The Townsend Tomb in King's Chapel Burying Ground

Stepping away from the tombs along the front fence of King's Chapel Burying Ground in Boston, Massachusetts, we carefully make our way to some of the other armorial tombs there.

I say "carefully," but the burying ground has paths laid out for people to follow, in order to better preserve the tombstones there from damage. This does mean, alas, that I was not always able to get as close to a tomb as I would have liked to get the clearest possible photograph of the arms carved on it. Still, that's what a good variable telephoto lens is for. And being a historian as well as a heraldry enthusiast, I will (mostly) gladly follow the rules laid out by an historical site that continues to allow common folk like myself to have access to these artifacts.

Although here at King's Chapel, it does mean that I can no longer get a photograph like the one my wife took of me back in 2008 in front of the tomb of my 10th great-grandparents who are buried here. (We will see the side of this table tomb and its coat of arms in a subsequent post.)

No matter, we will continue to do the best we can within the limits of what the site allows.

Next, we come to the tomb of James Townsend. We are certain of this identification because the inscription at the bottom of the armorial plaque in the center of the slab says “James Townsend’s Tomb”.

Changing the orientation of the photograph, and zooming in a little, we can see the arms more clearly. (I did try working some "perspective correction" magic on this photo, but it was not sufficiently improved that I felt that I could in good conscience use it here.)

Zooming in, and you can click on the image above to go to the full-sized picture to do that, what I saw was: James Townsend. A chevron between three escallops. Crest: A stag statant.

The Heraldic Journal, Vol. II, p. 21 makes the chevron Ermine.

Burke’s General Armory: “Townsend (Ludlow, co. Salop) [also, Townshend]. Azure a chevron ermine between three escallops argent.”

The Dictionary of British Arms, Vol. II, p. 334, gives Townsend/Townsende, Azure a chevron ermine between three escallops argent.

Bolton’s An American Armory, citing The Heraldic Journal, gives the same blazon as Burke and the Dictionary of British Arms, but for one of the other Townsend coats of arms he cites make the escallops Or rather than Argent.

As does Crozier’s General Armory:

            “Townsend. Massachusetts.
            “Thomas Townsend, Lynn, 1637.
            “Salop.”
            “Azure a chevron ermine between three escallops or.
            “Crest—A stag passant proper.
            “Motto—Droit et evant. [Right and forward]”

Two of the sources we have cited in some of our recent posts give us more information about the Townsend family:

The Heraldic Journal, Vol. II, p. 21: “The Townsend tomb possibly belonged to the family descended from William Townsend, who married Hannah Penn, and had sons James, Penn and Peter here. Of these, the most noted was Penn, who married Sarah Addington, Mary Leverett and widow Hannah Jaffrewy, and held many high offices here. Penn Townsend died in 1727, leaving several children.
    “In this case as in several others it is extremely difficult to race out the ownership of the tombs, and we must leave the task to those interested, having discharged out duty in recording the existence of the stones.”

Preachers, Patriots & Plain Folks, Boston’s Burying Ground Guide, p. 125, notes that Penn Townsend (1651-1727) is buried in Boston’s Granary Burying Ground (just a few blocks from King’s Chapel) in Tomb No. 36 there.

Next Up!

Moving along the Tremont Street fence fronting the King's Chapel Burying Ground in Boston, Massachusetts, we come to our third armorial tombstone, No. 6.

This one is a little tricky, because the sources describing it don't match.

What the arms look like to me, based on what can be seen on the top portion of the half-buried stone, is: A charged field, though it's difficult to make out the charges well, on a chief three delfs. No crest.

It was a little (but only a little) clearer when we were there back in 2008:

Preachers, Patriots & Plain Folks, Boston’s Burying Ground Guide says: ”Waine, E. … ae 13, 1787”, but dates the tomb to 1741. But the arms on this tombstone are not found in Burke’s General Armory under either Wain or Waine.

The Heraldic Journal, vol. II, pp. 20-21, says: 

The tomb bearing the following arms is inscribed, Capt. John Steel, and was no doubt the property of the gentleman who died July 18, 1768, ‘far advanced in years,’ as his will states. He was in in 1750 the Captain of the North Battery, and was doubtless the son of the Thomas Steele who died 8 Jan. 1735-6, aged 71, upon whom Rev. Benj. Colman preached a funeral discourse.

The arms illustrated there are: [Field] a bend counter-compony Ermine and [tincture] between two lion’s heads erased [tincture] on a chief [tincture] three delfs [tincture].

Going back to Burke’s General Armory based on this identication of the arms, we find: “Steel (Derwent Bank, co. Cumberland) [also, Steele]. Argent a bend checky sable and ermine between two lion’s heads erased gules on a chief azure three billets or. Crest – A lion’s head erased gules.”

