Oliver Ratcliff's 1907 Almanack - Olney Coat of Arms

Some years ago, when collating and writing up the history of Olney which appeared under the title of “Olney, Past and Present, etc” I used every endeavour to find out if our town was more fortunate than our county, by possessing a coat-of-arms of its own. During the many enquiries I made from every known local authority the answer was in the negative, and so I let the search drop. When working up the “History and Antiquities of the Newport Hundreds “I found upon the grave of Elizabeth wife, first of Sir Walter Hungerford, who died in 1572, a coat-lf-arms, engraved on brass, showing the following quarterings:

1. Throckmorton - Gules (red) a chevron argent (silver)

2. Abberbury - Arg. on a fess embattled sable (black)

3. Olney - Arg. on a fess embattled between six cross-crosslet fitchée
sable, three crescents of the field arg.

4. Spiney - Gu. a cheve, arg. Between three crescents arg.

5. Olney - Arg. a fess sable between six crosses patée fitchée sable,
three roundels of the field purpure (purple).

6. Bosun - Gu. Three blunt arrows pur

7. Wylie- Gu. a fess arg. between six gutté-d’eau (white)

IMPALING:

1. Hussey - Shield of St George, arg. cross gu

2. Hussey also - Barry of six ermines (white spots on black) and gu

3. Fortesque- Arg a bend wavy cotised or (gold)

4. Hussey - as the first

At the death of Sir Walter Hungerford, Elizabeth married Sir Robert Throckmorton, hence the above quarterings.

The heraldic description shows that the primier quartering of Olney is simply a silver shield with black blazoning (argent and sable), and the subordinate one a silver shield with black blazoning, having three purple roundels of the field. As the former is undoubtedly the arms used by the elder branch of the Olney family, I issued this coat-of-arms upon post cards when the craze of collecting them was rampant. Since that time there have appeared fabrications both in blazoning and colouring which are entirely foreign to the original and also must cause disappointment to those interested in heraldry when they notice these worthless imitations bearing other colouring.

John Olney who died in 1405 was buried in Weston Underwood church. The Latin inscription upon his tomb records that he converted that ancient and dilapidated chapel into a church.

A JUDICIOUS BULL. Mrs Tommy Atkins: Of course we ought to have a coat-of-arms.
Mr T A: Well, I'd like to have a bull rampant, with some kind of a Latin motto meaning that he was only rampant when the market was right.

"Sidney, dear, you are very late; it is long after midnight." "Well, if that isn't just like a woman. Before we were married you didn't seem to care how late I got home."