What's In A Name? Bowes
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What's In A Name? Bowes
Barwicker No. 119
September 2013
The first recorded spelling of Bowes as a name was in 1269 when
Gerard de Bowes acted as a witness in the Assize Court Rolls of
Northumberland, and the surname has long been common in the north
of England.
The word 'Bowes' is derived from an Old English word for a bend in a
river, and the surname Bowes is thought to have originated in the
village of Bowes in County Durham. The name was spread by
villagers who trudged the countryside in search of work, and were then
identified by the name of their birthplace, e.g. Thomas of Bowes.
Barwick-in-Elmet was home to one such family when brothers John
and WiIliam Bowes migrated from North Yorkshire via Roecliffe with
John settling in Thorner and William came to live in Barwick. Both
young men married local girls and worked as platelayers on the NE
Railway. William's wife, Ann Bowes, operated the Railway Crossing
Gates on Whinmoor in the 1880s and 1890s, and descendants of their
family still live in Barwick and the surrounding area.
Another, unrelated Bowes family also had links to Barwick - Bill
Bowes, the famous Yorkshire and England Cricketer is known to have
visited his aunt who lived in The Boyle.
A couple by the name of John and Josephine Bowes founded what we
now know as the Bowes Museum at Barnard Castle, Co. Durham. John
was a wealthy businessman and Josephine was an actress and artist
who shared his love of antiquities. They met in Paris and spent much
of their married life collecting objects that interested them, leaving
their legacy to the nation in John's ancestral home of Teesdale.
The late Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, had ancestors by the
name of Bowes. John Lyon, 9th Earl of Strathmore, married Mary
Eleanor Bowes, only daughter of George Bowes Esquire of Streatlam
Castle in County Durham. The Bowes name formally entered the Lyon
family as part of the marriage contract, and Lord Strathmore later
added his own family name to it, resulting in the surname Bowes-
Lyon.
SUE MURRAY
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