The Townshend family can lay claim to a long and illustrious line of descent in the direct male line traceable from the fifteenth century. The real founder of the family was Sir Roger Townshend. Born about 1430, he was in September 1454 admitted as a student of law at Lincoln's Inn in London and was later appointed Governor of that institution in 1461. In 1466 he was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Norfolk and in April 1467 was returned to Parliament as the member for Bramber in Sussex. He continued his legal career at Lincoln's Inn where he was appointed a Reader in 1468. His legal practice was evidently considerable, and in November 1469 he enlarged his Norfolk estates by purchasing the Manor of East Beckham and other lands from Sir John Paston. He seems to have acted as legal advisor to the Paston family and in June 1470 he was counsel to John Paston who was tried on a charge of Felony at the Norwich sessions for shooting two men. Sir John Paston borrowed money from him and by 1477 owed him four hundred marks. Roger was again returned to Parliament in September 1472, this time representing Calne in Wiltshire.

Roger Townshend was a capable and distinguished lawyer. He continued as a Reader at Lincoln's Inn in 1474 and in June 1478 was made a Sergeant-at-Law, becoming King's Sergeant in 1481. In September 1485 he was elevated to the Bench as a Justice of the Court of Common Pleas by Richard III. He was retained in this position by Henry VII who knighted him at Worcester on Whitsunday in 1486. He remained a Judge of this Court until his death in 1493.

Sir Roger married Eleanor, the daughter of William Lunsford of Lunsford and Battle in Sussex. Their youngest daughter, Thomasine, married Sir Thomas Wodehouse, who was created a knight of the Bath at the marriage of Arthur, Prince of Wales and was ancestor of the Earls of Kimberley. Sir Roger Townshend died on 9 November 1493 and was succeeded at Raynham by his son, Roger.

The younger Roger Townshend did not assume complete possession of the family estates until his mother's death in September 1500. Born about 1478, he too was educated for the law at Lincoln's Inn where he was admitted in 1496. However he did not make much headway with the law and instead devoted himself to his lands and to local affairs. He served against the French in 1512 and 1513, in which year he provided a force of thirty men, but found most success in the administration of his county, especially during the upheaval of the Reformation. In 1513 he was appointed a Commissioner for the raising of the sum of one hundred and sixty three thousand pounds by a poll tax to pay for the French War. He was a Justice of the Peace for Norfolk from 1501 to 1513 and then from 1524 until his death in 1551. He held the important office of High Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk three times in 1511, 1518 and again in 1526 and acted on many commissions at the behest of the Government. He was knighted by Henry VIII in 1518 and twice represented Norfolk in Parliament, in 1529 and 1542.

In 1536 Sir Roger Townshend was consulted by the third Duke of Norfolk as to the probable yield of the subsidy in that County, and throughout the 1530s he was in constant correspondence with Cromwell, giving news of any disaffection, heresy or treason. He was particularly active in the dissolution of the monasteries during the reformation. "Would that the King had three of four such as Townshend in every shire", wrote the Duke of Norfolk in 1538. In 1528 Sir Roger had been one of the councillors hearing cases in the Court of Requests and he was called 'King's Councillor' as late as 1549. The new reign following the death of Henry VIII saw no cessation of his activities and on 2 February 1547 he was one of four gentlemen whom the Privy Council bade secure East Anglia and four years later, only a few months before his death, he was one of three commissioned to act as lieutenants of Norfolk.

Sir Roger Townshend's son-in-law Sir Edmund Wyndham was High Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk in 1547 when William and Robert Kett raised their rebellion in Wymondham and blockaded Norwich. The rebellion was a protest against the steady progress of the agrarian revolution and against the rise in prices that was pressing hardly on the poor. Riding into Kett's camp Sir Edmund boldly proclaimed Kett's followers rebels and commanded them in the King's name to disperse. They were greatly offended at his words and crowded around him, but he was well enough mounted to break through them and ride away to Norwich. Nevertheless the following day Sir Roger, believing that the rebels would respect him as a near neighbour, determined to try persuasion instead to threats. Taking with him his servants and three carts, laden with beer and provisions, he advanced into the camp and was treated worse than Wyndham. He was seized, stripped and made a prisoner and would have been slain but for the courage of his servants.