Obviously, the arms on the tombstone do not have a crest. And it is very plausible that the stonecarver didn't know that heralds treat billets and delfs as different, though similar, charges, or that checky and counter-compony are also different, though similar.** But those two items notwithstanding, the arms 

Putting the entire story of this armorial tomb together,* it would appear that this was originally the tomb of Captain John Steel, who died in 1768 and whose arms are carved upon the face of the stone, but where nine years later 13-year-old Master Waine was also buried, this practice not being uncommon as we have seen before in several of the tombs in Copp's Hill Burying Ground in some of our recent posts of armorial memorials there.

* Well, except that this still doesn't explain the 1741 dating of the tomb. Is it an error? Is there additional information about which we have not been told? It will take more research to determine what's going on with that.

** Counter-compony has but two rows of checker squares; checky has three or more. Or as James Parker tells us in his A Glossary of Terms Used in Heraldry: "If there be two rows [of checks] it is called counter compony (or compony counter compony), but if more, it comes under the term chequy." As I said, different, though similar.

The Next Armorial Tombstone in King's Chapel Burying Ground

Continuing from our last post along the fence at the front of King's Chapel Burying Ground in Boston, Massachusetts, we come to Tomb number 7.

If you click on the image above of this half-buried tombstone, you can see "No." on the top left and "7" on the top right of the stone.

The Heraldic Journal, Vol. II, pp. 19-20, ascribes these arms to John Wheelwright, 1740. The illustration of the arms there hatches the field ermine and the fess or.

Preachers, Patriots & Plain Folks, Boston’s Burying Ground Guide, p. 191, of this tombstone says only “John Wheelwright” and dates the tomb to 1740.

Bolton’s An American Armory cites these arms, with his source being this tombstone: 

Wheelwright. Ermine on a fess or between three wolves’ heads erased three roundels. Crest: A wolf’s head erased.

At top of the slab ‘No. 7’ at bottom ‘John Wheelwright,’ 1740. King’s Chapel Graveyard, Boston, by Tremont Street fence.

Obviously, any inscription at the bottom is no longer visible to us.

The one Wheelwright family listed in Burke’s General Armory bears an entirely different coat of arms from those shown here. Papworth’s Dictionary of British Armorials does not show the arms here; the very closest in the Papworth’s category of “On a fess between three heads,” and the only one with an ermine field, is the arms of Gordon, Ermine on a fess between three boar’s heads erect and erased sable a spear point to dexter argent. So, not that close. Nor are any Wheelwrights listed in Sir James Balfour Paul's An Ordinary of Arms of Scottish arms granted in Scotland. Finally, the name Wheelwright does not appear in Fairbairn’s Crests, though a large number of families bearing A wolf’s head erased do appear there.

So what's the bottom line for me?

I am taking the sources which mention this coat of arms at face value, and allowing both the tinctures of their blazons and the inscription at the bottom of the stone. But in the end, I have no idea where these arms come from. But there they are, literally "carved in stone," so I feel we have to take them as we see them. (Or as we half-see them, given the state of the placement of the stone in the ground here.)

Still, I'd love to know from whence they came and how they came to be here.

Armorial Tombstones in King's Chapel Burying Ground, Boston, Massachusetts

Having finished reviewing the armorial tombstones and headstones that I saw in Copp's Hill Burying Ground in Boston, Massachusetts, we now walk a few blocks to King's Chapel Burying Ground.

If you walk in the front gate of the burying ground and make an immediate left turn, along the front fence you will find three tombstones carved with coats of arms. In today's post, we're going to look at the first of these, Tomb Number 9. In our next two posts, we'll see Tombs Numbers 7 and 6, before moving on to the other armorial tombs and headstones in the burying ground.

Tomb Number 9 is that of Bartholomew Gedney, whose name is carved at the top. (You can click on the image below to go to the full-size photograph, which shows everything in greater detail.)

The arms carved into this headstone is Three eagles displayed (facing to sinister). And the crest, An eagle displayed (facing to sinister).

Burke’s General Armory gives us the colors on the shield: “Gedney (co. Suffolk). Or three eagles displayed sable.”

The crest does not appear in Fairbairn's Crests.

I am not sure why all of the eagles, both on the shield and the crest, face to sinister. The expected default would be to dexter. Is it an error on the part of the stonecarver, or did the Gedney family bear these arms and crest this way? 

The Heraldic Journal, vol. II, p. 20: “The Gedney tomb has these arms [illustration] upon it. This was a branch of the Salem [Massachusetts] family, which commenced with John, who had sons John, Bartholomew, Eleazur [sic], and Eli.”

