General Notes

Henry Ferrers, son of Walchelin, assumed the name from Ferriers, a small town of Gastinois, in France, otherwise called Ferrieres, from the iron mines with which that country abounded, and, in allusion to the circumstance, he bore for his arms "six horses' shoes," either from the similitude of his cognomen to the French Ferrier, or because the seigneurie produced iron, so essential to the soldier and cavalier in those rude times when war was esteemed the chief business of life, and the adroit management of the steed, even amongst the nobility, the first of accomplishments. Henry de Ferrers came into England with the Conqueror and obtained a grant of Tutbury Castle, in the county of Stafford. According to Stapleton, he was ancestor of the Oakham house of Ferrers, whose memory is preserved by the horseshoes hanging in the hall of their castle. He m. Bertha -----, and had issue, Robert, his heir; Eugenulph, who d. s. p.; and Walkelin, of Radbourne. [John Burke, Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. III, R. Bentley, London, 1834-1838, p. 127, Ferrers, of Baddesley Clinton]

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The first of this eminent family that settled in England was Henry de Feriers, son of Walcheline de Feriers, a Norman, who obtained from William the Conqueror a grant of Tutbury Castle, co. Stafford, with extensive possessions in other shires, of which 114 manors were in Derbyshire. This person must have been of considerable rank, not only from these enormous grants, but from the circumstances of his being one of the commissioners appointed by the Conqueror to make the great survey of the kingdom. He was the founder of the Cluniac priory at Tutbury which he liberally endowed. By Berta his wife he had issue, Egenulph, d. v. p.; William, d. v. p.; Robert, his successor; Gundred; and Emmeline. [Bernard Burke, Dormant and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, London, 1883, p. 196, Ferrers, Earls of Derby]