During the half century of his public activity Sir Roger Townshend did not neglect his own interests. The twenty manors that he inherited from his father were valued at just under £100 a year, but by 1500 he himself estimated his annual income to be £250. He added some properties before 1536, but it was after the dissolution of the monasteries that he made his greatest acquisitions. Between 1536 and 1541 he bought or obtained by exchange at least six manors and much other land. His aim seems to have been to consolidate his holdings around his chief manor at Raynham and eventually he owned a score of manors within a ten mile radius as well as a number of others only a little further away.

Sir Roger Townshend was a man of sufficient resources to have secured his election as senior knight of the shire from 1529, but as an increasingly valued servant of the Crown he could also have counted on official support. By the end of the Parliament of 1542 Sir Roger was an elderly man, and although he remained active until the end of his life he had already begun to provide for his family. In 1537-8 he settled a number of estates on himself and his wife with remainder to his heir. As early as 1511 he had settled four manors on his eldest son John and his wife. In 1537 he allotted considerable estates to his grandson Richard on his marriage, and between 1536 and 1550 he provided for his younger sons. Although his children were numerous his estates were to yield an ample heritage.

Sir Roger married Anne Brewes, the daughter and co-heir of William Brewes of Stinton Hall in Norfolk. Anne's grandfather Sir Thomas Brewes had been High Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk in 1438 and 1442 and she was a descendant of the ancient Barons Braose of Bramber who settled in England with William the Conqueror.

Front view of Raynham Hall, Norfolk outside view   inside view   NEW colour view

Sir Roger Townshend died on 25 November 1551 and was succeeded at Raynham by his six year old great-grandson Roger, his eldest son John and his eldest grandson Richard both having predeceased him. The younger Roger's inheritance was a rich one and one which his descendants proved worthy of. This Roger was knighted in 1588 for his spirited conduct against the Spanish Armada and died in 1590. His direct descendants in the male line continue at Raynham to this day, his grandson, another Sir Roger, being created a Baronet in April 1617, and that Sir Roger's grandson, Horatio, being created Baron Townshend in 1660 and later Viscount Townshend in 1682. Charles, second Viscount Townshend was Lord Lieutenant of Norfolk, Ambassador to the Netherlands and Lord President of the Council in 1721. His daughter married an Archbishop of Canterbury and his son, the third Viscount Townshend, after retiring from public life, devoted his attention to the improvement of his estates and is remembered in history as 'Turnip Townshend'. The fourth Viscount Townshend was a Field Marshall in the army and was created Marquis Townshend in 1787. The first Marquis' brother, Charles, served as chancellor of the Exchequer in 1766 and died on the point of being appointed Prime Minister. The current seventh Marquis Townshend still resides at Raynham.

However it is from Sir Roger and Anne Brewes' second son, Sir Robert Townshend, that the Townshends of New Zealand descend. Sir Robert Townshend, like his father and grandfather before him, was trained in the law. He was admitted to Lincoln's Inn and in the early part of the reign of Henry VIII became eminent in the study of law, being retained by Queen Jane Seymour. He was sufficiently distinguished to be appointed Serjeant-at-law in 1540 and King's Serjeant in 1541. In May 1541 he was elevated to the Bench as Lord Chief Justice of Chester. He was later knighted by Henry VIII at Hampton Court on Trinity Sunday in 1545 and was a member of the Council in the Principality and Marches of Wales.

Sir Robert Townshend married Alice Poppy, the daughter of Robert Poppy of Twyford in Norfolk, the marriage indenture bearing the date 1 October 1516. By right of his wife's family Sir Robert possessed the advowson of Twyford, and in that capacity appointed Robert Jary vicar of Twyford in 1541, and Robert Watson to the same position in 1554. Sir Robert died on 8 February 1556/7, possessed of the manors and rectories of Twyford and Guyst, the manors of Swanton, Foxley and Southwell in Norfolk and the priory house of St. Augustine in Ludlow, Shropshire.

