The School Badge -  Chris Snuggs & Mark Frost

Ron Gould -
Corners 50-55: “That was the very first Woolverstone Hall blazer badge, blue background with gold heads etc.”
Louis Parperis -
Orwell 63-70: “The distribution of the blue dots in the badge was far less concentrated than in the badge worn by Richard.”

Historical Footnotes (Mark Frost)

Further to my previous research on the Arms of the Wolverstone family, I thought I would follow some leads in some old documents which miraculously are online.

In 1561 there was a ‘Visitation’ to Suffolk by the Heralds from The College of Arms (still exists in City of London) to check on the pedigrees of certain families and their Coats of Arms.

 https://archive.org/details/visitationsofsuf00harvuoft/page/50/mode/2up

 By 1561 the Wolverston family had no male heirs. Elizabeth was the daughter of Thomas Wolverston and she married into the Latymer family of Freston (how convenient!). That meant that the Latymer family Coat of Arms incorporated the Wolverstone Arms and the result is as described in the Visitation. 

Further research has found that the Latymer School
in Edmonton has the school badge shown right.
This school was founded and endowed in 1624 by
William Latymer, a successful City lawyer
from the Latymer family of Freston!

Motto translation:  ‘He conquers who endures.’   


 
Woolverstone/Wolverston/Wolffersston/Wulverston

A short while back Ipswich High School raised the question of where the school badge of Woolverstone Hall School originated as they were preparing some new artwork.

This initiated some research, and it is the shield from the Coat of Arms belonging to the ‘Wolverston’ family, and certainly dates back to Henry VI and probably to Hamon de Wolverston in 1291. The earliest depiction is of a knight from a 1445 manuscript ‘Sir Thomas Holme’s Book of Arms’ in the British Library.

The Norman French description is

“Sable a fess undee’ between 3 wolves’ head coupe’ Or”

Translation: Black background, with a wavy horizontal bar between 3 gold wolves’ heads.

The first son of a marriage inherited the Arms. However, by the late 16 th century Thomas Wolverston had no male heirs. His only daughter Elizabeth was also entitled to its use, and she married William Latymer of Freston.

A descendant went on to found the Latymer schools in London (1624), and the school badge of the one in Edmonton has the Wolverston Arms incorporated with Latymer.

Mary Wolverston (1525-c.1590) was married to John Killigrew, a Cornish pirate. Mary’s father Philip Wolverston was dubbed ‘the gentleman pirate of Suffolk’. He was obviously a man living beyond his means as he was fined in 1553 for selling the bells of St Michaels church for £20, and had various lawsuits against him. He sold the estate in 1580 to Thomas Gawdy (presumably to meet his debts) and as his son Thomas had no male heirs the title and Arms became extinct.

You will note that the WH School badge usually has a dark blue background rather than black – I can only assume that this was done for expediency as the blazers themselves were dark blue. I have also not been able to find out why the wolves’ heads and horizontal bar have a speckled design – a possible explanation is that in a non-coloured heraldic drawing gold is represented by dots – maybe they just got left on there by mistake? Possibly an embroidery error? Or maybe it just differentiates it from the true Coat of Arms, which no one has claimed since about 1600.