Great British Family Names and Their History

What's in a Name?

John Moss

• Publisher: Pen & Sword History
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781526722812
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: History

A reference guide to hundreds of surnames that reveal the story of the United Kingdom across generations and centuries. To some extent, we are all products of our family history, the many generations before us. So it is with nations. The history of Great Britain has been largely defined by powerful and influential families, many of whose names came down from Celtic, Danish, Saxon or Norman ancestors. Their family names fill the pages of history books, indelibly written into events we learn about at school. Family names like Wellington, Nelson, Shakespeare, Cromwell, Constable, De Montfort, and Montgomery reflect the long, checkered history of Britain, and demonstrate the assimilation of the many cultures and languages that have migrated to the British isles over the centuries. This book is a snapshot of several hundred such family names and delves into their beginnings and derivations, making extensive use of old sources, including translations of The Domesday Book and The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, as well as tracing many through the centuries to the present day.

Part One

North-East England

Family Names in County Durham, Northumberland, Tyne & Wear and Yorkshire

The Aske Family of Aughton

The Askes are an old family whose origins can be traced to the eleventh century in Aske, a township in the Parish of Easby, near Richmond in the North Riding of Yorkshire. They held the land as tenants from the Earl of Richmond following the Norman conquest of 1066. Formerly, they had belonged to a Saxon named Thor.

According to the Domesday Book, the estate was known as Alreton, ‘in the hundred of Land of Count Alan’, and had just ‘five villagers, three smallholdings and four ploughlands’. The first record of the surname was in Cumberland, (now Cumbria), though the main body of the family lived in Aughton in Yorkshire. Variations on the surname include Askey, Askew, Aiscough and Asker.

The church at Aughton bears brass effigies of Richard de Aske and his wife, who died in the fifteenth century. Later, Robert Aske, (1500-37), a lawyer and Fellow at Gray’s Inn, objected to the king’s Dissolution of the Monasteries, and was a protagonist in the insurrection known as the ‘Pilgrimage of Grace’, during the reign of Henry VIII. He was beheaded for treason at York in 1537.

There is an alternative variation of the surname – that of Asker, derived from the Old Norse ‘askr’, which translates as ‘the ash tree’, and probably describes a specific location, where a branch of the family lived. It was possibly at a special place or a district boundary of some kind. In early times, the ash tree had mystical significance and was often planted at the outskirts of a settlement or at an important meeting place.

In 1922, Sir Robert William Aske was created Baron Aske of Aughton. A barrister and decorated Lieutenant Colonel in the Territorial Army Reserve, he was a Liberal Member of Parliament on two occasions for Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

At the time of writing, Sir Robert John Bingham Aske, the third Baron, is the incumbent, and lives in Exeter, Devon.

The Belasis Family of Durham

The surname derives from the Manor of Belasis near Billingham in County Durham, which along with the Lambtons and Edens, was once the family seat of the Belasis family. It is a Norman-French name, which comes from ‘bel’, meaning beautiful, and ‘assis’, to sit. Hence the name means ‘beautiful seat’. In this case, the word ‘seat’ almost certainly pertains to the place, eg. a country or a family seat.

Rowland de Belasis, (sometimes spelled Belasyse) was the first known holder of the surname and took it directly from the placename. By 1264, he was a knight of the Bishop of Durham and lived at Cowpen Bewley. Although the family continued their association with the area, the Manor of Belasis later passed into the ownership of Durham Cathedral.

Between 1270 and 1280, John de Belasis held land around Wolviston and may have exchanged part of the Belasis estate for territory at Henknowle near Bishop Auckland, where the arms of the Belasis family are located in the church of St Andrews. The Belasis family also had strong connections with Coxwold near Thirsk in Yorkshire.

In 1611, Sir Henry Bellasis was made Baronet Belasyse of Newborough in Yorkshire, and his son, Thomas, the second Baronet, was created Viscount Fauconberg of Henknowle in County Durham in 1642. He was member of Parliament for Thirsk in 1624.

John Belasyse, the Baron of Worlaby, (1640-89), became a distinguished Royalist commander during the Civil War and fought at the Battles of Newbury, Naseby and Edgehill, with many honours being initially heaped upon him, including the Lord Lieutenancy of Yorkshire, as well as the Governorship of Hull and of Tangiers. However, in a somewhat chequered career, he was later impeached and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Finally, after release, he spent his latter days restored in status as Lord of the Treasury.

Another notable member of the Belasis family was Miss Mary Belasis of Brancepeth Castle near Durham, who lived in the eigtheenth century. She fell in love with a County Durham Member of Parliament by the name of Robert Shafto. She reputedly was heard to sing what became a well-known folk song, ‘Bobby Shafto’, which went thus:

‘Bobby Shafto’s gone to sea,

With silver buckles on his knee,

When he comes back, he’ll marry me,

Pretty Bobby Shafto.’

Unfortunately for the lovelorn Miss Belasis, when Shafto did finally return from sea, he married someone else. Mary is said to have died of a broken heart.

When Henry Belasyse, the second Earl of Fauconberg of Newborough, died in March 1802, without male heirs, the peerage passed through his eldest daughter, Lady Anne Belasyse, to her husband Sir George Wombwell, and the Belasyse title became extinct.

The Blenkinsop Family of Blenkinsopp

The Blenkinsop surname, (usually spelled with one ‘p’, but occasionally with two), derives from Blenkinsopp Castle, which is located at Haltwhistle in the Tyne Valley, near Hadrian’s Wall. The land and castle were held by the Blenkinsops from the thirteenth until the early nineteenth century.

The family traces its ancestry to one Richard Blenkinsoppe, grandson of Ranulfus, who held the manor in 1240. Later records show that Thomas de Blencansopp was licenced to fortify it in 1399, and that by the year 1416, the building was listed as a castle.

Explanations of the name’s meaning are obscure, though most authorities suggest it means ‘Blenkin’s hill’, probably after a man called Blenkin. An alternative interpretation of the Blenkinsopp name may have originated in the early medieval Cumbric language, where ‘blaen’, meant ‘top’, and ‘kein’, meant ‘back’ or ‘ridge’. Hence, ‘top of the ridge’. To this was later added the Old English element ‘hop’, meaning ‘valley’. Variants of the surname include Blenkinship, Blenkinshopp and Blenkenshippe.

A celebrated military member of the family was Major General Sir Alfred Percy Blenkinsop, (died in November 1936), who became a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath and a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George.

Later in the twentieth century, Blenkinsopp Castle served as a hotel, but major damage was caused by a fire in 1954, and large parts of the property were demolished on safety grounds. Today it is part home and part ruin. What remains is a Grade I Listed Building and a Scheduled Ancient Monument.

The Boynton Family of Sedbury

Bartholomew de Boynton was made Lord of the Manor of Boynton within a year of the Conquest of 1066, his family taking possession of land previously owned by Torchill de Bovington, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, which the Domesday Book refers to as Bouintone. Alternative spellings of the name include Boyntun, Bointon, Byington and Bointen.

The name probably came from the Old English personal name ‘Bofa’, plus ‘ing’, meaning ‘people’ or ‘family’, and ‘tun’, signifying a settlement or farmstead. Loosely translated it might mean ‘the settlement of Bofa’s people’. Alternatively, the name may have arisen from Boyton in Wiltshire or from Boyington Court in Kent, which was recorded in 1207 as Bointon.

Either way, the family seem to have taken their surname from the place, and the first persons known to use it were Walter, Adam and Gilbert in the early twelfth century. Walter de Boynton was actively involved in the building of Bridlington Priory.

Sir Matthew Boynton, (1591-1646), was created Baron Boynton of Barmston in 1618 and held the office of Sheriff of Yorkshire from 1628 to 1629 and was Governor of Scarborough.

By the sixteenth century, the Boyntons had become one of the ten richest families in the East Riding. However, they failed to produce male heirs and through marriage, their estates passed to the Del See family. By the middle of the seventeeth century, members of the family are known to have emigrated to America, sailing from Hull on the ship John of London and settling in Massachusetts.

In more recent times, Sir Griffith Wilfred Norman Boynton was a Lieutenant Commander in the Royal Navy and was the thirteenth Baronet until his death in 1966.

The Chaytor Family of Croft

See: The Clervaux Family

The Clervaux Family of Croft

The Clervaux family name, (sometimes Clairvaux, Clerevaulx, Clervoe or Clairvo), first appears in the North Riding of Yorkshire shortly after the Battle of Hastings, when they held a family seat as Lords of the Manor. It is thought to have derived from Sir Hamon de Clervaux, who probably came from Clervaux Castle in Anjou, and is recorded as having fought at Hastings with William of Normandy. However, apart from its derivation from a placename, opinions differ as to the exact origin of the surname. It may possibly have originated in Clervaux in neighbouring Luxembourg, or from Clairvaux-les-Lacs in the Jura Region of France, or from Clairvaux, near Rodez in Aquitaine - no definitive source seems to exist. According to contemporary accounts however, Hamon de Clervaux came to England in the train of Alan Le Roux of Brittany and received the honour of Richmond from the Conqueror himself.

An account of 1290 declares that the Clairvaux were freemen, and thereby excused the manorial duty of ploughing. Clearly, they soon gained status and influence in the county. Sir John Clervaux of Croft, (c.1400-43), for example, was High Sheriff of Yorkshire, as were many of his succeeding generations. The family also consolidated its power by marriage into influential families like the Neviles, the Belasyse, the Mortimers and the Vavasors, even though, as a result, some of their property passed out of Clervaux hands. Nevertheless, when Sir Richard Clervaux, who was a courtier of Henry VI, died in 1490, a plaque was placed above his tomb in Croft Church depicting the arms of Clervaux impaling those of the Vavasours, suggesting a higher status position.

During the reign of Elizabeth I, the family’s heiress, Elizabeth Clervaux, married Christopher Chaytor of Butterby in County Durham. He served as Surveyor General for Elizabeth and was granted arms in 1571. By descent, their son, Anthony Chaytor, inherited both the Chaytor and Clervaux estate at Croft.

William Chaytor, (1639-1720), was created Baronet Chaytor of Croft Hall, near Darlington, and the title passed to succeeding generations thereafter, culminating with William Henry Clervaux, the seventh Baronet Chaytor of Croft, who died as recently as 1976, when Sir George Reginald Chaytor succeeded as the eighth Baronet in September of that year.

Several family ancestors had military careers, with Major Henry Chaytor, (1686-1717), serving in the British Army under the Duke of Marlborough, as did his son, Thomas.

The Clervaux connection has been maintained throughout the centuries, being frequently incorporated as a middle name for many of the family members. Clervaux James Chaytor, (born in 1967), and Frances Alexandra Clervaux Chaytor, (born in 1961), demonstrate that the Clervaux family name survives right up to recent times.

The Constable Family of Burton Constable

Burton Constable was recorded in the Domesday Survey as Santriburtone and occupied by an unnamed knight on behalf of the Crown. It seems he was succeeded by Erneburga of Burton, who married Ulbert, the Count of Aumale’s constable. Their son, called Robert Constable, had land at Erneburgh Burton before 1190, and by the thirteenth century, the family held substantial areas of the Count’s estate. By then the place had become known as Burton Constable.

Sir Robert Constable, (c.1478–1537), eldest son of Sir Marmaduke Constable, was married to Jane Ingleby of Ripley, daughter of Sir William Ingleby of Ripley. He fought alongside Henry VII to quell the Cornish rebels at the Battle of Blackheath in 1497. However, after a dispute, he fell out of the monarch’s favour, and in 1537 was arrested, tried for treason, and hanged the following year at Hull.

The Constable surname comes from the Old French word ‘conestable’, (or ‘cunestable’), derived from the original Latin word ‘comes’, meaning a count and ‘stabuli’, meaning a stable. Hence, an ‘officer of the stable’. Also in the thirteenth century, the Constables added their name to the Manor of Burton, (the placename meaning ‘settlement at a fortified dwelling’), and the estate at Burton Constable in North Yorkshire came into being.