The alter tomb of Sir Robert Townshend in Ludlow Church. He died in 1556/57. Click here for another view

He was buried in the high chancel of Ludlow Parish Church in an alter tomb. On the top of the tomb, which still exists in excellent condition, are the full length recumbent figures of the old knight in full armour, and his lady dressed in the costume of the day, while figures of the children surround the tomb. Over the monument is a beautiful gothic arch and the family crest, and beneath the gothic window is the inscription:

"Here lyeth the body of Sir Robert Townshend, Knight, Chief Justice of the Council in the Marches of Wales and Chester, and Dame Alice his wife, daughter and one of their heirs of Robert Poppy, Esquire, who had between them twelve children, six sons and six daughters lawfully begotten."

On the panelling of the monument are the names of the children, the names of Thomas, Robert, Isaac and Henry being still visible.

Sir Robert Townshend's eldest son Thomas inherited most of his father's properties and resided at Mergate Hall at Braconash in Norfolk. He was a man of great wealth and possessions and kept considerable state at Mergate Hall, a house of some pretensions, indeed Queen Elizabeth dined with Thomas and his wife there in July 1578. Thomas' wife was Elizabeth, the widow of Sir Humphrey Style, and although he conformed to the reformed religion she refused to do so and remained a catholic. This refusal to conform prompted the Bishop of Norwich to write to Thomas in 1571 in the following terms:

"Dated at Ludham, this 12th day of February 1571.
To Mr Townshend of Braconash.

After my hearty commendation, I have been often advised that you and My Lady, your wife, do absent yourselves from Church, and hearing the divine service, and the receiving the sacrament. I have still hoped that my favourite forbearing, together with your duties in this behalf, would have moved you to have conformed yourself, and yet I hear, and thank God for it, that for your own part you come on very well, and shall by God's grace increase daily.

But touching My Lady, I hear that she is wilfully bent, and little hopes as yet, for her reformation, to the displeasure of Almighty God, the breach of Her Majesty's laws, and my danger and peril to suffer so long, and an evil example and encouragement to others. And because I am sharply called upon by some in authority to see the speedy reformation of such abuses either else to certify such disobedience that it may be reformed elsewhere, I have thought good at this time by my friendly letters to admonish you and you wife, that for her own part chiefly she may be more diligent henceforth to the Church, to hear the words of God, to receive the sacrament according to the richest institution of the Gospel of Christ to her comfort, as she hath done before hand time, as I have heard, in the time of King Edward and since the days of Queen Mary in popery and blindness, when that sacrament was abused, and yet the half thereof taken away from the people and when prayers were made in strange tongues, neither edifying to the hearer nor to the utterer for the most part. St. Augustine saith, "Set apart the understanding of the mind tho man hath fruit or profit of the things he perceiveth not" and again, "What profit is there in speech, be it never so perfect, if the understanding of the hearer can not attain it". St. John saith "This is the condemnation of the World", that " Light has come into the World, and men love darkness more than light." I could use many authorities, but it would be tedious. The fault is great in a subject to disobey the law established, and to give examples of disobedience to others in keeping a form of honouring God to his dishonour under a vain colour of zeal, but contrary to knowledge.

My duty and place of calling, together with my conscience Godward, cannot suffer me to know such disorder, and to suffer the same any longer, and, therefore, I desire you both from henceforth to frequent the Church and receive the sacrament, as becometh Christians, as I may be certified forthwith, both of the one and of the other, which I look for, otherwise this is most assured, I will not fail to complain of you both to Her Majesty's Council, wherewith neither of you shall have just cause to be offended, since you are so friendly admonished of your faults and have so long a time to amend.

And thus I bid you heartily farewell.
John, Bishop of Norwich."

Thomas Townshend had several children and died in June 1591. One of his daughters married Ambrose Clive, and was the ancestor in the sixth generation of Robert, Lord Clive of India, who established the British Empire in India. His only surviving son, Henry, lived at Gedding in Suffolk and died in 1625. Henry Townshend's son, Thomas, settled at Lynn in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in North America in 1636 and died there in 1677. His descendants are prolific and are now scattered all over the United States.

