Newman of Wessex
Contents of this WebPage-
1. Origins & History of Newmans of Wessex§. Arms of Newman of Wessex10. Newman of Wessex - Descent of Newman of Fifehead Magdalen Manor
§. Map of Wessex, showing Newman Estates & Residences§. Arms of Newman of Evercreech11. Newman of Evercreech
12. Newman of North Cadbury
13. Newman of Hendford Manor
14. Tweed Newmans§. Augmentation Never Assigned (1928, 1991)15. Campbell Newmans of Sydney
16. Newman Branches - Australia
17. Newman Branches - U.K.
GeneWeb Pages Affiliated with this Site-Genealogy 01- Main Page (Index)...Genealogy 05 to 09- Guise of Elmore (& Antecedents)...
SEE- Link: 5. Great Earls of Kent >> Aspley-Guise Pedigree [De Burgh]Genealogy 20- Cromwell, Walford & Tweed...
SEE- Link: 7. Plantagenet & Beaufort
SEE- Link: 8. Grey of Wilton & Ruthyn
SEE- Link: 9. Guise of Elmore >> De Guise Perry DescentSEE- Link: 22. TweedGenealogy 23- Ireland ConnectionsSEE- Link: 26. GabbettGenealogy 31- CampbellSEE- Link: 35. Campbell of Wharf HouseGenealogy 50- Welsh Connections: Webb, Jenkin, Kettle & Davis
SEE- Link: 38. Campbell of YarralumlaSEE- Link: 51. Webb of MoreeGenealogy 60- East European Connections
SEE- Link: 57. Newman of Farnham Hall
SEE- Link: 58. Kettle & JenkinSEE- Link: 60. Aksionov, Lenc & Savor
Other Related GeneWeb Pages-
'Newman Family Tree' of Chris Newman... [definitive & well-sourced ]
References
Map of Wessex -
Places linked with Newman Surname
Go to... (Contents) (Hist) (10) (11) (12) (13) (14) (57) (Refs) (Pics)
1.
Origins & History -
Newmans of Wessex
[Originally intended as a bit of fun, for my three children...]
The name NEWMAN comes from Old English, meaning 'newcomer', and implies that originally the families of Newman were simply foreigners to the Saxon hamlet. As a 'man' was not a serf, it has also been held to imply a created position of trust during Norman feudal times. Norman-French barons would frequently select friendly Saxon 'ealdormen' commanding proven allegiances to assist them in pacifying local communities. Some Newmans hold that their name was originally 'NEWNHAM', meaning 'of the new homestead', a surname which survives in its original form and is especially associated with the town of Nuneham Courtenay in Oxford. The name is commonest in the West Midlands, but seems to have been imported there from further south given its distribution.
Whatever the origins of the surname, the Newmans of Wessex (10) were a clerical family who clearly possessed Norman connections and patronage at an early date, and would have been fluent in Latin and French. Prior to the abolition of the monasteries, they seem to have been well-established in central Wessex as priests of Fifehead, their original home. They followed the custom of early English churchmen by marrying, contrary to edicts of Rome and Canterbury. By the beginning of reliable genealogical records, they had become associated with the Cathedral of St.Thomas at Salisbury. Our ancestor, Robert Newman, will dated 1558, became abbot of Stour Provost and of St.Austyns Abbey, Bristol. He witnessed and probably assisted the reformation of the local Church under Henry VIII, and his son appears to have been well-provided for, since he is recorded as the Squire of Fifehead Magdalen Manor, co. Dorset. He predeceased his father by two years.
The original grant of arms to Newman (§.i) was at an early date, since the grant is exceptionally simple, consisting of three silver mullets on a black field. After 1066 only the feudally enrolled were granted arms by the Heralds, implying an estate in fee simple and French bloodlines. The arms were quartered (§.ii) with an even more ancient family whose shield was plain silver without any devices. The ownership of this grant, and the heiress who bequeathed it, have been lost in the mists of antiquity, but she was probably of one of the families of the SAXON EARLS. The three stars of the blazon are actually spurs or 'mullets', and represent a medieval play on the word 'martlet', the family's heraldic beast. A mythical bird, scaly, half-fish and legless, the martlet can never rest in one place. Eternally restless, later descendants simply called it the 'flighty bird'.
By Tudor times the Newmans had acquired the feudal right of advowson over the Rectorship of Fifehead in Dorset, and installed members of their own family. In 1663, Humphrey Newman of Wincanton died without a male heir, and the advowson passed to his second cousin, Richard Newman of Fifehead Magdalen Manor, who had meantime purchased the investiture of the parish of Sparkford from Lovel, baron of Castle Cary. Richard married into wealthy families twice. He married first on 5th May 1614 Elizabeth SYMONS of Woodford Castle, co. Somerset, who died in childbirth leaving him with a daughter, Anna, later married to Robert WHESTE of Dorset. He married secondly Elizabeth de Guise PERRY, of Castle Kenn, Somerset, sole heiress of the fortune of Christopher Perry and Elinor de Guise. This marriage to the grand-daughter of Sir William GUISE of Elmore, Bart.Royal, placed their children in court circles near the political intrigues of Charles I and Queen Henriette Marie.
