The Heraldry of Godinton House, near Ashford. Part I: Introduction, Ward Family Heraldry and some Miscellanea
THE HERALDRY OF GODINTON HOUSE, NEAR ASHF ORD.
PART I: INTRODUCTION, WARD FAMILY HERALDRY AND
SOME MISCELLANEA
PHILIP L.A. NEWlLL
Godinton House is a property of great antiquity some two miles to the north-west
of Ashford in Kent. 1 The property has undergone many additions and modifications
over the centuries but would once have been a ty pical Kentish hall house, dating
from c.1400, possibly with earlier origins. The Great Hall remains, although after
various improvements; and the solar with storage room underneath (now the
Needlework Room and Parlour, respectively) survive in truncated form due to
construction of the east front in the early 1630s. The rooms at the lower end of the
hall were demolished in the eighteenth century to make way for a dining room on
the site of that seen today.2 Other enlargements include creation of the south front
also in the eighteenth century and more recently a range designed by Sir Reginald
Blomfield, added to the western side of the house at the end of the nineteenth
century.3 Notable features of the interior include the grand staircase dating from
1628; stained glass by Thomas Willement in 1826;4 interior designs by Blomfield;
and work in the medieval part of the house by Liberty & Co. of London in 1925 . 5
In addition, Blomfield designed the fonnal gardens in 18966 which were created in
the following years.7
h1 terms of ownership, the Toke family had the longest reign (over four hundred
years) to be followed by the Dodd family, the Ward family, Alan Wyndham Green
and most recently the Godinton House Preservation Tmst. Thomas Toke is thought
to have inherited Godinton from the Goldwell family via Joan, his wife,8 in the mid
fifteenth century. The estate passed down through many generations ofTokes until
it was sold to the Dodd family in 1895 by Col John Leslie Toke.9 George Ashley
Dodd (son of George Dodd, MP for Maidstone) purchased the house and owned it
until his death in September 1917 . 10 George Ashley Dodd 's widow sold Godinton
to Lillie Bruce Ward in 1917. Lillie, wife of Robert Bmce Ward, was the daughter
of Edward Partington, first Baron Doverdale, a wealthy industrialist, and it was
Lillie who purchased Godinton and presided over the changes to the interior. In
particular, it was Lillie who commissioned the piercing of the Great Hall east wall
and refurbishment of the Parlour by Liberty and Co. of London in 1925. Upon
the demise of Lillie in 1951, 11 Godinton passed to her grandson Alan Wyndhan1
Green, who managed the estate until his death in 1996.12 Alan never married and
consequently had no children, so he set up the Godinton House Preservation Tmst
to maintain the house for future generations of the visiting public.
223
PlfilIP LA NEWILL
The Ward Family
l11e known male line of the Ward family (Fig. 1) originated in Newcastle-underLyme,
Staffordshire, with Michael Ward and his wife Margaret. Their only son
Thomas married in 1647 as his second wife Amy Shaw, daughter of the Alderman
of Newcastle-under-Lyme. In 1679 their son Michael, also of Newcastle-underLyme
married Ha.ll.llah Roades, daughter of the Vicar of Leek, Staffordshire. The
involvement of religion with the Ward family is emphasised with their son, Rev.
Michael Ward, Rector ofBlithfield and of Leigh, Staffordshire, who in 1714 married
secondly Sarah Spateman, daughter of the Rector of Yoxhall, Staffordshire; and
their son the Rev. Francis Ward of Stramshall, Staffordshire, Rector of Stanford,
Nottinghamshire, who married Margaret Bill in 1754. Their eldest son, John, also
of Stramshall, married in 1784 Hannah Hawkes, daughter and heiress of Samuel
Hawkes ofOgboume St Andrew, Wiltshire. The fifth son of the above, Rev. Charles
Ward was Rector of Maulden, Bedfordshire, and married in 1825 Susannah Foster
daughter of the Prebendary of Wells. In tum, their son, Rev. Charles Bruce Ward,
Vicar of St James's, Glossop, Derbyshire, married Hannah Maria Blagg in 1863
Thomas Ward m.
Hannah Gill
Rev. John Ward
lll.
Ann Merriman
Thomas Ward m.
Amy Shaw
. I
Michael Ward m.
Hannah Roades
I
Rev. Michael
Ward m.2 Sarah
Spateman
Rev. Francis
Ward m.
Margaret Bill
I
JohnWard m.
Hannah Hawkes
Rev. Charles
Ward
m.1
Susannah Foster
I
Rev. Charles
Brnce Ward m.
Hannah Maria
Blagg
I
RobertBrnce
Ward m. Lillie
Jane Partington
I
Thomas Ward m.
Martha Merriman
Margaret Ward m.
Rev. John Joseph
Goodenough
I
Lydia Ward m.
Sir James
Alexander
Gordon
Fig. 1 The marriages of s elected Ward family members.
224
HERALDRY OF GODINTON HOUSE, Nr ASHFORD. PART 1: INTRO., WARD FAMILY & MISC.
and had ten sons (including Robert Bruce Ward, later of Godinton) and a daughter
who died in childhood. Robert Bruce Ward became a J.P. for Worcestershire and
married the Hon. Lillie Jane Partington, a daughter of the first Baron Doverdale
and J.P. for Kent, in 1897.13 They had two children: Edward Bruce and Geraldine
Amy Beatrice. Edward married three times, but had no children, while Geraldine
married Capt. Graham Harry Wyndham Green in 1920 and had an only son, Alan
Wyndham Green. Geraldine died prematurely in 1937, while Alan was still a
teenager and he was then raised at Godinton by his grandparents. Robert died
in 1943 and when Lillie died in 1951 she left Godinton to Alan, not to Edward,
probably because it had become Alan's home and Edward had been successful as
a businessman, with a house of his own elsewhere.