The oldest part of the manor house dates from the reign of Stephen in the twelfth century, but in the late fifteenth century a new brick house was built by Sir John Constable, (born around 1400, son of William IV, known as ‘le constable’), replacing Halsham as the family’s principal seat. This was replaced again in 1768, by a Palladian villa designed by John Carr for Sir Marmaduke Wyvill.

Sir Philip Constable, born around 1595, gained the title of Baronet Constable of Everingham, but with the death of Sir Frederick Augustus Talbot Constable in 1818, the baronetcy became extinct.

The Conyers Family of Durham

Conyers, (sometimes De Conyers), is a name of Anglo-Norman origin and derives from the Old French word ‘coignier’, that is, a person who mints money – as in the English word ‘coin’. The family were originally from the town of Coigners in Normandy and moved to live at Sockburn, where the Bishop of Durham, Ralph Flambard, granted the manor and estate of Sockburn-on-Tees near Middleton St George to Roger de Conyers at the end of the eleventh century. Conyers was appointed Constable of Durham Castle.

The first recorded spelling of the family name in England is that of John le Conyare, dated 1327, in the Sussex Subsidy Rolls, during the reign of Edward II.

The village of Norton Conyers, north of Ripon, takes its name from the family, and has been associated with the Conyers for centuries. The village was mentioned in Domesday Book, but there was probably a habitation of some kind there in Viking times.

In June 1509, William Conyers was created Lord Conyers, and his descendant, Sir John Conyers, (1599-1664), became Baron Conyers of Horden in County Durham. However, with the family’s inability to produce male heirs, in the eigtheenth century the baronetcy passed through marriage of the female line into the Darcy family.

In the early twentieth century, David George Conyers, who fought in the Great War, was forced to sell his home at Castletown Conyers in County Limerick, Ireland, and died childless in Canada in 1952, bringing the main family line to an end.

Norton Conyers House, a Grade II Listed mid-fourteenth century house with Tudor, Stuart and Georgian additions, has been the home of the Graham family since 1624. The novelist Charlotte Brontё is said to have based Thornfield Hall, in her novel Jane Eyre, on the house at Norton Conyers.

The Fenwick Family of Northumberland

The first record of the Fenwick surname occurs around 1220, when Robert de Fenwicke is known to have lived in the Scottish border region. Later, a Walter del Feneweke is recorded in Lincolnshire in 1275, and Thomas de Fenwyck of Northumberland in 1279. Nicholaus Fynwyk was provost of Ayr in 1313, and Reginald de Fynwyk, (sometimes Fynvyk), appears as bailie and alderman of the same borough in 1387 and 1401.

The name is usually pronounced ‘Fennick’, and comes from Old English, meaning, simply, ‘the farm on the fen’.

The Fenwicks achieved notoriety throughout the north and were frequently involved in the border troubles of Tudor times. They held strongholds at Kirkharle, Bywell-on-Tyne and the original peel tower at Wallington; this later became Wallington Hall, near Morpeth. In fact, the Fenwicks were found on either side of the English-Scottish border and are thought to take their name from Fenwick near Kyloe in Northumberland.

During the Civil War, Sir John Fenwick was killed at Marston Moor, and his descendant, another John Fenwick, was beheaded for high treason after conspiring to murder the Dutch-born protestant William of Orange. Fenwick’s property and estate were confiscated by the Crown, as was his horse, Sorrel. This was the same horse that threw William as it stumbled over a mole hill in the grounds of Hampton Court. Ironically, shortly afterwards the king died from his injuries.

The Fulthorpe Family of County Durham & Halifax

The Fulthorpe surname, (sometimes Folthorpe or Foulthorpe), is of northern o...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Dedication
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Map
• Foreword
• Part One North-East England
• Part Two North-West England
• Part Three The West Midlands
• Part Four The East Midlands
• Part Five East Anglia
• Part Six The South East
• Part Seven The South West
• Part Eight Scotland
• Part Nine Wales
• Part Ten Ireland
• Bibliography
• Useful Web Sources
• Acknowledgements