On 30th October 1635, Thomas [III] Newman of Fifehead, scholar of Pembroke College Oxford aged 15 years, 'matriculated with his younger brother Richard [II]'. He died in 1668, his estates passing to Colonel Richard Newman, barrister-at-law, first of Evercreech Park (11). Richard put his name, popularity and fortune at the disposal of the royalist faction, and during the early Civil War period was elevated to the War Cabinet as High Steward, roughly equivalent to the office of first minister. Large sums from the Perry-Guise fortune aided Stuart kings Charles I and II. At the Battle of Worcester (1651), Richard held the gates of the City to enable Charles II's retreat, a gallant feat which earned his senior grandson a baronetcy in posthumous gratitude following the King's restoration. As well, the arms of all descendants of Colonel Richard were distinguished by a 'portcullis or [gold] surmounted by a crown' representing service to the crown before the Gates of Worcester (§.iii).
During the interregnum of Cromwell, Richard was imprisoned, but instead of confiscation, his estates were permitted to be overseen by his elder brother Thomas [III]. By 1657 Richard was provisionally free, but restricted to living in Westminster where he practised as a barrister during the later Protectorate, sending considerable financial aid toward restoration of the exiled Charles II. Meanwhile his brother Thomas had become associated with a coven of witches at Wincanton, and was obliquely identified in the Witchfinder-General's report of 1664. The ensuing Somerset Witch Trials established legal precedents, since they were the first for more than a century not to result in executions, nor to have been prosecuted using torture. According to the report, the 'gentleman of Evercreech', i.e. Thomas Newman, was identified as the coven's leader or 'Robin Goodfellow', and also as its convenor and 'man-in-black'. Among the eleven women and one other man, only he and his partner were never charged, 'for want of evidence', or perhaps because he had the right connections.
Richard Newman married Anna, daughter of Sir Charles HARBORD, Surveyor-General to Charles I and II, some time before Charles I was beheaded in 1649, and by her had a large family. He died in 1695, aged 75 years, and was succeeded by his senior grandson, Sir Richard Newman [III] of Preston Hall, who as we saw was created a baronet on 19th December 1699 (§.iv) in recognition of his grandfather's services to the Stuarts. He married Lady Frances, daughter and co-heir of Sir Thomas SAMWELL, baronet of Upton Hall, Northampton, and died on 30 December 1731, leaving his estates and the baronetcy to his son Sir Samwell Newman who died without issue in 1747. The estates of Preston Hall, Evercreech Park and Fifehead Manor passed to his sister Frances [~I] Newman, and were sold when she died unmarried on 25th August 1775. Another surviving sister, Elizabeth KITCHIN, described as 'widow lunatic', was excluded from all rights to property by Act of Parliament in 1754, and died without issue 20 years later in 1774. Instead, Frances adopted in her own will the grandchildren of her aunt Anne Newman, and they on 8th September 1775 assumed by Royal License the NEWMAN surname and arms. At this time various Newman families seem to have relocated, possibly via Farnham co. Dorset, to cos. Hampshire and Surrey, others to Thornbury Park, co. Gloucester.
Anne Newman, eldest child of Richard Newman of Evercreech and Grace née EDMONDS, was senior grandaughter of Colonel Richard Newman cavalier of Westminster (see above). She married Ashburnham TOLL of Greywell, co. Hampshire. Several generations of a junior Toll branch went by the names 'NEWMAN-TOLL', 'ASHBURNHAM- NEWMAN- TOLL' and 'NEWMAN' (by deed poll), before finally settling for 'GOODENOUGH'. The village of Farnham (57), not far west of Evercreech in North Dorset, may have been a staging post for a number of these families on an eastward march, including those of the Toll line, and later Thomas [IV] and brother Richard, who continued from Hampshire into Surrey in the final years of the 17th century, shortly after Thomas [III] of Evercreech disappeared in scandalous circumstances. Thomas, Richard and John seem to have been natural sons of Thomas the 'man-in-black' to a village 'greenwood bride' from Wincanton. This Ann[e] NEWMAN, widow 'late of Hampshire', was a single mother wealthy enough to purchase a cottage and farm near Farnham in co. Surrey, and it was soon after that her sons Thomas and Richard NEWMAN purchased Farnham Manor. Their later descendant, Elizabeth Newman, was a wealthy spinster and landholder seated at Farncombe Hall (fr. ca. 1822 to 1863).
These were evidently large families, dominated by powerful women. One of these, represented by the 'BARTLETT' branch, emigrated to Canada, leaving North Dorset and Gloucester NEWMAN lines to prosper for several generations before sinking afresh into obscurity. Another, claiming a quite early connection, was represented by Elizabeth, descendant of Henry Newman (fl. 1800) of Farnham, and later of Farncombe Hall. Of this branch was the 'NEWMAN KETTLE' family of Sussex, Brecon and Ross-on-Wye (58). A related 'NEWMAN JENKIN' emigré branch was briefly associated with Balranald in the Riverina, and Nowra on the South Coast of N.S.W. up until the 1980's. Other Newmans of Surrey and EPSOM were not directly related to the Wessex families, having acquired their name locally at an earlier date with the meaning of 'STRANGER', later becoming well-known as horticulturalists and speculative builders.