Preachers, Patriots & Plain Folks, Boston’s Burying Ground Guide, p. 54, gives us some more information about Mr. Gedney: “Bartholomew Gedney (1698-1762) …, A[cient and] H[onorable] A[rtillery] C[ompany]. He was a wharf manager and his gravestone is one of the few heraldic ones here. His uncle Maj. Bartholomew Gedney of Salem was an associate judge at the Salem Witch Trials, May 27-Oct. 29, 1692.”

It is much easier to find information about Bartholomew’s uncle Bartholomew (owing to his relation to the Salem witch trials) than this Bartholomew. A genealogy website gives us only the briefest thumbnail sketch of his life. Bartholomew Gedney was born on 22 March 1698, in Salem, Essex, Massachusetts, to Major William and Hannah (Gardner) Gedney. He married Abigail Mason in 1720 in Boston. They were the parents of at least 1 daughter. He died on 16 July 1762, in Boston, at the age of 64, and was buried in Kings Chapel Burying Ground there (thus leading to his inclusion in today's post).

Two Confusing Armorial Tombstones in Copp's Hill Burying Ground, Boston

One of the problems in researching armorial headstones and tombstones in colonial American burying grounds is that there are many instances where a burial plot where an armiger has been buried is later sold to an entirely different family, whose deceased members are buried there, though the coat of arms still displayed on the stone does not relate to them.

We saw this in our recent post of December 15, 2025 (http://blog.appletonstudios.com/2025/12/we-start-looking-at-some-armorial.html), where one tombstone displays the arms of and an inscription toWilliam Clark, but also has the name of a later owner, Samuel Winslow, carved into it, though he clearly had no relation to the arms seen there.

Today, we're going to take a brief look at two other armorials tombstones which have the same issue as "the Winslow stone" bearing the arms of Clark. (Again, you can click on any of the images here to see the full-size, and more detailed, photographs.)

The first is the tomb of T[homas] and J. Lewis, but it is decorated with the arms are the Hutchinson family of Boston. These arms appear three times in the Gore Roll of Arms, for Elisha Hutchinson, Eliakim Hutchinson, and for William Hutchinson. 

The arms are blazoned: Per pale gules and azure a lion rampant argent within an orle of crosses crosslet or.

The crest (seen in the close-up above, is: Issuant from a ducal coronet a cockatrice azure combed beaked wattled and the tail barbed gules.

Built in 1711, several members of the well-known Hutchinson family have been buried here, but the Copp’s Hill Burying Ground Guide, p. 15, gives a more detailed description of which Hutchinsons were, and which were not, buried here. At some later date, Thomas Lewis purchased the tomb and inscribed it with the Lewis name.

Even more mysterious is another nearby tomb, whose arms do not appear to be related to either of the two families known to be the tomb's owners.

The arms (without knowing the colors), Three crescents. The crest is: An eagle displayed.

The Copp’s Hill Burying Ground Guide, p. 23 says: “Edward Martyn (1665-1717/8). Tomb 10 is the first one to the right as you enter Copp’s Hill and bears a coat of arms. He was a merchant, living on Hanover near Richmond, and served on many selectmen’s committees. He left 10 pounds to 2nd Church for a ‘piece of plate and 20 pounds to be distributed to the poor of the flock.’ He owned most of the land from Hanover St. to the water. A[ncient &] H[onorable] A[rtillery] C[ompany], 1702.”

However, the Guide, later on p. xx, gives the name Watts, and says: "On the reverse of the stone bearing the inscription No. 1199, to the Rev. Andrew Eliot, will be found the following arms. [Illustration of the arms photographed above.]

    "This however was an honest transaction, as is pointed out in the Heraldic Journal, ii, 119, as the Eliots bought the tomb and paid for altering the stone. The presumption is that the Watts family represented the original owner, and that perhaps the stone came from tomb No. 15. The arms are not inscribed to any family of the name of Watts."

I cannot find these arms of three crescents ascribed to any of the surnames noted in the Guide or in The Heraldic Journal; not to Martyn/Martin, nor Watts, nor Eliot. And looking through the usual ordinaries (Papworth's Dictionary of British Armorials and the more recent The Dictionary of British Arms) gives us way too many potential families of this simple coat of arms to decently research in my "copious free time."

So it's a bit of an heraldic mystery. Most every source seems to agree that it is not the arms of the most recent owner of the tomb, the Eliots, nor does it seem to be the arms of the Watts. And I have no indication of where the author who ascribes this tomb to the Martyns obtained that information.

Still, it's kind of interesting to learn about the purchase and sale of tombs in burying grounds in colonial Boston, Massachusetts Bay Colony, isn't it?

Wishing You All a Very Happy New Year!

Well, my friends, we have completed another year's orbit around the burning orb we call our Sun.

At this time, I would wish for each of you a very happy and prosperous new year. May 2026 be good to you.