Durnford History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms

The surname Durnford was first found in Wiltshire where Roger de Derneford (b. 1135) held the fifth part of a knight's fee in 1165. His father was born in 1090 in that area but his grandfather was born in 1040 in Normandy. 3 Roger de Derneford was listed in the Pipe Rolls of 1190. This "Roger" may be the same as the aforementioned. A few years later, William de Durneford was listed in the Hundredorum Rolls in 1255. 4

The Hundredorum Rolls of 1273 included Richard de Dumeford, Wiltshire 1 and the Testa de Nevill, sive Liber Feodorum, temp. Henry III-Edward I listed Richard de Demeford, Wiltshire, Henry III-Edward I and William de Durneford. Wiltshire. 5

To the south in Devon, the manor of East Stonehouse (commonly called Stonehouse now) was passed from the Stonehouse family to the Durnfords through marriage, "whose heiress in turn carried it to its present possessors, the Edgcumbes. Apart from the building whose solid character gave the manor its name, there is little evidence, until stonehouse came into the hands of the Durnfords, that it consisted of more than the castellated mansion of its lords, with some buildings of a monastic character, doubtfully connected with the great Priory of Plympton. The Durnfords, however, did their best to foster their infant town ; and James Durnford, as noted, brought down upon him the Abbot of Buckland, as lord of the hundred of Roborough, by setting up a pillory and tumbrel at ' Estonhouse ' and holding courts there, wherefore, 26th Henry VI., it was ordered that the pillory and tumbrel should be ' deposed, destroyed, and removed,' that no courts should be held by Durnford which interfered with the abbot's view of frank-pledge, and no hindrance put to the execution of the abbot's precepts or the action of his bailiffs, etc., in the manor. Stonehouse was little more than a fishing village from

the time of the Durnfords until the reign of Henry VIII. , when it grew more rapidly. " 6