Sir Robert Townshend's third son, Henry, followed his father into the law. He was educated in the tradition of his immediate ancestors at Lincoln's Inn where he was admitted in 1559. He was called to the Bar in 1569 and was returned to Parliament as the member for Bridgenorth in Shropshire in 1571 and 1572. He returned to legal practice and was appointed to the bench as Deputy Justice of Chester in 1577, in which position he remained until his death. He was additionally appointed a Judge of the Sheriff's Court of London and from 1576 was also a member of the King's Council in the Principality and Marches of Wales. A reference to his judicial style is contained in the State Papers of January 1620 as follows:

"Petition of John Edwards, prisoner in the Marshallsea, to the Council. Is sorry for having offended Sir Thomas Chamberlain and Sir Henry Townshend by contrasting in his letter the leniency of the King and his council towards himself, a recusant, with their severity, begs release being old and infirm, and having a lawsuit pending which concerns his posterity."

Henry Townshend was knighted by King James I at Whitehall in 1604 and was appointed Vice-Chamberlain of Chester in the same year. His first wife was a daughter of Sir Rowland Hayward, Lord Mayor of London. His eldest son, Hayward, was returned to Parliament for Bishop's Castle in Norfolk in 1597 and 1601, but was unfortunately denied a promising parliamentary career by his early death in 1604.

Sir Henry Townshend's youngest son, Henry, married a daughter of Sir John Acton of Elmley Lovett in Worcestershire, which estate and house he inherited from his father-in-law and remained the seat of his descendants down to the eighteenth century. Henry Townshend, of Elmley Lovett, kept a diary which is often quoted as the most important Worcestershire source on the civil war. One of Sir Henry Townshend's daughters, Mary, married Sir Philip Cromwell, uncle of the Lord Protector of England, Oliver Cromwell. One of her sons, Philip Cromwell, was killed at Bristol in September 1645 fighting for the Parliamentary cause against the King. However, and as so often happened during this dark period in English history when brother fought against brother, another of her sons, Thomas, fought on the opposing Royalist side. The family, like so many others was divided by the civil war, indeed Henry Townshend of Elmley Lovett was a Royalist Commissioner.

An interesting reference to Sir Henry Townshend's second wife is contained in the State Papers of June 1614 where it is recorded that Dorothy, Lady Townshend, and others were fined £3000 for their part in forging the will of Sir Randall Brereton. It is recorded that Sir Henry refused to pay the fine as he said that he took no part in the offence, however the order was given that to "maintain the authority of the Star Chamber, power be given to levy the fine on the goods and chattels of Sir Henry Townshend on behalf of his wife." Sir Henry sought to recover from the other defendants their share of the fine, but these actions were stayed until he had made payment of the fine in full. These circumstances do not appear to have hindered Sir Henry's career as he was elected as Member of Parliament for Ludlow, Shropshire in the same year that the fine was levied and remained Deputy Justice of Chester until his death in December 1621.

The Townshends of New Zealand descend from Sir Henry Townshend's elder brother, Robert. Robert Townshend settled at Ludlow in Shropshire on an estate settled upon him by his father. Like his elder brother, Thomas of Braconash, Robert was suspected by the authorities of recusancy or catholic sympathies. His wife, Anne Machell, the daughter of John Machell, Alderman and Sheriff of London, came from an old catholic Westmorland family and in 1581 Robert with his brother-in-law Ralph Dutton got into trouble over his relations with the Jesuit missionary to England Edmund Campion. Robert's sister, Grace, was the mother of George Gilbert, a young catholic gentleman who with Thomas Pound founded the 'Catholic Association' to assist Campion on his arrival in England. Gilbert had been on the Continent in 1579, where he was reconciled to the Catholic Church, and on his return to England he founded the Association. It was blessed by the Pope and was in being when the Jesuit Campion arrived in England in 1580. The Association's members were young men of property and family, unencumbered by wives or office, and so free to devote themselves to fostering the Jesuit's campaign. It was alleged that Robert had brought both Campion and Gilbert to the house of his brother-in-law Ralph Dutton of Hatton. Commissioners were sent to Hatton in March 1581 to inquire. Both Robert and Dutton denied any knowledge of the matter. Robert did admit that he had seen his nephew for three days the previous summer, but he did not know that he was acquainted with Campion, whom he said he had never met. The records tell no more, he may have been innocent, but he can scarcely have been quite unaware of his nephew's notorious activities. In any event Gilbert withdrew to Rheims in France and died two years later. Gilbert is particularly remembered for the frescoes of the English martyrs which he caused to be made at great expense for the walls of the English College in Rome.