Senior male lineal descent of the WESSEX family was through Francis Hollis Newman, Sheriff of Somerset, 4th son of Colonel Richard. Francis was the first Newman of (North) Cadbury (12). This was an imposing country manor just a few miles north of the archaeological site of Arthur's Camelot, close to Castle Cary. Francis [I] was buried in the grounds of Cadbury on 13th October 1714 aged ca. fifty years, having married Elianor née MOMPESSON of Brewham, one of four daughters of Thomas Mompesson, on 16th March 1689, by whom he had 9 children. Francis [II] Newman, 2nd of Nth.Cadbury, born 5th May 1691, succeeded his father, and was created High Sheriff for Somerset in 1738 and 1744. He married Dorothy GIFFARD of Boreham, Wiltshire, but died without issue, buried at Nth.Cadbury, 26th August 1754. In 1747 he had inherited the investiture of Sparkford from his cousin Sir Samwell Newman.
Francis [II] was succeeded by his nephew Francis [III] [Frank?] Newman, 3rd and last of Nth.Cadbury and of West House, both co. Somerset. This Francis acquired [inherited?], speculated on and built Newman Street near Oxford Street, London, and became associated with Newman Hall, co. Essex, anecdotally both held on credit from William Berner. Curiously however, the Newman Street property appears to have been granted to Colonel Richard as early as the reign of Charles I (Barbara Girvan, 1957; in Chris Newman 'Update', 2013); whilst the Essex estate of Newman Hall, subsequently renamed 'Quendon Hall', has been linked with both Thomas of Fifehead (d. 1649) and with his grandfather, also Thomas (ca. 1540).
In 1752 at Sherbourne, Francis [III] married Jane, daughter of Henry SAMPSON, Clerk Prebend of Wells. He inherited his uncle's grand estate at North Cadbury in 1754/58, and lived a life of extravagance and pleasure, interspersed by duties as a Justice of the Peace from 1771. During a tumultuous tenure he convicted his cousin [William Baily] 'for uttering blasphemous and profane oaths' at a hearing convened in a local pub, resulting in 1776 with Francis [III] being 'struck off the rolls for life' and fined one guinea for 'perverting the course of justice' (Chris Newman 'Francis [Frank] Newman', 2012). With Jane he had three daughters. The eldest, Frances, fought with her father, eloped and married wayward cousin Francis [IV] at Piddletrenthide, co. Dorset in 1778. On May Days, popular for 'greenwood' or 'country' marriages, the two younger daughters were married in lavish extravaganzas at North Cadbury, the second in 1788, in the fashionable rococo style. The elder wed Rev.James ROGERS of Newnton, Wiltshire, Vicar of South Cadbury, the younger Sir William YEA, baronet of St.James, Taunton. Francis James NEWMAN ROGERS married his cousin Julia Eleanora YEA in 1822, whereupon his aunt Frances [~II] NEWMAN of Piddletrenthide bequeathed the Newman Bible to their descendants.
Fond of gambling, alone in a large house after his wife died in 1784, indignant that his nephew, son-in-law and heir, Francis [IV], had already given up his own stake in Cadbury in a drunken gambling binge during his uncle's lifetime, and with mounting debts due to upkeep of a grand country home, Francis 'senior' [III] then lost house and everything else in an all-or-nothing gambling session one luckless evening in 1789/90 to the same BENNETT family, who thereupon became the new owners. Berner [?], sensing his business partner was now insolvent, foreclosed on the other Newman properties in London and Essex. Not unlike Lear, but in reverse order, Francis [III] was now disowned by his flamboyant younger daughters, but evidently reconciled to his elder daughter Frances, newly deserted, and infant grandaughter Charlotte, spending his remaining years with them on the Piddle River at their cottage at Piddletrenthide. He died there, perhaps happier for greater simplicity, on Christmas Day 1796. The sole surviving grandchild from the ill-fated union of daughter and nephew was Frances [~III] Charlotte, unhappily married to Robert COX, an alderman of the City of London and Justice of the Peace, later becoming mistress of famed Shakespearean actor Edmund Kean of The Drury Lane, following which her mother Frances [~II] seems to have adopted the NEWMAN ROGERS family as her own. After some prevarication, possibly with his own conscience, the younger Francis [IV], no longer apparent heir, and sensing his own fortune on a downward spiral if he stayed, deserted for a new life in America.
