Nicholas Mosley

Who is Nicholas Mosley?

Sir Nicholas Mosley, also spelt Mosly and Moseley, was a manufacturer of woolen cloth, lord of the manor of Manchester, and Lord Mayor of London.

Nicholas Mosley was born in or near Manchester in ca. 1527, supposedly the eldest son of Edward Moseley and his wife Margaret Moseley. With his younger brothers, Oswald, Francis, and Anthonie, he appears to have initiated what became a highly successful business as a woolen manufacturer and merchant.

By the early 1550s, Mosley had moved from Manchester to London as a step in the expansion of the business. Mosley went on to become a city of London merchant and a member of the Worshipful Company of Clothworkers.

In London Mosley married Margery Whitbroke at All Hallows, Honey Lane, in the City of London. They were to have a total of nine known children, of whom the youngest, Edward, became a highly successful barrister, was knighted by King James I in 1614; was appointed a justice of the peace and Attorney-General for the Duchy of Lancaster; was elected as an MP for Preston in 1614, 1620-2, and 1624-5; and was the Mosley who first acquired the estates at Rolleston on Dove, in Staffordshire, held by the Mosley family for 400 years from the early 1600s until the 20th Century.