While Robert Townshend's innocence in the Campion affair may be doubted his catholic sympathies cannot. The state papers of September 1609 record the following entry relating to him:

"To the Council of the Clerk of Assize, and the Clerk of Peace, Shropshire. No proceedings are to be taken against Robert Townshend of Ludlow for recusancy, he being 77 years old and of ill carriage."

One cannot help but wonder how Robert would have fared if he had been brought before the court of his brother, Sir Henry Townshend, on a charge of recusancy, or perhaps it has become his brother was a Judge that he was not. The catholic religion of the Townshend family at this time is also evidenced in the marriage of Robert's daughter, Mary, to Sir Robert Rookwood. Rookwood's father, Ambrose, was implicated in the Gunpowder Plot to blow up James I and his Parliament and was executed at Tyburn in London in 1605. Illustrating the fratricidal nature of the English Civil War one of Mary Rookwood's sons, Robert Rookwood, was a Captain in the King's army and was killed fighting for the royalist cause during the civil war.

Robert Townshend died in August 1614 and was succeeded in his estates at Ludlow by his eldest son, Sir John Townshend. Sir John was knighted by James I in 1603 and was the Member of Parliament for Chipping Wycombe in 1604. One of Robert Townshend's younger sons settled in the nearby town of Birmingham, much smaller then than the large city of today. Thomas Townshend, who died in 1624, began an association that this branch of the Townshend family retained with Birmingham until the twentieth century. Both his son, John (died 1668), and his grandson, Jacob, lived at Birmingham. Jacob Townshend died there in 1702, and his son, Joseph (died 1726), settled outside Birmingham at Northfield. Joseph's son Joseph farmed his own freehold property at Illey in the Parish of Halesowen, near Northfield. This younger Joseph Townshend was Churchwarden of Halesowen in 1721 and following his death in 1757 was buried in the nave of Halesowen Parish Church.

Two of the sons of Joseph Townshend of Illey went to North America. Jacob Townshend, who was educated at Merton College, Oxford University, took Holy Orders and is reputed to have gone to North America and served for a time as a Chaplain to General George Washington, later first President of the United States. What is certain however, is that he was curate of the parish of Hilperton near Trowbridge in Wiltshire until his death in 1778. Rev. Jacob Townshend's younger brother, Benjamin, was an officer in the British Army serving in North America, where he was killed in a duel on the banks of the St. John's River. An event must have occurred which soured the relationship between Benjamin and his brother as Jacob in his will written in 1763 described Benjamin as "my ungrateful and treacherous brother". In the next generation of the family, Jacob and Benjamin's nephew is recorded as having been murdered in America after "recovering the estates of his uncles there."

The fourth son of Joseph Townshend of Illey, William, was born at Illey in February 1730. He married Elizabeth Nicholls and lived at Illey where he farmed his own freehold property. His seven children were all born at Illey where he died on 26 November 1792. Two of William Townshend's sons, Joseph and William, became collectors of the excise. This next William Townshend was born at Illey in September 1766 and married Mary Beale of Atherstone in Warwickshire on 31 March 1800. While in the early part of his career he lived at Birmingham, by the end of his career his chosen profession had him living at Walworth in Surrey on the south bank of the Thames within greater London. He died there in 1840.

Of William and Mary Townshend's children, their second son Edmund became a wine merchant operating his business from Bloomsbury in London. Of their daughters, Eliza, married Rev. Edward Andrews of Walworth, Anne married Benjamin Snook Hall, a Birmingham manufacturer and Mary married Thomas Hutchings and emigrated to Springfield, Illinois in America. Their eldest son, William, followed his father into the Office of the Excise, eventually rising to become Supervisor of Inland Revenue. He married Ann West of Croydon and later retired to Birmingham where he died in 1881.