Francis [IV] Newman seems to have been an inveterate gambler, and like fellow dissolutes spent time in the debtors' prison. Having dissipated his first wife's fortune, and already staked and lost his future inheritance of North Cadbury to the BENNETT family some years before his uncle's spectacular losses, only grand action could rescue the material comforts and prestige to which he had become accustomed. The BENNETT family, seizing the manor as promised, expunged all trace of the former NEWMAN occupants. Francis therefore emigrated, at first intending to elope to America with one of its most wealthy heiresses, Lydia [or Naomi] nee JENNINGS, but this plan was thwarted in France by revolutionary activity and Lydia's ill-timed pregnancy. An offer of accommodation at Chateau Dorne was eagerly accepted. An unabashed flatterer of the French nobility, Francis had his natural son Jean Elisabeth François Georges NEWMAN baptised at the Chateau in 1786. His godfather was the Marquis de Gouttes; his godmother the Contesse d'Alix. In America, Francis [IV] used other connections to become a colonel in the incipient US Army. On Lydia's untimely death in 1796, he married yet another heiress, Elizabeth Hannah FRIERS, by whom he had another four surviving children. Back in Piddletrenthide, Frances bailed her father out of another debtors' prison, and set about trying to recover at law some of what she was owed by her former husband, without success. In America, the second and third Newman families flourished, some of them becoming plantation owners in the deep south.
The second surviving son of Francis [I] Hollis Newman of North Cadbury, was Charles Newman of Sherbourne, who was born in his parents' house in 1694 and buried there on 23rd November 1734. He married Hannah, daughter of Revd.John SANDYS, of a puritan family, by whom he had the colourful Francis [III] who inherited North Cadbury after his uncle's death, and Rev.Henry Newman, Rector of Shepton Beauchamp, who was instituted to the Rectory of Sparkford in 1757. This second son Henry married Ann UNDERWOOD of Leicester, leaving two sons, Francis [IV] formerly of Piddletrenthide, the elder, who deserted his wife and died in America in 1811/17; and Edwin [I] Sandys Newman, Curate of Babcary and Rector of Sparkford (instituted 14th April 1798), the younger. Edwin [I] was educated at Magdalen College, Cambridge, gaining a Bachelor of Laws in 1791, and seems to have practiced as a Barrister before a career as Curate. He married Frances daughter of Allen LYDE of Lavender House, Berry Pomeroy, co. Devon, and died 19th April 1836, buried at Babcary.
Edwin [I] was succeeded by his only surviving son, Edwin [II] Newman, first Squire of Hendford Manor (13), Yeovil, co. Somerset, born ca. 1795. A gentleman farmer and Justice of the Peace, he also inherited the advowson right over Sparkford. Hendford Manor appears to have been a rambling farm manor with many rooms and rising damp. Animals were regularly brought into the house for warmth during cold spells, and several generations and related families lived under the same roof. In 1834/5 Edwin [II] married Charlotte JECKYLL who contracted tuberculosis, or 'consumption', in the cold, damp conditions of the home, and may already have carried the infection. CETN thought it was from her cow's infected milk. Whatever the source, she passed it on to four generations of descendants. Edwin [II] is recorded as having the 'gift of living [right of investiture] of the parish of Hawkridge with Withypool' in the 'wilds of Exmoor', as well as Sparkford. He died 22 January 1885, aged ca. 90 years, the only Newman of Hendford to have been 'TB-free'.
Five sons of the Squire of Hendford were successively educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, each occupying the same room, later known as the 'Newman Room'. The eldest, Edwin and George, founded the firm 'Newman, Newman, Newman and Paynter, Solicitors', whilst a daughter, Henrietta, married the partner Henry Paynter, and a grandson, Walter [II] Newman (b.1865/6) married his cousin Lilian Paynter. Another grandson, Edwin [IV] was killed in action in Africa in 1885. Walter [II]'s son Colonel Harold Ernest Montague Newman, soldier, engineer and farmer (b.1900), returned to the West Country after service in India, Burma and Germany during WWII; his descendants represent the senior branch of Newman (13a). An eighth son, Rowland [I] Newman, became Rector of Lufton (1871), and later of 'Yeovil, Hawkridge with Withypool' in Exmoor (1876). Ordainded in 1870, he finally succumbed to TB in 1919, some years later than brothers Joseph and Charles. I understand that his son Rowland [II], born 1878, was invested as Rector of Sparkford by his cousin Harold before the right was abolished by regulation during [?] the 1939-45 War, and later followed his father in accepting Withypool in Exmoor. He suffered from bone TB, losing at least one limb during lifelong illness. He refused surgery to amputate another limb, and died of the illness in 1958 aged ca. 80 years. He was remembered fondly.
Most of the foregoing is based on reminiscences of my grandfather 'CETN', although dates are either from documents, including the College of Arms 'Pedigree of Newman' in my father's possession, or imputed from events described. From this point, however, family records supplement these sources.
