The real Richard Whittington really did go to London to make his fortune, after his father died. He was apprenticed to a mercer, and went on to become a very wealthy one himself – counting King Richard II among his customers. He was also Lord Mayor of London – and not three times, but four.
He married Alice, daughter of Sir Ivo FitzWarin (or Fitzwarren) in 1402, when he was 48 years old. Sir Ivo came either from of Wantage in Berkshire (now Oxfordshire), or from Dorset – depending on who you believe. The History Jar names him as the mercer to whom Richard Whittington had been apprenticed; other sources are more circumspect.
Alice died in 1411, and Richard in 1423. They had no children.
© Haydn Thompson 2017