Joseph & Sophia Townshend & family, 1907 (L to R, Back Eva, Lucy, May, Harry. Middle Althea. Front Arthur, George, Percy, Lily)

William and Ann Townshend had a family of six sons and one daughter. Each was privately educated, Alfred at a Grammar School in Stratford on Avon in Warwickshire and Joseph by a Mr and Mrs Rootham in Canterbury, Kent. Of their six sons, four of them settled in New Zealand. The first three, Frederick, Edwin and Joseph, left England in 1858, each with £2000 given to them by their father, and spent four years in the Australian Colony of Victoria. In 1862 they ventured across the Tasman Sea and settled in New Zealand's Southland province. The three brothers landed at Lyttelton and walked the Bridle Path to Christchurch in Bell top hats and frock coats, the required fashion for young gentlemen of the time. In the adventurous spirit of the age they then ventured to the West Coast and spent some time at Gabriel's Gully gold field prospecting for gold.

Later the three brothers each purchased farming properties at Mataura in Southland. According to Joseph's son, George, the land was purchased by Frederick in trust for the three of them. However when it came to dividing up the property amongst them Frederick retained the best land. This was apparently the cause of some bitterness which resulted in embarrassment when George in 1918 visited his uncle Frederick then living at Marton in the North Island shortly before Frederick's death. Nevertheless Joseph is recorded as purchasing 10 acres in the town of Mataura in 1872. In the same year he purchased 60 acres of bare land and a further 139 acres in 1873. These rural lands were sold to McGovan in 1875 but in the Register of Freeholders of 1882 Joseph was recorded as owning 445 acres at Mataura valued at £1830. In the same year Edwin was recorded as owning a 484 acre property at Mataura valued at £2700. In 1890 Joseph listed his land holdings as Section 1 Block XII Chatton Survey District, Sections 74, 75 and 76 Block IV Tuturau Survey District and Sections 71, 72 and 73 Block III Tutarau Survey District.

1915, Harry Townshend (1890-1954)

Their younger brother, Alfred joined the three Townshend brothers already in New Zealand, when he accompanied Frederick's bride, Frances Thomas on the voyage out to New Zealand, in 1865. Alfred Townshend established a grocery shop on the goldfields but lost heavily when the goldfields in Australia were discovered and large numbers of miners left the colony quickly without paying their debts. He later established a shop in Gladstone, near Invercargill before settling with his family in Christchurch in November 1899.

Arthur Townshend (1893-1917) Killed in France

Joseph Townshend married Martha Haste at Invercargill in Southland in 1876, however she died childless in 1882. Seven years later in 1889 he married for a second time, marrying Sophia Sharp at Mataura. She was the daughter of Henry Sharp who farmed a small property at Moketua in Southland. The Sharp family had immigrated from Blockley in Gloucestershire to New Zealand in 1874 and bought a house in Dunedin before settling at Moketua in 1880. Joseph and Sophia Townshend had a large family and remained farming at Mataura until 1904, when they sold their farm and moved north to Christchurch. There, Joseph purchased a market garden on the north bank of the Heathcote River at the end of Ferry Road. He later acquired five residential properties in the Christchurch suburbs of Sumner, Speydon and Sydenham, the rentals from which provided him with retirement income. In 1906 Joseph retired and sold the market garden and purchased a house in Duncan Street in Sreydon and later a house nearby at 58, Rosewarne Street. A further move was made in 1916 to 135 Antigua Street and finally in 1919 to 110 Strickland Street in Sydenham.

Two of Joseph Townshend's sons, Arthur and Harry, served in France during the First World War. Whilst Harry was wounded in the leg at Gallipoli, and returned home, Arthur did not return. Charles Victor Townshend, son of Joseph's brother Alfred, also served in France and happened to met Arthur in the trenches during a lull in the fighting in February 1917. They had an opportunity to talk before Charles was sent to Battalion Headquarters. An hour later Arthur was killed by shrapnel. Arthur Townshend had something of an independent nature, his personality naturally rebelling against the severity of his father's religious conservatism and material austerity. He was very close to his sister, Lucy, and had spent many pre-war days working on farms at Le Bons Bay on Banks Peninsula near Christchurch where he befriended a Le Bons Bay farmer, Edward O'Connor. Lucy Townshend joined her brother at Le Bons for occasional holidays and in this way came to know Edward O'Connor, her future husband. Edward also served in France and when he returned to New Zealand he and Lucy were married in 1920 at Christchurch.

Joseph Townshend died at Christchurch on 23 November 1923 aged 85. Sophia Townshend died on 21 May 1934. They were buried together in the Sydenham Cemetery in Christchurch.