Arthur Newman, born 9th October 1843 at Yeovil, seventh son, fourth of the 'Newman Room' Trinity College, gained his BA in 1867, MA in 1873, but had already been created Vicar of Wembdon in 1870. On completion of his BA, he married on 21st February 1867, at Royal Ascott, Charlotte daughter of Revd.James Peers TWEED of co. Essex. One of the last 'hunting, shooting and fishing' parsons, he obtained fame from newspaper reports of the case of George Chilcott, labourer, a parishioner declared dead whom Revd. Newman refused to bury, instead keeping a coffin vigil for three days 'whereafter Mr.Chilcott showed signs of life and later made a full recovery' [reported in Bridgewater Times, c.1880]. A capable high churchman, he was created Chaplain of Bridgewater Union (1885), and Vicar of Axminster, co. Devon (ca. 1900). In midlife he absconded from his parish with a mistress, ready to embark for America. Intercepted by his brother Rowland [I] on the ship just before departure, he was persuaded to return, but found a petition from the parishioners of Axminster nailed to the locked door of the Church barring him from entry. Effectively sacked, he died at Cumberland Lodge, Parkstone, co. Dorset, 2nd January 1915 aged 72 years. Staunchly Tory and conservative, he disinherited his son for being 'not only Whig, but worse a radical'. His estranged wife Charlotte survived him, dying 23rd March 1924 at their son's Vicarage in Whittlesey, co. Cambridge, aged ca. 80 years. A descendant of the CROMWELL, DISBROWE and WALFORD 'parliamentary' or 'roundhead' families of East Anglia, and of Spurgeon TWEED, famous cloth-maker, two generations of her descendants bore the name TWEED NEWMAN (14)
Arthur Edwin Tweed Newman, Vicar of Whittlesey, co. Cambridge, was born 8th December 1867 at Hendford Manor. Educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, after gaining a Mathematics scholarship in 1887, he became President of the Union and gained a BA Honours in 1889. At this time his main interests were mathematics, theology and politics, which coalesced in the new science of political economics, although this was not then entirely respectable. Ordained in 1893, he served as London Curate of the Holy Trinity Church at Hoxton (1892-5), Vicar of St.Barnabas South Kensington, co. Surrey (1895-7), and of Granborough, Buckinghamshire (1897-1907). In 1894, working in a soup kitchen in London, he met Alice Kate GABBETT, grand-niece of William Smith O'Brien, revolutionary Irish MP of Dublin (and sometime political prisoner). They were married in co. Donegal, N-Ireland, before returning to parish and busy political life in England, and had two daughters and four sons before her premature death of septicaemia in 1907 aged just 30 years.
A radical liberal, from the 1890s he was a proxy-orator during elections for politician aristocrats Rothschild and Wedgwood, both of whom had speech defects. After relations with his father soured to the point of disinheritance, and mourning the deaths of his first wife (1907) and elder son (1915), whilst watching the decline of his beloved Liberals after the Great War (1918), he resigned the remainder of his life to delivering sermons as Vicar of St.Andrews Whittlesey (1907-44). These were carefully composed vignettes which attempted to unite his intellectual, theological and political conceptions with a strong and theatrical rhetoric that would appeal to ordinary Englishmen. Handicaps included bouts of consumption throughout his life, a legacy of TB from Hendford, and binge drinking. Before and during World War II his sermons gained notoriety and drew large congregations which spilled out into the street. In 1908 he married, secondly, Florence Elsie PRICE, daughter of a local butcher, by whom he had two sons, Francis 'Frank' Newman, a mechanic, and Arthur [IV] 'Jerry' Newman, a parson in the high church. Arthur [II] died on 28th May 1944, buried at East Preston, co. Surrey, aged 76 years, survived by his six sons and two daughters.
Colonel Charles Edwin Tweed Newman of the Rajputana Rifles, Indian Army, later of New South Wales, was his eldest surviving son after Arthur [III] Maurice Tweed Newman was killed in action at Aubers Ridge in France on 9th May 1915. Born 2nd July 1898 at The Rectory, Granborough, co. Buckinghamshire, Charles was sponsored with his brother Maurice to go to Christ's Hospital School in London by a wealthy benefactress, Mrs.Thompson. She would occasionally drive them about London in her carriage-and-four with dogs and liveried coachmen. Slightly dyslexic, Charles preferred to leave his homework to his brother Maurice whilst he played cricket. In 1915, aged 16 years, he followed his brother by enlisting. Asked by his Commanding Officer which position he played, he naively replied that he played 'slips', and was given the job of catching German grenades in the trenches. This normally carried a life expectancy of just six weeks. Surviving on his wits for eighteen months, with some drops and near misses, his war service ended when he accidentally dropped a heavy munitions box on his arm, forcing him to recover in hospital. Though 'gonged' for seeing action, he suffered shell shock, spending months after the War seeking solitude in the rear pews of churches, whilst developing a distaste for the joyless religion he saw practiced there. In 1919 he was asked if he wished to accept a commission, and graduated as a junior officer. From then until 1945 he served in India, and as Major again saw active service on the North-West Frontier [Afghanistan] in 1929. During the Second World War he became Acting Brigade CO of the 7th Battalion, XIX Hyderabad Regiment (1943-45), training troops for action in Burma against the Japanese Imperial Army. After several Courts Martial for insubordination, in which he took a keen interest in his own defence and gratified a latent talent for legal argument, he retired Lieutenant Colonel in 1945.
