[Illustration] This is the eldest branch of the great family of
Blount or le Blond, whose origin has been traced by the late Sir
Alexander Croke to the Counts of Guisnes before the Norman Conquest.
Robert le Blount, whose name is found recorded in Domesday, was a
considerable landholder in Suffolk, Ixworth in that county being the
seat of his Barony. Belton in Rutlandshire was afterwards inherited
by his descendants from the Odinsels, and Hampton-Lovet, in the
county of Worcester, from the Lovet family. In 1404, Nicholas le
Blount, who had been deeply engaged in the conspiracy to restore
Richard II. to his throne, changed his name to Croke, on his return
to England, in order to avoid the revenge of Henry IV. The Crokes
afterwards became a legal family, and seated themselves at Chilton
in Buckinghamshire. The priory of Studley was purchased from Henry
VIII. by John Croke, in 1539.
Younger Branches. Blount of Sodington, in the county of Worcester,
and of Mawley Hall in Shropshire, descended from William, second son
of Sir Robert le Blount, who died in 1288, and the heiress of
Odinsels. The Blounts of Maple-Durham in this county, and the
extinct Lords Mountjoy, are of a still junior line to the house
of Sodington. The other extinct branches are too numerous to
mention.
See Croke's Genealogy of the Croke Family, 4to. 1823, and "The
Scrope and Grosvenor Roll," vol. ii. p. 192, for a memoir of Sir
Walter Blount, who fell at the battle of Shrewsbury together with
Sir Hugh Shirley and two other knights in the royal coat-armour of
Henry the Fourth--
"semblably furnished like the King himself."
ARMS.--For Blount. _Barry nebulée of six or and sable_. For Croke,
_Gules, a fess between six martlets argent_. The more ancient coat
was, _Lozengy or and sable_, which was borne by William le Blount in
the reign of Henry III. Sir William le Blount of Warwickshire, (so
called because he held under the Earl of Warwick,) bore the present
_nebulée_ coat in the reign of Edward II. Sir Thomas le Blount at
the same period _the fess between three martlets_, now called the
coat of Croke. (Rolls of the dates.)
Present Representative, George Croke, Esq.