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The Penhallow Coat of Arms

Above the Coat of Arms of the original Penhallow family. The coat of arms is known to have merged with that of the Penwarin family - I have yet to find an illustration of these arms.

April 2000. I took a trip to the College of Arms in London to try and get confirmation of the above - they were particularly unhelpful. Once I have the spare cash I will pay them for a full search. In the meantime I believe the above to be correct probably with a goat crest above the shield

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An extract from the New York Herald - June 19??
[Note: The room refered to here is now an exhibit at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, England]

CLIFFORD'S INN'S LINK TO AMERICA

Sir Purdon Clarke Unravelled a Mystery in an Exquisite Treasure of the Past

PENHALLOW - PENWARIN ARMS

In Beautiful Portsmouth and in Boston Live Those Whose English Ancestors Founded an Enduring Name

[Special Cable to the Herald]

London, Saturday. - It has not often happened that to find missing links in family histories or to establish the authenticity of antiques England has felt it necessary to turn to America, but this is just what has happened in the case of one of the latest aquisitions to the South Kensington Museum. The story is of additional interest to Americans from the fact that Sir Purdon Clarke, the director of that institution, recently accepted the charge of the Metroploitan Museum of Art in New York.

There is now standing in London, but about to be demolished, an old building, a sort of rookery, which for centuries has been to solicitors what portions of the Temple have meant to barristers and literary men-houses, offices, in short, a sort of professional abode, with an atmosphere of its won.

Cliford's Inn dates from 1310, having been built by Robert de Clifford. In 1344 his widow let it to students of the law for the sum of £10 per annum, and from that time it grew to be a sort of adjunct to the Inner Temple. Coke, the famous lawyer, once lived there, and much later George Dyer, mentioned by Charles Lamb, whom Leigh Hunt, the poet, often visited.

An Example of Wren

In the building was a room whose rich panel decorations had long been famous. Though the fine carvings and traceries had been hidden under layer after layer of paint, the beauty was still there, and when the building was sold, two years ago, Sir Purdon Clarke and several other distinguished architechs who saw the chamber pronounced it unmistakably an example of the time of Christopher Wren.

At Sir Purdon's suggestion the South Kensington Museum purchased the room at an outlay of £600, and the whole of the panelling has recently been set up in the Museum, where there are a number of examples of rooms of different periods.

The panelling of this room is in oak, of beautiful grain, and the carved decorations are partly in cedar. Over the mantel is an exquisite design of roses and leaves, in the centre of which is a coat of arms. It was this shield which furnished a clew to the origin of the room and at the same time provided a puzzle.

When any new aquisition is made by the South Kensington Museum the director has made it practice to learn as much as possible about its history, and in this case patient research was begun. After a time it was found that the room ...?ted by John Penhallow who was admitted to the inn in 1674, the chambers afterwards being known as No.3.

The building was rebuilt in 1686 and John Penhallow afterward admitted to the chamber in which the panelling was erected, and also to another chamber, over it. "In consideration", so run the records, "of the interest which he had in his old chamber before it was rebuilt and also of the money which he hath laid to rebuilding the same chamber."

Penhallow was evidently a man of great wealth, for the money he expended in rebuilding the chamber must have represented a considerable outlay. He was, in consequence of his act, not only granted two sets (leases) for his own lifetime, but also two assignments, that is to say, for two further lives.

Anything further about John Penhallow it was difficult to learn, theough the "conies feeding" on the shield above the mantel were easily found to be part of the arms of the Penhallow family, now extinct in England, except though the female line. The shield had been painted in fancy colours, and this put investigators off the track, as color plays such an important part in heraldry.

Penhallow in America


After more patient research it was learned that a John Penhallow, of Cornwall, had married a Mary Penwarin in the time of Henry VIII, and that the quarterings on the shield with the Penhallow conies were the arms of her family. Tracing the family down, it was found that though this particular branch had become extinct here, one scion, Samuel Penhallow by name, had emigrated to America toward the close of the seventeenth century, where he had become a judge in Portsmouth N.H.

Looking over a copy of Matthews' American Blue Book, Sir Purdon Clarke found there the name of Mr.Charles Penhallow, of Boston, with the coat of arms identical with the one over the mantel of the old room, and wrote to him about the matter.

Mr.Penhallow was able to supply Sir Purdon with some interesting details, from which it appears that the last John Penhallow was a cousin of Samuel. John Penhallow occupied No.3 until his death which took place in 1716, just ten years before that of his American cousin. His son, Benjamin, succeeded him in the possession of the chamber, which after Benjamin's death passed into other hands. The panels and decorations of the chamber have been scraped free of paint and it is looked upon as a valuable aquisition to the Museum.

Sir Purdon Clarke is naturally much pleased with the sucessful outcome of the research, and particularly that it had an important American connection. That Sir Purdon will be sorely missed at the South Kensington Museum is evident from what I have heard officals of the Museum say.

"It would be easy enough to get a mere museum director", said one, "but where are we going to find another man who knows about everything from architecture to carpets, who has travelled everywhere, who keeps travelling and who is always picking up art treasures in the most out of the way places?"

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