According to secondary source material Lawrence Sheriff or Sheriffe was born either in Rugby or Brownsover c1515/1516. Not much is known about his childhood, it is likely he was educated by the Monks of Pipewell Grange. At the time they lived on the Close, which in 1750 would become the home of Rugby School and the place where rugby football was invented. 

As an adult Sheriff became a grocer and spice merchant. He was apprenticed to William Walcott till 1541. In 1544 he was elected to the London Company The Worshipful Company of Grocers. His membership of this company was later represented on the wall of the Rugby School Chapel ante-chapel with an engraving of a camel. 

Sheriff became grocer to the Princess Elizabeth (later Elizabeth I) during the reign of Edward VI. Elizabeth's Household Accounts from 1551-1552 record the purchase of spices from Sheriff. As a protestant he remained loyal to the princess during even during her exile. Sheriff appears in Foxe's Book of Marters due to an altercation which took place in 1554 when he defended his “Royal Mistress” after Farrer spoke ill of her in the Ross Tavern in Holborn Hill. His loyalty was rewarded when Princess Elizabeth was crowned Elizabeth I. The Queen awarded him a coat of arms and allowed the inclusion of the Lancaster Rose a symbol used by herself. This coat of arms would be used by Rugby School until it was granted its own crest in 1932. The crest used since 1932 incorporates Sheriff's official coat of arms with a few additions. 

In the 1560s he became very wealthy as a grocer and spent his time between Rugby and London. He was elected warden of the Company of Grocers in 1566. However, he fell ill and in the early part of 1567 he wrote his will and intent. The intent specified that Lawrence Sheriff wished for a free grammar school to be opened in Rugby for the children of the town. Later in 1567 he reduced the amount of money left to build the School but left a parcel of land in Middlesex to help the ongoing funding of the School. This parcel of land would later become the London Estate. Lawrence Sheriff also left money to found some almshouses. Both the school and the almshouses were originally on Church Street Rugby. The School moved to the Close in 1750 and the almshouses to the gyratory in the twentieth century. 

Sheriff died in 1567/68, his will was proved in October 1568. He had asked to be buried at St Andrew's but was laid to rest at Christ Church, Greyfriars. His burial site was destroyed by the Great Fire of London in 1666. By this time the School he had founded was starting to grow in fame and just under 100 years later would start to develop into a fee-paying school. In 1878 Lawrence Sheriff School was founded to further honour his wishes for education in the town of Rugby. 

Today Sheriff is remembered with a Blue Plaque on the wall of School House, stained glass windows in the Temple Speech Room and Museum in the symbols on the outside wall of the ante-chapel and Sheriff House is named after him. To find out more about Lawrence Sheriff we recommend reading the following:

• History of Rugby School by W H D Rouse Chapter I The Founder
• The Book of Rugby School edited by E M Goulburn Chapter I The Founder
• Rugby School By G H Bettinson Lawrence Sheriffe pp7-15
• Ideal Portraiture of Lawrence Sheriff, The Meteor June 1876 Filename.ashx (rugbyschoolarchives.co.uk)
• Lawrence Sheriff, The Meteor July 1876 Filename.ashx (rugbyschoolarchives.co.uk)
• Lawrence Sheriffe and Rugby School, The Meteor November 1876  RUGMET1876_Iss_105.pdf (rugbyschoolarchives.co.uk)