An avid hunter until a close encounter with a tiger in its lair led to a mutual and respectful truce, he devoted much of his energy instead to being a successful sportsman. In 1926 he travelled to Australia to buy ponies for polo cross, where he met and married the following year Kate Agnes Margaret Annabella CAMPBELL of Yarralumla Station, Canberra (39), whose father Frederick insisted that all descendants bear the name and blazon of Campbell in addition to or instead of those of Newman. Frederick died just before his first grandson Maurice Charles Campbell Newman (15) was born in Sydney on 21st December 1928. He was baptised twice, once as 'Charles Campbell', then in a second ceremony the same day as 'Maurice Newman'. Since 1950 the Australian family has lived in or near Bellevue Hill, Sydney, N.S.W., and later in other eastern mainland states. Colonel Charles Newman died on 20th March 1985, aged 87 years.
Maurice Newman was married in 1955 at St.Philip's Church, Sydney, to Maureen Noela WEBB of Sydney, whose parents were from Moree and Mudgee in country NSW. Her mother's mother was Elizabeth NEWMAN KETTLE, a descendant of the Newmans of Farnham, co. Surrey, and therefore of Thomas [III] (d. 1668), 'the Swallow'.
After 1928, the arms of Newman and Campbell were to have been merged, although the change was never registered. Due to the rules of heraldry which forbid metals gold [or] and silver [argent] being quartered, the change would have required a bar or bisecting band. The proper colour for the separation is blue [azure] since this derives from an existing colour (third quarter field of the Campbell of Duntroon blazon), and when merged the two sets of heraldic devices might be set off without ambiguity against the azure field. Poetically apt for the late 20th and early 21st centuries, suggesting 'twilight before nightfall' (§.v), it might also be done with a more aesthetically appealing green [vert] bar, the Campbell gyronny above and Newman mullets below. (§.vi) I understand the 'gyronny' represents the 'Annwn' or 'Celtic heaven'. My younger son Sascha always liked this version, although it also disconcertingly reminds me of global warming.
The CAMPBELL NEWMAN's are therefore Maurice Charles Campbell Newman, barrister, born 21st December 1928, his son Campbell Alexander Newman, born 25th April 1957 [me], my cousin Malcolm Sandys Campbell Newman, pilot, born [?] 1964, my son Mischa Alexander Campbell Newman, born 11th March 1989, my daughter Anoushka Julijana Campbell Newman, born 20th January 1991, and my youngest son Sascha Nikolai Campbell Newman, born 27th December 1991. I married first, on 17th December 1983, Brenda AKSIONOV of Melbourne, whose parents were from Croatia in the former Yugoslavia; and secondly, on 27th May 2006, Wendy PATTERSON of the Gold Coast, Queensland, whose parents were of Lancashire, England.
All of this seems a far cry from a lucky Norman-Saxon alliance of Wessex families, probably occurring in the 13th century. At the centre of that drama was a Saxon woman significantly more important than her Anglo-French man, but the politics can only be guessed at, and both of their identities are lost.
The Newman motto is the ecclesiastical and therefore strange one, for defiantly married priests of their time, 'Lux mea Christus' ('Christ my light'). It would have resulted in elegant metre and rhyme with the Campbell one 'Agite pro viribus' ('work with all your might') following. The Martlet could have flown above, the Boar's Head of the Campbells rendered less terrible as an insignia atop the ship's mast, with the defeated Gordon clan's 'hairy arm' at the prow. Fred Campbell, however, wanted total Campbel-isation, which his daughter, my paternal grandmother, firmly rejected. As with the Tweed union, which from the number of Tweed Newmans appears to have brought similar pressures to bear, the Newmans eventually benefited whilst refusing to quarter or worse hyphenate the names.
C.E.T. Newman often said that he was the descendant of 'a gambler, a rake and a drunk, and that [he] therefore must be the fool'. He enjoyed this private joke, which I never could quite grasp. By turns cunning and amusing, with a persistent Indian Army streak, my grandmother called him 'Shaaal', i.e. 'Charles' with a French accent, perhaps thinking of the laughing cavalier. Most Newmans, according to him, had been 'passengers', something far worse than merely bad. The records show many clergymen, three gambling addicts, two lunatics, a witch, several rakes, three colonels, two major-generals, and quite a collection of heiresses.
Pondering this, I thought to myself that not a few of us had been 'bounders' as well, including some not mentioned hitherto. There has always been a readiness to move literally and quickly away from parents, children, siblings or spouses alike, for such reasons as elopement, a new life, excitement, ephemeral happiness, or due to conflict or debt. I suspect these have rarely been without some grief both for what has been lost, and for the realisation that others have been hurt in thoughtless pursuit of false idylls, personal prosperity or mere isolative exoticism.
If there are common Newman themes, they are restlessness and risk-taking, whether organised on the sports field or impulsively acted out in life. Other themes have included adventurism that has led to opportunism, wealth and luxury, a series of spectacular wrecks along the way, contrasting strains of political partisanship, often turning full circle and volte face; also on occasion to moral and physical courage. Above all marriage, and therefore women, have played more central roles than birth in fortune and wreck. Unfortunately, patriarchal history to date gives little clue to the characters behind the named and highly flawed procession of players.
Photograph (1927) of Nth. Cadbury & Newman Cemetery…
'' This is the moral of all human tales,
'Tis but the rehearsal of the past;
First Freedom, and then Glory; when that fails,
Wealth, Vice, Corruption, - and Barbarism at last;
And History with all her volumes vast
Hath but one tale" (Byron 'Childe Harolde', 1817).
