The legend that William Sevenoak was abandoned in the streets of Sevenoaks as an infant and rose from extreme poverty to become one of London’s leading citizens appears to have grown up during the Elizabethan period. It even won him a place in Johnson’s Nine Worthies of London, where the poet dwells upon his subject’s triumph over misfortune: Behold en ebbe that never thought to flowe, Behold a fall unlikelie to recover Behold a shrub, a weed that grew full lowe, Behold a wren that never thought to hover.
In common with many grocers, Sevenoak had diverse commercial interests. Between January 1401 and September 1416, for example, he shipped occasional consignments of cloth into the port of London, besides obtaining royal licences for the export of wool to Calais. The customs accounts are too fragmentary to give much idea of the scale of his operations, but he does not seem to have invested as heavily as many of his contemporaries. Even so, in May 1402 he obtained a royal licence to send 160 quarters of salt from London to the Low Countries. He was importing wine from France in the following year, but this cargo fell into the hands of pirates, as did another ship carrying salt which he had bought in Devon for sale in the City. In February 1405 Sevenoak was himself held partly responsible for an act of piracy against a Prussian ship whose master complained that he had been attacked by a number of English vessels including two fitted out by the MP at his own expense. The latter was obliged to offer suitable compensation, but did eventually gain permission to recover his losses from the sailors themselves. Three years later, as part of a measure to counteract the rising price of grain in the City, Sevenoak was empowered to buy 1,000 quarters of wheat in the north of England and ship it south for sale in London.
From 1400 onwards, if not before, Sevenoak was a churchwarden of St. Dunstan’s in the East, to which he left ten marks a year from his property in the parish. We know that he owned a wharf, shops and a number of tenements in this area, but as with his many holdings in other parts of London these cannot easily be distinguished from the premises which he held to the use of friends and associates. Already in 1412 he could rely upon an annual income of nearly £20 as a rentier in the City, and there can be little doubt that by the time of his death his revenues had risen substantially. He had, moreover, other possessions outside London: it was probably from his father that he inherited the cottages in Sevenoaks which he bequeathed as almshouses for the deserving poor. In 1403 he and his heirs were confirmed in possession of a messuage and land in Upchurch, Kent, although he seems to have disposed of this before he died.
By the time of his retirement from public life in about 1426, Sevenoak had not only served as bridge warden, alderman, sheriff and mayor of London, but had also sat on a number of important commissions. The post of bridge warden, which he held from 1404 to 1406, was no sinecure, and during his period in office he acquired a considerable reputation as an authority on the repair and construction of bridges. When, in September 1422, the wardens of Rochester bridge were concerned with problems of maintenance they came to London to interview him, and subsequently invited him to Rochester for further consultations. His advice must have been sound, for in 1430 they spent 3s.6d. on half a boar, intended as a gift to keep his good favour. Sevenoak attended at least eight of the parliamentary elections held in London between 1407 and 1423. He also arbitrated in a number of disputes occurring between his fellow citizens, and was on hand to give specialist advice as an auditor. Further evidence of his social position may be found in the award of a papal indult, in 1412, permitting him to make use of a portable altar.