The Townsend Family were noted benefactors for the two villages, having a direct presence in King’s Newnham for around a century, and a similar time in Church Lawford but also with a presence in the wider local area for many more years, notably in Long Lawford and Clifton Upon Dunsmore, but also in Newbold, Hillmorton and Bilton. Even after the family had left the two villages, various family members still supported local causes.
There are suggestions the family could trace roots back to the reign of Henry I when the Ludovic Townshend married the heiress to the Raynham estate in Norfolk. Raynham House is still the family seat for the Townshend family, and by 1682 Horatio Townshend had become Viscount Townsend. Any Warwickshire links were augmented in 1751 when the fourth Viscount Townshend married the heiress of the Compton Family. However before that time there was a long line of a Townsend family in the Lawford area – with interests in Church Lawford, Long Lawford, Little Lawford and Lawford Heath, as well as in Clifton Upon Dunsmore. This line is well documented in the Warwick Records Office, and over a century ago the family produced their family tree going back to the 16th century in Easenhall and Cubbington.
Various publications have suggested the link between the Warwickshire Townsend family and the Norfolk Townshend clan, but the fact that the Warwickshire family has clearly spent considerable time and effort on creating Family Trees back to the 16th century which terminate in Easenhall and in Cubbington, and do not find any Norfolk link casts some doubt. There is certainly a link between the Raynham-based Townshend family and our two villages, in that the fourth Duke of Buccleuch married Katherine Townshend in 1795. Katherine was the daughter of Thomas Townshend of Raynham Hall – see here for details. Perhaps it is this link that has encouraged the assumption of a past split of the Norfolk family into the Warwickshire Townsend line.
Back in the 17th Century, when the Leigh Family still had a base in King’s Newnham, and when they were also establishing their presence in Stoneleigh, Thomas Townsend of Cubbington (1575 to 1651) bought land in the Long Lawford / Newbold area from the Leigh family, selling off his interests in Cubbington at about the same time. The next 100 years or so saw a focus in the Long Lawford / Newbold area, and then from the late 18th century onwards there was a family presence in Church Lawford, with the links to King’s Newnham following in the 19th Century.
There is a discussion about the specific people who lived, farmed and were benefactors to Church Lawford and King’s Newnham on the main family page – here. On that page are reports showing details of the family generations in the Lawford and Newnham area.
This page looks in more detail at how the family as a whole arrived in the Rugby area, starting from back in the 16th century. Perhaps the pivotal point for the family locally was when Thomas Townsend (1712) married Frances Hands, the daughter of the vicar of Newbold. Their son John Townsend (1754) bought the Manor of Clifton-upon-Dunsmore from the Bridgeman family in 1790. Another son William continued with the family involvement in Long Lawford, and his grandson Henry married Ann Worth in King’s Newnham to establish the family there. A third son, Thomas, married into a Church Lawford family, and his son Willliam Samuel began forming at Manor Farm in Church Lawford.
Others in the group of family members shown in the table below include Thomas Townsend (1788) who lived at Hillmorton Hall, William Townsend (1797) who inherited the Manor at Clifton-Upon-Dunsmore from his father, marrying Jane Sutton. John Hands Townsend (1801) farmed in Church Lawford as well as in Clifton Upon Dunsmore. William Samuel Townsend (1827) following in his father’s footsteps at Manor Farm Church Lawford, and with his wife Elizabeth, together with his sister Louisa, funded the clock at the new Church in Church Lawford in the 1870s.
Louisa Hackett Townsend (Long Lawford) funded the clock with her brother and his wife as discussed above, living for a while in Church Lawford, and after her brother died moved to Long Lawford where she was influential in village life. She bought the original Long Lawford village school in 1878, along with an adjacent cottage, ran it as a Reading Room and Sunday School before bequeathing it as a village Reading Room in 1885.
William Townsend was listed as landowner for 129 acres in Long Lawford in the 1848 tithe records, with Henry Townsend also owning 14 acres as well as farming considerably more. George Worth was landowner for 113 acres farmed by John Whiteman. In Clifton the family also owned land – John Hands Townsend owned 166 acres some of which was farmed by Thomas Townsend, with Thomas himself owning a further 72 acres. William Townsend owned 103 acres in Clifton. in the late 18th Century John Townsend bought the Manor at Clifton, and the family was in residence at Clifton Manor through the 19th Century. Thomas Sutton Townsend (1847-1918) passed the Manor to his daughter Mary Frances Roscoe in 1918 after his only son was killed in action during the First World War.
Julia, Mary Jane and Frances Lydia Townsend were known as the Misses Townsend of Clifton, and were both benefactors and contributors to village life in Clifton-Upon Dunsmore,
Thomas Sutton Townsend (Clifton) was Lord of the Manor in Clifton-Upon-Dunsmore, inheriting it from his father William who had earlier inherited it from his father John detailed above.
The Worth Townsend family are discussed in more detail, along with their Church Lawford-based cousins here.
In order to trace the family line back to the 16th century we can look at the ancestors of William Townsend, son of Thomas Townsend, whose descendants are shown above.