Five marriages not on the main male line should also be mentioned (Fig. 1).
Firstly, Thomas, an elder brother of Rev. Francis Ward, married Hannah Gill in
1765. Their nephew Thomas, a solicitor, and younger brother of John Ward, married
in 1798 Martha Merriman. The Rev. John Ward, Rector of Wath near Ripon and
elder brother of Rev. Charles, married as his first wife Ann, daughter and heiress of
Samuel Merriman in 1823. Two other marriages in this generation are for sisters of
Rev. Charles. Margaret Ward married in 1807 Rev. John Goodenough, later Rector
of Bow Brickhill, and nephew of Rt Rev. Samuel Goodenough, Bishop of Carlisle;
and Lydia Ward married Admiral of the Fleet Sir James Gordon in 1812.
The Ward family tree found in the literature is complicated and lengthy due to
several generations having a large number of members, so the pedigree given here
(Fig. 1) is only a minimal excerpt in order to explain the heraldry clearly.
The Heraldry
l1.1e Ward fami I y left their mark on Godinton in the form of minor structural alterations
as well as some interior decoration, including a quantity of heraldic items. At the
time Lillie Bruce Ward acquired Godinton, the heraldry in the house was probably
just that left by the Toke family and certainly no Dodd-related heraldry is present
today. Only some rooms possess Ward-related heraldry and each is dealt with here
separately in the order encountered during the usual tour of the house.
The Great Hall
Very little Ward family heraldry exists in the Great Hall, perhaps due to the
abundance of Toke heraldry already present when the Wards acquired Godinton.
(Part II of this article will examine the Toke Family heraldry.) Careful inspection
reveals that within the brackets of the four wall-mounted electric lamps (two on
the chimney breast and two on the pierced east wall opposite) are the coats and
crests of the families of Ward, Partington, Hawkes and Foster. Each lamp bracket
contains two shields back-to-back, held perpendicularly to the wall, decorated on
the north facing side with a family crest and on the south face with the corresponding
arms. The pierced east wall bears two lamps; that to the left (north) features the
Ward crest (a wolf's head erased Or gorged with a collar Azure charged with an
escallop of the first between two bezants) and arms (Azure, a cross patonce Or
within a bordure of the last charged with eight hurts), while the bracket to the right
225
PlfilIP LA NEWILL
(south) displays the Partington crest (out of the battlements of a tower a goats
head proper, charged on the neck with a mullet of six points between two escallops
Sable) and arms (Sable, on a bend nebuly between/our mullets of six points, two in
chief and as many in base Argent, three Cornish choughs proper). Similarly, on the
brackets above the fireplace on the west wall are, to the left (south), the Hawkes
arms (Or, three bendlets Azure, on a chief ermine two crosses patty Gules) and
crest (on a chapeau proper an owl with wings expanded Argent); and to the right
(north), the Foster arms (ermine, on a chevron Vert between three bugles stringed
Sable an escallop Or) and crest (an arm embowed in armour Argent garnished Or
holding in the hand proper a broken tilting spear proper). The Ward, Partington
and Hawkes coats, and crests, 14 found on the lamp brackets are in agreement with
the literature, along with the coat of Foster.15 The crest of Foster of Draycot Foliot,
Wiltshire, does not appear in the literature used above, but an almost identical one
for Foster of Brickhill, Bedfordshire (an arm in armour embowed, holding in the
hand the head of a broken tilting-spear proper) does.16
The positioning of these four coats and crests may be significant. It may be said
that at Godinton the order of decreasing importance of the four families represented
is: Ward, Partington, Hawkes, Foster. These fom families are represented on the
arms of marriage for Robert and Lillie: Ward (quartering Hawkes and Foster)
impaling Partington. In this contex1 Ward represents Robert, a male and therefore
takes priority; Partington represents Robert's wife Lillie; Hawkes is for Hannah, an
heiress who married into the Ward family; and Foster is for Hannah, an heiress who
married into the Hawkes family and was grandmother to Hannah aforementioned.
The Ward and Partington families are represented at the 'upper' end of the hall,
i.e. that adjoining the Parlour (seemingly the heraldic focus for the Ward family
(see the next section)). These tv,ro families may be considered more important than
the Hawkes and Foster families, which could explain the residence of their arms
upon this wall, while Hawkes and Foster are relegated to the 'lower' end. The four
families are represented in the order previously mentioned in a clockwise manner
starting in what may be thought of as the north-east comer.
A possible alternative interpretation relates to the heraldic display of marriages,
in which the arms of the male are displayed to the left of those of the female,
when the arms are on separate shields. On the east wall Ward is represented to the
left of Partington; and on the west wall Hawkes is to the left of Foster. The Ward
- Partington marriage is detailed above and the Hawkes - Foster marriage was
between William Hawkes and Hannah Foster, sister and co-heiress of Hon. Sir
Michael Foster, of Draycot Foliot, Wiltshire, Judge of the Court of King's Bench.
Given that the second of these two marriages has no real relevance to Godinton,
the interpretation involving the clockwise arrangement of families in order of
importance would seem the most likely.
The Parlour
The Parlour is the main focus of the Ward heraldry and is home to some fourteen
coats of arms displayed at the top of the panelling on the south wall (see Fig.
2). Twelve of these coats represent marriages, while two represent families. The
layout of this group of fourteen shields has been carefully planned and the twelve
226
HERALDRY OF GODINTON HOUSE, Nr ASHFORD. PART 1: INTRO., WARD FAMILY & MISC.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
A B C D w ® (J) ® p ® (3) (2) Q)
Fig. 2 Schematic representation of the fourteen coats in the Parlour. Key: