Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Goodwin, William
GOODWIN, WILLIAM, D.D. (d. 1620), dean of Christ Church, was a scholar of Westminster School, whence he was elected in 1573 to Christ Church, Oxford. In 1590 he is mentioned as sub-almoner to Queen Elizabeth, and prebendary of York. He accumulated the degrees of B.D. and D.D. 1602, and on resigning his prebend in 1605 he was appointed chancellor of York, an office which he retained with many other good Yorkshire benefices until 1611, when he was promoted to the deanery of Christ Church. In 1616 he became archdeacon of Middlesex and rector of Great Allhallows, London; from the latter, however, he withdrew in 1617 on being presented to the living of Chalgrove, Oxfordshire. In 1616 he likewise received from the Lord-chancellor Egerton the living of Stanton St. John, Oxfordshire.
He was vice-chancellor of Oxford in 1614, 1615, 1617, 1618, and died 11 June 1620, in his sixty-fifth year. His remains were interred in Christ Church Cathedral, where a monument was erected to his memory.
Goodwin, in his capacity of chaplain to James I, preached before the king at Woodstock 28 Aug. 1614. This sermon was published at Oxford. He is also mentioned as having delivered sermons in memory of Prince Henry, 1612; of Sir Thomas Bodley, 1613; and of Anne, wife of James I, 1618, at the chapel of St. Mary's, Oxford. Thomas Goffe [q. v.] preached his funeral sermon in Latin, published at Oxford in 1620.
[Welch's Alumni Westmon. pp. 17, 50; Wood's Fasti, i. 296-8; Wood's Hist. and Antiq. ii. 312, 314, 332, iii. 439, 496, and Appendix, pp. 120-1; Willis's Cath. Surv. i. 80, 120, ii. 240; Newcourt's Rep. i. 82, 249; Le Neve's Fasti, ii. 331, iii. 165, 175, 477, 569.]