Effigy of a Montfort in Hitchendon Church

Effigy of a Montfort in Hitchendon Church is in Monumental Effigies of Great Britain.

THIS is one of the family of De Montfort Wellesburne, the particulars of whose settlement at Hitchendon, in Buckinghamshire, were detailed in the description of a former effigy. The present figure is carved on a stone placed on the door of the chancel of the parish church of the above place. Notwithstanding its low relief, its rude and singular appearance, the armour shows that it is of no earlier date than the latter end of the fifteenth century. On the helmet appears an obscure representation of a panache of ostrich feathers and a wreath. In the right hand is a mace, a horseman's weapon formerly much in use; the left arm supports a shield, on which, under a chief cheque, is the griffin rampant, holding in his paws a child, (the remarkable bearing which has been noticed under the article of Richard Wellesburne de Montfort,) over all a bend.