Arms.—Argent, a chevron sable between three ram's heads erased azure.
Present Representative, John Bendyshe, Esq.
CHESHIRE.
Knightly.
Davenport of Woodford.
The Davenports claim precedence among the knightly families of Cheshire,—that "seed-plot of gentry," "the mother and the nurse of the gentility of England," and are traced directly to the Conquest. The elder line, which Leland terms "the best and first house of the Davenports at Devonport; a great old house covered with leade on the Ripe of Daven, three miles above Congleton," became extinct in 1674. The coheiresses married Davies and Davenport of Woodford. Ormus de Daumporte, living in the time of William I., is the first recorded ancestor of this family. To his son, Richard de Dauneporte, Hugh Earl of Chester gave the chief foresterships of the forests of Leek and Macclesfield about 1166, a feudal office still held by this house.
The present family are sprung from Nicholas, third son of Sir John or Jenkin Davenport, of Wheltrough and Henbury, who was himself a younger son of Thomas, second son of Sir Thomas Davenport of Davenport, the 13th of Edward II. Woodford was granted by John Stafford and Isabella his wife, about the time of Edward III., to John, third son of Thomas Davenport of Wheltrough, (an elder line not traced beyond 1677,) while the Davenports of Henbury were extinct before 1664. Davenport of Calveley, founded by Arthur, sixth son of Sir John Davenport of Davenport, killed at Shrewsbury in 1403, became extinct in 1771. The coheiresses married Bromley and Davenport of Woodford. Davenport of Bramhall, founded by the second son of Thomas Davenport of Wheltrough and the heiress of Bramhall, in the time of Edward III., survived till 1838. The Davenports of Davenport House, in the parish of Worfield, in Shropshire, are the only younger branch now remaining; they spring from the Davenports of Chorley and the heiress of Bromley of Hallon or Hawn, in the parish of Worfield. See Blakeway's Sheriffs of Salop, pp. 85, 143, 228.
For Davenport of Davenport and Woodford, see Ormerod's Cheshire, iii. 39, 346, 357; for those of Calveley, ib. ii. 153; Henbury, iii. 352; Bramhall, iii. 401; Chorley, iii. 312. See also Leland's Itin., vii. fol. 42, and Harl. MSS. 2119, for a good pedigree of the family drawn from original evidences.