Coat of Arms and Seal of Great Grimsby

Coat of Arms - Cleethorpes        Grimsby Heritage       

The description of the Great Grimsby Coat of Arms, which are recorded at the College of Heralds, is "Argent, a chevron between three boars heads couped sable armed or". The date of the grant is unknown.

The earliest known use of these arms dates from the middle of the seventeenth century. They adorn the end of the shaft of the larger of the town's two maces which was remodelled in 1645 and they also appear on the Corporation's Seal about that time. Earlier documents sealed by the Mayor, Aldermen and Burgesses were sealed with the Grim and Havelock Seal. The two seals appear to have been used contemporaneously for some time as an impression of the Grim and Havelock Seal has survived on a document dated 1694.

It is reported that the boars' heads commemorate an ancient right of the Mayor and Corporation to hunt boar in Bradley Woods. Further credence is given to that belief by the possession of an early Mayoral seal in which a boar hunt is depicted.

Several families which had connections with Grimsby had similar charges on their arms. A family of de Grymesby bore chevrons on their arms and  a Broxholme who was an M.P. for Grimsby at about the time the arms first appear bore a chevron between the three brocks heads. (Top left)

The images to the left of the matrix and the seal are reproduced by kind permission of the Havelok the Dane Website at http://www.havelokthedane.com/

Please click on any of the images to see larger versions of them. 

Grimsby Rural District Armorial Bearings

Grimsby Rural District Council was established in 1894 and was granted Armorial Bearings by the College of Arms in 1961. The description is as follows:

Arms : "Vert an ancient Ship of three masts Or each flying a forked Pennon of St. George the sails set Argent the mainsail charged with a Beehive and the fore and mizzen sails chraged with an Escallop Sable on a Chiefwavy also Argent two Dolphins embowed also Vert finned Gules."

Crest : "Out of a Coronet composed of four Ears of  Wheat and as many Acorns leaved set alternately upon a Rim Or a Mount Vert there on an Aberdeen Angus Bull statant proper."