; Memoiren der Herzogin Sophie nachmals Kurfürstin von Hannover, ed. A. Köcher, Leipzig, 1879; Whitelocke's Memorials, ed. 1853, vol. iv.; Verney Papers, ed. J. Bruce for the Camden Society, 1853; Thurloe's State Papers, ed. Thomas Birch, 1842, vols. i. and ii. The Craven MSS. remain unpublished as a whole, and do not appear as yet to have been inspected by the Historical MSS. Commission.] 

CRAVEN, WILLIAM (1548?–1618), lord mayor of London, second son of William Craven and Beatrix, daughter of John Hunter, and grandson of John Craven, was born at Appletreewick, a village in the parish of Burnsall, near Skipton in the West Riding of Yorkshire, about 1548. The date is made probable by the fact that he took up his freedom in 1569. At the age of thirteen or fourteen he was sent up to London by the common carrier (, History of Craven, edit. 1812, p. 437) and bound apprentice to Robert Hulson, citizen and merchant taylor, who, as we gather from Craven's will, lived in the parish of St. John the Evangelist in Watling Street. Having been admitted to the freedom of the Merchant Taylors' Company on 4 Nov. 1569, Craven appears to have entered into business with Hulson, and subsequently to have quarrelled with him. On 9 Nov. 1583 they submitted their differences ‘from the beginning of the world to this day’ to the arbitration of the master and wardens of the company. The quarrel turned upon a ‘shop late in the occupation of William Craven.’ The judgment of the master and wardens, given on 26 Nov. 1582, was that he should pay 10l. to Craven and ‘have unto himself the said shoppe to use at his pleasure’ (MS. Records of Merchant Taylors' Company). In 1588 Craven took a lease from the Mercers' Company of a ‘great mansion house’ in Watling Street in the parish of St. Antholin, where he carried on business with Robert and John Parker until his death. He was elected warden of his company on 4 July 1593, the year that the plague was ‘hot in the city’ (, Annals), and on 19 July 1594, having ‘borne and behaved himself commendably in the said place,’ he was made one of the court of assistants. The minute books of the company show of what his commendable bearing consisted; thus on 15 May 1593 he gave 20l. ‘to the relief of the widows of the almsmen of the company,’ and on 15 May 1594 the master reported that ‘Mr. Craven, instead of only giving 20l., would take upon himself the support of one woman at 16d. a week.’ Two years later he made a donation of 50l. towards the building of the library of St. John's College, Oxford, with which college the company was, by its school, closely connected; this donation is recorded on one of the windows of the library. On 2 April 1600 he was elected alderman for Bishopsgate ward, in which capacity he took part in the government of the city (Calendar of State Papers, xcviii. 469–70), and on 14 Feb. 1601 he was chosen sheriff of London. Towards the expenses of the shrievalty the Merchant Taylors' Company, as appears from its records, on 12 March 1600 voted him the sum of 30l. out of the ‘common box,’ and ordered its plate to be lent to ‘him during his year of office.’

In 1602 he founded the grammar school in his native parish of Burnsall, Yorkshire (, Rambles in Upper Wharfedale), and on 15 May of the same year became alderman of Cordwainer (vice Bishopsgate) ward. He was knighted at Whitehall by James I on 26 July 1603 (, Progresses of James I, i. 234). In 1604 he was one of the patrons of ‘the scheme of a new college after the manner of a university designed at Ripon, Yorkshire’ (, Desiderata, vii. 290). It was probably about 1605 he married Elizabeth, daughter of William Whitmore, alderman of London. In 1607, the Merchant Taylors' Company being minded to entertain James I and Prince Henry, Craven was de-