William of Wrotham or William de Wrotham (died ) was a medieval English royal administrator and clergyman. Although a late 13th-century source says that William held a royal office under King Henry II of England (reigned 1154–1189), the first contemporary reference to William is in 1197, when he became responsible for, among other things, the royal tin mines. He also held ecclesiastical office, eventually becoming Archdeacon of Taunton, and served King John of England as an administrator of ecclesiastical lands and a collector of taxes.
William's main administrative work was naval. He was in charge of the royal fleet in the south of England in 1205, and was one of those responsible for the development of Portsmouth as a naval dockyard. He continued to be involved in naval matters until 1214 or later, but by 1215 he had joined the First Barons' War against John. After John's death in 1216, William returned to the royalist cause. He probably died in late 1217. Known to a contemporary chronicler as one of John's "evil advisers", William is said by modern historians to have had a "special responsibility for ports, customs, and the navy", and was "keeper of ports", a forerunner of the office of First Lord of the Admiralty.
Early life
Little is known of William's background or family, except that his father Godwin held land in Shipbourne, near Wrotham in Kent, perhaps as a vassal of the Archbishops of Canterbury. William's brother Richard was named as William's deputy in 1207.
According to late 13th-century documents, the Hundred Rolls, King Henry II gave William the office of steward of Exmoor, and lands at North Petherton, Somerset. William was the prebend of St Decumans in the cathedral chapter of Bath Cathedral by 9 May 1204. He claimed to have held the office since 1194 during a later dispute with Savaric fitzGeldewin, the Bishop of Bath and another canon of the cathedral, Roger Porretanus, who claimed the prebend. By 23 December 1205, William had secured a papal judgement against Roger.
William may have owed his advancement in royal service to Geoffrey fitzPeter, a royal judge. In 1197 he granted William a manor at Sutton-at-Hone, Kent, which later was supposed to become a hospital, but instead eventually became a preceptory for the Knights Hospitaller. From 1197 William was responsible for the collection of revenues from Geoffrey's lands at Lydford, Devon, and held the office of chief forester of Somerset; it is unclear to whom he owed that position.
Royal service
In 1197, Hubert Walter, who was Archbishop of Canterbury and Justiciar, appointed William to the administration of the royal stannaries, or tin mines, and in 1198 William was placed in charge of tin production, an office later known as the Lord Warden of the Stannaries. Under his control the mines became much more lucrative for the king, and accounted for a total of £1100 in William's first year of administration. As part of his administrative work he became the first warden of Lydford Castle after it was constructed in the 1190s. In 1199 he was involved in a dispute over the stannaries with another official, Hugh Bardulf, temporarily losing control of them – along with his office as sheriff – in 1200. The reason for the loss of these offices is uncertain. After restoration to office, he remained as Lord Warden of the Stannaries until 1215.
In 1198 and 1199, William was Sheriff of Devon and Sheriff of Cornwall, along with another royal servant, and served as a royal justice. In 1200 he was recorded as a receiver of the carucage, a tax on land, in the Pipe roll; whether this meant that he was a local or a national collector of the tax is unclear. By 12 September 1204, William was Archdeacon of Taunton in the Diocese of Bath, and he witnessed the election of Jocelin of Wells as the new bishop of the diocese. He was jointly placed in charge of the mints of London and Canterbury in 1205, along with Reginald de Cornhill, with whom he also shared the collection of the tax of a fifteenth on merchants, a post the two had held since 1202. In May 1205 William, along with de Cornhill, was given custody of one of three dies for the mint at Chichester; in July the king gave William's custody to Simon of Wells, the Bishop of Chichester. William was one of the officials in charge of the collection of a tax of a thirteenth in 1207.