POSTSCRIPT.
After withdrawing this article because I felt it was confusing, and unduly obsessed with the Y-chromosome, it is here revived in an unfinished state of [de-]composition. This I have done to dispel impressions that have arisen as the result of edited publication of an earlier inferior version on the internet of which my conscience had only then become aware. In particular, as will be seen following, this project has been the result of considerable, if not overly pedantic research, not least by my grandfather, who spent many months in England wandering about cemeteries, peering into parish records, and finally going to the trouble and expense of having his researches confirmed and certified by the College of Heralds. If my article is 'apocryphal', it was never lost as a 'defunct website', but rather deliberately withdrawn for many reasons. My notes were originally intended only as a story-telling exercise for the amusement of my three children, and published at a time when the internet was not of such keen interest to historians and genealogists. I hope I have succeeded in removing passages that seemed to me, on briefest revision and re-aquaintance, to have had fatal flaws, genealogical and stylistic. Chris has done a wonderful job, this is offered simply as an amusing diversion, with some speculation to give it the breath of life, but necessarily entailing historical risk.
My other passion, apart from story-telling, is with heraldic devices. That has not dimmed over the years, and I hope that the cryptic and mythic symbols making up Newman blazons, with all their visual drama, may be of some interest. An excellent resource for 'Newman Coats of Arms' has been created by John Lehman (2015).
The family trees regrettably cannot be recalled or corrected with my limited technical expertise. It has been suggested that they are riddled with error, for which I ask the reader's indulgence. However, on reflection, errors in the family trees are overwhelmingly to do with my earlier ignorance of the Hendford line; Chris Newman's website offers scholarly correction of these. Other genealogical trees were copied word for word, painstakingly, from the official College document (1965), which carried sufficient weight with the British High Commission for me to use it instead of birth certificates to obtain work visas to the U.K. from Australia twice, in 1975 and 1988 respectively.
One of my themes is that Thomas [III] is plainly described in the College document as being 'elder brother' of Colonel Richard of the Worcester Gate, and to have died 'within his father's lifetime', not in infancy. He is also described as having died 's.p.', in other words without 'legitimate' issue. The mysterious emergence of Anne, Richard and Thomas [junior] in 1685, with sufficient funds to purchase 'Farnham Manor' in co. Surrey, within twenty-one years of the Witchfinder's report (co. Somerset, 1664) mentioning the fugitive 'gentleman of Evercreech', suggests that he had illegitimate children. As a first name 'Thomas' is common in the Somerset family before 1664, but after that was all but wiped out after one generation; whereas in the Surrey family, it was given to firstborn sons.
My story is speculative, and open to correction if better evidence comes to light; but the descent of Elizabeth of Farncombe from mysterious Newmans who arrived in Surrey from the West Country in the 17th century with chivalrous pretensions is fairly clear. One family's dark scandal seems to have heralded another's brief golden dawn. Whoever lies interred in the table-tomb near the church tower outside the chapel at Fifehead may remain something of a mystery. The marble tub purports to house the remains of 'Thomas, gentleman', born 1619, died 5th April, 1668, under the haunting but poetic inscription, 'One swallow doth not make the spring'. Those who seek elucidation must ask, 'Why not?' Presumably the 'swallow' is Thomas, since 'martlet' symbolises 'Newman'; 'spring' in post-Reformation religious metaphor, 'heaven'. Thomas may have been liked well enough, yet was considered by close members of his Wessex family to have lived a damnable life, if my reading is correct. Retrieval of family blazons from the Surrey Newmans could help build more evidence.
Whilst my account is organic and collaborative, of reasonable factualness for much that has been checked and verified, it is obviously of a more speculative and fabulous kind the further back I have delved. We are all human, and of one family, even more linked by kin-myth than by blood or genes, and in a nearer past than might be guessed. It is said that most Englishmen are descendants of Edward III (including Newmans, via the Guise connection), and that even more share the DNA of his extraordinary mother, the wild and dangerous Isabella of France. Or, to quote the wise words of my late uncle Sandys, 'we are all related if you go back far enough, and that is not very far'.
I should point out that the Epsom-and-Surrey Newman family is quite distinct. They were gardeners, builders and developers, having no earlier connection with Wessex, but apparently having an old and venerable connection with Middlesex and Surrey.
For those interested, Chris and I are third cousins once removed, by my calculation. His father and my grandfather were second cousins, and Chris has elsewhere published his father's amusing account of their chance meeting in a railway carriage in India, where I understand both were 'Colonel Newman'. My grandfather had a more than passing resemblance to his cousin (once removed) 'Claude', also a soldier; and Rowland [II] 'Rowie' Newman, Vicar of Hawkridge and Withypool in the 'wilds of Exmoor' bore a striking resemblance both to my great-grandfather Arthur Edwin Tweed Newman, Vicar of Whittlesey, co. Cambridge, and to Arthur's youngest son Frank, who I understand was christened 'Francis'. By pure coincidence, Chris and I not only lived in Australia, but in the state of Queensland, where we arranged to meet one hot afternoon on a Gold Coast beach. I am indebted to Chris for much of the honing information that has corrected some initial and rash exploration. Since then I have become increasingly interested in the undocumented but obviously pervasive female influences in an overly male-centred story, and although the nature of our society engendered this because it has been patriarchal, the roles of women are likely keys to at least half its understanding.
