Author Topic: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire  (Read 12336 times)

Offline jsm25

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Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« on: Thursday 15 March 12 13:45 GMT (UK) »
I am trying to identify a coat of arms which belong to the Bell family. We know a Henry Bell (1731 – 1816) who lived at Portington Hall, Nr Eastrington, East Yorkshire used the arms on his house and other members  of the family have it on their headstones.

Does anyone know how to write a formal description for the arms, and how you go about making a correct identification?

Is it possible to find out about the history of the family from the coat of arms?


John

Offline GrahamSimons

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #1 on: Thursday 15 March 12 14:14 GMT (UK) »
This doesn't show in my 1902 edition of Armorial Families.

There are a number of lines of enquiry:

The grant of Arms is to a person, not a family, and is passed down the male line by primogeniture. In England and Wales this is controlled by the College of Arms, who will search for you - at a price! http://college-of-arms.gov.uk/  My experiencehere was that we have alleged family crested items - no Grant was ever issued and my g-g-g-grandfather seems to have suddenly invented the device with no authority. It's possible to get Arms granted for yourself, again at a price....

You can get hold of copies of Burke's Peerage, Burke's Knightage and Baronetage, and Burke's Landed Gentry in a major library, or online for old editions, and follow up that way. Burke, as I understand it, was given the genealogies by the families themselves and there was no formal checking, and I have found some quite entertaining fiction in at least one Burke genealogy.

Might be worth trying (I have no local knowledge, and I don't know whether you can visit) the local library which could have a Local Studies section with informantion. A family which used a coat of arms would have had influence locally and left documentary traces. Try also the County Record Office on the same lines.

They might have been connected with one or more Manors - you can trace where those documents are via the Manorial Documents Register at http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/mdr/
Simons Barrett Jaffray Waugh Langdale Heugh Meade Garnsey Evans Vazie Mountcure Glascodine Parish Peard Smart Dobbie Sinclair....
in Stirlingshire, Roxburghshire; Bucks; Devon; Somerset; Northumberland; Carmarthenshire; Glamorgan

Offline behindthefrogs

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #2 on: Thursday 15 March 12 15:00 GMT (UK) »
There are a number of coats of arms belonging to Bell families that use a hawk as their crest but interestingly I have only found one, the Berks and Bucks family where the wings are extended.  In all cases they have bells on their ankles.  I can't quite see from your picture whether this is true in your case.

Can you let us know what the motto under the shield says as again that is not very clear?  I will have go at producing the blazon (proper description) for the shield when I have a little more time if no-one does it in the mean time.
Living in Berkshire from Northampton & Milton Keynes
DETAILS OF MY NAMES ARE IN SURNAME INTERESTS, LINK AT FOOT OF PAGE
Wilson, Higgs, Buswell, PARCELL, Matthews, TAMKIN, Seckington, Pates, Coupland, Webb, Arthur, MAYNARD, Caves, Norman, Winch, Culverhouse, Drakeley.
Johnson, Routledge, SHIRT, SAICH, Mills, SAUNDERS, EDLIN, Perry, Vickers, Pakeman, Griffiths, Marston, Turner, Child, Sheen, Gray, Woolhouse, Stevens, Batchelor
Census Info is Crown Copyright from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

Offline davidbappleton

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #3 on: Thursday 15 March 12 16:25 GMT (UK) »
The blazon (written description) of the arms would be:

Gules, a chevron Ermine between three bells [sometimes, church bells] Or.

(So the arms are clearly "canting" arms; that is, the arms are a pun on the surname.)

The blazon for the crest could be blazoned equally well several ways, but all would come close to:

Atop a mount Vert a hawk rising [wings elevated and addorsed] Or charged [on the wings] with a chevron couped Gules.

The  closest coat of arms in Papworth's Ordinary of British Armorials is for Bell (Sunderland, co. Durham), with Sable, a chevron ermine between three church bells argent, the differences being the colours of the field and of the bells.  And Burkes' General Armory notes the crest for this Bell as being A hawk close proper beaked and belled or, also different than the one you are looking to identify.

None of the other Bell's listed in Burke's General Armory come as close.

In Crozier's General Armory, subtitled "A Registry of American Families Entitled to Coat Armor," there is a listing for a William Bell of Massachusetts (1737), from Scotland, whose arms are blazoned as Azure, a chevron ermine, between three bells or, with the crest of A falcon, wings expanded, ermine.  So the arms are identical except for the field colour (blue here, instead of red), and the falcon crest is a different colour and lacks the couped chevron but is otherwise very similar.

I hope that this is helpful to you.

David


Offline behindthefrogs

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #4 on: Thursday 15 March 12 16:49 GMT (UK) »
I wonder whether the hawk (or falcon) is supposed to be gold or in its natural colour.  All of the crests that I found describe it as a hawk propr. billed and belled that is in its natural colouring.  However I would agree that in the picture it appears to be the same colour as the bells which would be gold.

It is however obvious from the fact that the wreath is coloured incorrectly that the picture could have other errors.
Living in Berkshire from Northampton & Milton Keynes
DETAILS OF MY NAMES ARE IN SURNAME INTERESTS, LINK AT FOOT OF PAGE
Wilson, Higgs, Buswell, PARCELL, Matthews, TAMKIN, Seckington, Pates, Coupland, Webb, Arthur, MAYNARD, Caves, Norman, Winch, Culverhouse, Drakeley.
Johnson, Routledge, SHIRT, SAICH, Mills, SAUNDERS, EDLIN, Perry, Vickers, Pakeman, Griffiths, Marston, Turner, Child, Sheen, Gray, Woolhouse, Stevens, Batchelor
Census Info is Crown Copyright from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

Offline jsm25

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #5 on: Thursday 15 March 12 17:24 GMT (UK) »
Thank you for you your replays so far I have tried to look it up but did not fully understand the  descriptions.

I have attached the coat of arms from a different member of the family (I only have a scan of this) and this is very similar to the ones on the headstones.

I photographed the colour coat of arms from some distance and then have zoom in so the motto at the bottom is not legible.

I don’t know if this helps but the oldest family member we know of is Thomas Bell b1690 we then have tree Henry Bells, a Henry Wade Bell and then Arthur Bell b1860 d1946 and he used the coat of arms on his headstone.

Any more thoughts greatly appreciated


John           

Offline jsm25

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #6 on: Thursday 15 March 12 17:27 GMT (UK) »
My other thought is that the colour way not be correct as the house has had a number of owners and they may have just painted it what they thought look good!

Offline davidbappleton

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #7 on: Thursday 15 March 12 17:34 GMT (UK) »
My other thought is that the colour way not be correct as the house has had a number of owners and they may have just painted it what they thought look good!

That is certainly a possibility; if the photograph of the carved version is "hatched" correctly for heraldic colours, the field is black, the chevron ermine, and the bells are white!  That makes a huge difference in trying to track it down.  Indeed, this revised blazon would match the arms (but not the crest) of the Sunderland Bell arms found in Burke's that I quoted earlier.

David


Offline jsm25

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Re: Bell Coat of Arms - Eastrington, East Yorkshire
« Reply #8 on: Saturday 17 March 12 08:49 GMT (UK) »
Thank you all for your assistance it’s a great help and its interesting to get the correct colours.      ;)