I always enjoy giving concerts in Salisbury Cathedral. These days its 123m high spire is more famous than ever thanks to the publicity it received from two bungling Russian spies, but I also like playing there because it’s the final resting place of my 18xgreat grandparents Lord Walter Hungerford (d 1449) and his wife Catherine Peverell.
Walter fought heroically at Agincourt and was at various times Speaker of the House of Commons (like his father who was the first to hold the position), Treasurer of England and Executor of Henry V’s will. He was created Baron Hungerford and served with distinction under Henry IV, V & VI. You can read all about his career on Wikipedia.
Walter was buried in the Hungerford Chapel in the nave of Salisbury Cathedral, but this was destroyed when the nave was opened out during the restorations of 1790.
Walter and Catherine’s tomb was relocated to an aisle in the nave, and their effigies have been lost, along with most of the heraldic devices that commemorated their ancestors.
Some of them survive, though, because during the 1790 restorations, the ironwork from the Hungerford Chapel was removed to the south side of the quire as part of the Radnor Pew, reserved for the Earls of Radnor and their family.
The chapel is covered in heraldic devices including the arms of Hungerford and the sickle, which the family used as their emblem. Carved into the stone are escutcheons representing Walter’s two marriages and his parentage. Sometimes they are surrounded by the garter he was entitled to use as a knight of that order.
You can’t enter the chapel, or at least you haven’t been able to whenever I have been there, but you can catch a glimpse of the beautiful ceiling through the ironwork and after many unsuccessful attempts I managed to take a photo of it (or of the part of it that is lit). It’s a delightful combination of heraldic shields and pendants that would capture the imagination of anyone interested in heraldry.
So what does it all mean? I was hoping I would find the arms of more of my ancestors represented, but I was to be disappointed. It turns out that the ceiling was commissioned to show the world how Jacob Pleydell-Bouverie, the 2nd Earl of Radnor, and his Countess, Ann Duncombe, both descended from Lord Hungerford. In effect it’s his justification for appropriating the chapel for his own family’s use.
At the top of the design is a shield representing the marriage of Walter Hungerford to Catherine Peverell. On the male (dexter) side, the arms of Hungerford are quartered with those of Heytesbury (a geometric version of the Hungerford sickle sometimes thought to be the original Hungerford arms) while the female (sinister) side has the Peverell arms quartered with the famous Courtenay arms (also seen on the tomb of Sir John Chichester). The whole shield is surrounded by a garter inscribed HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE and topped by a coronet indicating that Walter was a Baron.
Emerging from the base of the shield are two cords or vines leading to shields representing the two sons of Lord Hungerford who survived him. There is no shield for his eldest son Walter, who predeceased him without issue, or for his daughter Elizabeth, my ancestor who married Sir Philip Courtney of Powderham and was the great-great grandmother of Gertrude Courtney who married Sir John Chichester.
So none of the other shields are my ancestors, but as I haven’t found the ceiling described in detail anywhere else, I’ll give a quick summary of who they all are.
To the bottom right of Walter & Catherine’s shield there is a shield for his younger son Edmund Hungerford and his wife Margaret Burnell who founded the Down Ampney Hungerfords. Their shield also leads to two vines, the upper of which represents the lineage down to the Countess of Radnor.
- Philippa Hungerford and Thomas St.Maur (Seymour)
- John St.Maur (Seymour) and Elizabeth Choke
- Margaret St.Maur (Seymour) and William Bampfylde (Bampfield)
- Edward Bampfield and Elizabeth Wadham
- Katherine Bampfield and Erasmus Pym
- Alexander Pym and Philippa Coles (in shadow)
- John Pym* and Ann Hooke (in shadow)
- Charles Pym and Katherine Gerard (in shadow)
- Mary Pym and Thomas Hales (in shadow)
- Thomas Hales and Mary Marsham
- Ann Hales and Anthony Duncombe, 1st Baron Feversham
- Ann Duncombe, Countess of Radnor
*This is the famous John Pym MP (1584-1643), the Puritan whose opposition to Charles I precipitated the Civil War. His half-sister Dorothy Rous married the elder brother of my 10xgreat grandfather Henry Upton. This marriage connection enabled Upton’s brother-in-law Sir John Clotworthy to appeal to Parliament about the religious persecution practised by Thomas Wentworth, Lord Strafford, the Lord Deputy of Ireland.
The lower vine from Edmund Hungerford’s shield gives the ancestry of the Earl.
- Thomas Hungerford and Christian Hall
- John Hungerford and Margaret Blount
- Anthony Hungerford and Dorothy Danvers
- Jane Hungerford and William Forster of Aldermaston
- Humphrey Forster and Margaret Barrett
- William Forster and Mary Stewart
- Humphrey Forster and Anne Kingsmill
- Margaret Forster and George Pratt of Coleshill
- Mary Pratt and Thomas Pleydell
- Thomas Pleydell and Jane Stuart
- Mark Stuart Pleydell and Mary Steuart
- Harriet Pleydell and William Bouverie, 1st Earl of Radnor
- Jacob Pleydell-Bouverie, 2nd Earl of Radnor
Most of this pedigree is confirmed by the Forster pedigree in the Visitation of Berkshire 1665-66.
The Earl also claimed another descent from Walter Hungerford’s son, Robert Hungerford, the second Baron Hungerford whose effigy still lies in the nave of Salisbury Cathedral across from his father.
This descent is more dubious, but the shields represent the following people:
- Robert Hungerford, 2nd Baron Hungerford and Margaret Botreaux
- Katherine Hungerford and Richard West, 7th Baron De La Warr
- Thomas West, 8th Baron De La Warr and Elizabeth Mortimer
- Elizabeth West and Charles Somerset, 1st Earl of Worcester* (hidden)
- Sir George Somerset and Mary Bowles
- Anne Somerset and Edward Barrett of Belhouse
- Margaret Barrett and Humphrey Forster of Aldermaston
*Charles Somerset was the illegitimate son of the Duke of Somerset so his arms were Beaufort arms with a baton sinister to indicate bastardy. After the death of the Duke of Clarence’s son in 1499 he was the last remaining Plantagenet in the male line.
There are two possible problems with this pedigree.
Firstly, Wikipedia casts doubt on the Earl of Worcester’s second marriage to Elizabeth West so although the Visitation of Suffolk 1561 confirms that Sir George Somerset was a son of the Earl and the father-in-law of Edward Barrett, he may not have been the grandson of Lord De La Warr.
Secondly, the Forster pedigree in the Visitation of Berkshire 1665-66 says that Margaret Barrett was the daughter of John Barrett of Stanford Dingley. And although Edward Barrett of Belhouse did inherit Stanford Dingley from his mother, the Visitation of Essex 1612 does not say he had a daughter called Margaret.
The 2nd Earl of Radnor’s great great granddaughter Sybil Pleydell-Bouverie married Mervyn Wingfield, 8th Viscount Powerscourt in Ireland. The wonderful gardens at Powerscourt have featured in several of my earlier posts. Mervyn and Sybil were great grandparents of Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York.
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Chris West Ancestry Blog 