Then again, whilst based on assiduous research, this is also meant as a bit of fun, not to be taken too seriously. The only exception is the allusion to themes. The 'martlet' or 'flighty bird' theme of charmed restlessness applies to most of us shackled to this world of post-industrial disappointment, with the choice between virtuous and negligent outlets for restlessness the key to its understanding.
Finally, where there is conflict between textual narrative and the charts or map, I urge the reader to give greater weight to the more considered, and ten years' later textual version.
'Lux mea Christus, agite pro viribus'
'Christ my light, work with all your might'
or...
'Work like hell!' (CETN)
C.A.Newman
29th January, 2011; revised, 27th August, 2019.
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(11) Newman of Evercreech...
Back to top of Page...
Heraldry of Newman §. 1 & 2
Newman of Fifehead Magdalen (1405, 1556)
(12) Newmans of North
Cadbury...
(57) Newmans of Farnham
Hall...
Heraldry of Newman §. 3 and 4
Newman Baronet of Fifehead, Evercreech &
Preston Hall (1699)
12.
Newman of North Cadbury
Back to Text (12)...
13. Newman
of Hendford
Back to Text (13)...
14. Tweed Newman
Back to Text (14)...
15. Newman
of Sydney
<THIS LINK UNDER CONSTRUCTION>
Heraldry of Newman §. 5 & 6
'Campbell Newman' (1928) [never registered] Sascha's preference (1995), aged 4 yrs
Motto 'Lux mea Christus
Agite pro viribus'
'Christ my light,
Work with all your might' (C.E.T. Newman, ca. 1970);
--or, in the vulgate, 'Work like hell ! '... [his translation] ).
16. Newman
Branches- Australia
<THIS LINK UNDER CONSTRUCTION>
17. Newman
Branches- U.K.
<THIS LINK UNDER CONSTRUCTION>
57.
Newman of Farnham
<THIS LINK UNDER CONSTRUCTION>
Or see, 'Speculative Family Tree of Farnham...
incl. 'Bibliography' & 'Footnotes to the Text'...
Please feel free to contact me with any new material, requests for information, questions or corrections.
All enquiries are welcome, and will be answered in order. Please don't be offended if a response takes a while, it will come eventually!
Email me at canewman@optusnet.com.au
'One swallow doth not make the spring'.
Fr. table-top tomb of last Thomas of Fifehead, d. May 1668 [?], elder brother of Col. Richard, overseer of estate of Evercreech Park during his brother's absences.
My thesis is that he had a natural wife, Anne Newman, and sons Richard and Thomas, who after a brief sojourn at Farnham, co. Dorset, and at a farm in Hampshire near their cousins the Tolls, bought lands in Churt and Frensham, then Farnham Manor and some time later Farncombe Hall, both co. Surrey; the Surrey 'Farnham' was a memory of Wessex, meaning 'where ferns grow'.
Although Aristotle suggested the proverb in his Nichomachian Ethics (4th C. BCE), with translators ensuring its popularity in England by the 17th century, the meaning remains cryptic. On the surface, it simply warns against fallacy based on generalisation, particularly of the type associated with darting passions heralding 'false springs'. More deeply, it suggests that only dualism and complementarity, whether of genders, family or humanity, can bring about true prosperity and bloom.
As an epitaph it looks bleak, since it suggests that the person to whom it refers is a 'one-off' who never attained the spring. However it had a new vogue when it was popularised in theosophical circles, with an entirely different, and optimistic connotation-
Thou know'st one swallow doth not make the Spring,
Nor two, nor twenty. Spring is in the heart.
And when the swallow lights, and folds his wing,
And glad earth, breaking, bears a thousand buds,
Whose perfume steals like music to the soul,
Yet shall cold winter freeze the ice-bound heart.
And when the swallow flies, and Winter's snow
Earth's beauty drapes beneath her winding sheet,
Yet in some hearts Spring's flowers are blushing still,
Fragrant, unseen, untouched by frost or chill.
This then the wish my heart shall breathe for thee,
'Mid all the joys which haply thine shall be,
Thro' Summer, Winter, onward to thy rest,
The heart of Spring beat ever in thy breast!' (Kaber Harrison, 1910).
Quite fitting for a family caught between stodgy respectability, eccentric adventurism and a love of nature, whose badge is the restless, fish-scaled martlet, the 'flighty bird' that finds it hard not to pursue a life of endless though tiring movement, soaring towards the sun, or diving and delving into the depths of night. Perhaps to live it is better sometimes to stop and gather some moss, but maybe 'flighty birds' do gather their own souvenirs of heaven on the wing: if only the judging eye were wise enough to see.
[Revised: March 17, 2012; August 27, 2019]
