Sep-05 Issue - The Heraldry Society

4
THE HIGH SHERIFFS OF OXFORDSHIRE - PART ONE
Martin Davies's recent appeal for information
about court room heraldry made me dig in my
files. He is quite right that photography is a
problem in any court building as it is feared that
photos may fall into the hands of violent
criminals who then use them to plan their gang
members' break out while on trial. Indeed,
even access by the general public is
sometimes difficult for similar reasons. Without
good cause to be there it may be impossible to
gain entry to certain court buildings. Whereas
they were seen as prime targets for IRA
terrorism for 30 years, that fear has now been
supplanted by one of more global origins.
As well as the depictions of current royal
arms, certain courts display the arms of High
Sheriffs or Lords Lieutenant of their county in
an ante room. When I was approached by
John Brooke-Little some years ago to produce
a shield for the upcoming High Sheriff of
Oxfordshire I was given the signal honour of
being allowed to take a camera into the Oxford
Crown Court, albeit carefully chaperoned, to
John Thomson 1957
Ermine an eagle displayed
Sable charged on the breast
and each wing with an
escallop Or on a chief Gold a
rose Gules barbed and
seeded proper between two
bulls' heads cabossed also
Gules.
The first shield in the series.
This was painted many years
later as Spurrier was only a
schoolboy in 1957. It is a
good example of his skill as
an artist with well drawn
charges, nicely balanced and
filling their space. Strangely,
he varnished the eagle and
overlapped the varnish onto
the white of the ermine field, a
technique known as “pencil
varnishing”. This is usually
only done on glass to protect
the artwork. Here the varnish
has yellowed, inevitable over
the years, and now shows up
on the white.
David Wills 1961
Gules three estoiles of twelve
points fesswise between two
griffins passant Or beaked
Azure that in chief charged
with a crescent Gold on a
mullet Gules for difference.
(The stars are composed of
alternating wavy and straight
lines.)
record the existing shields. There are now
some 33 adorning the walls of this large room
where witnesses and appellants sit waiting for
their turn in front of a judge. Most before 1998
were done by that most accomplished heraldic
artist and one time herald Peter Spurrier, who
is no longer with us.
The arms on the wall are not a complete
record of the High Sheriffs. The shields have to
be paid for by the office holder, no public funds
ever being made available. In recent years all
have elected to join in and it can be assumed
that the gaps relate to those who did not. Nonarmigers
can use the badge of office on a blue
hexagon with their name and year below. This
can be blazoned as, ''Two swords in saltire
blades uppermost Argent pommels and hilts Or
that in bend broken.''
In this and the following part is a complete
list of shields displayed up to the present
incumbent of 2005. The post is held for one
year starting in April. The names and dates are
as written below each shield.
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J. Heyworth 1962
Quarterly 1st & 4th: Argent six
lions three two and one Sable;
2nd & 3rd: Argent two
barrulets wavy between three
bats Sable.
Alan Budgett 1965
Azure on a cross invected
between four water bougets
Or an escallop between as
many horseshoes of the field.
Charles Radclyffe 1967
Argent two bendlets engrailed
Sable a label Gules.
Miles Gosling 1970
Gules on a chevron between
three crescents Or a squirrel
affronty cracking a nut
between two like squirrels
also cracking nuts respectant
proper in chief a cinquefoil
Gold. (The cinquefoil is an