Celebrating Hampshire Historians

Godwin, George Nelson

4 July 1846 – 10 January 1907

George Godwin was born in Winchester to Edwin Godwin, a draper, who later became a farmer at Melksham, and his wife Mary (nee Tugwell).  By the age of 22 he had passed through the London College of Divinity at Highbury, being ordained deacon in 1869. The following year he entered the priesthood, the same year in which he married Mary Godwin (not closely related) with whom he had a daughter.

Godwin’s first posts were as a curate at Heanor, Derbyshire and East Bergholt and Capel St Mary, both in Suffolk.  Thereafter he was appointed a chaplain in the armed forces, serving in Malta, Cairo, Dublin, the Curragh and at Netley Hospital.  He also found time to continue his studies by attending Trinity College, Dublin, winning the Cluff Memorial Prize (for history) in 1882. He earned his BA in 1884 and became a Bachelor of Divinity three years later.

From 1890 to 1893 Godwin was vicar of East Boldre, in the New Forest, and after holding various other parochial appointments, became curate in charge of Stokesby in Norfolk.  He died suddenly of heart failure while staying overnight in Little Walsingham and was buried there.

Godwin was an accomplished antiquary and local historian, best known as an authority on the history of Hampshire and neighbouring counties. He was particularly interested in the course of the English Civil War and the fate of Basing House.  His Civil War in Hampshire first appeared in 1882 but was ‘carefully revised and practically re-written’ so that the 1904 edition included ‘the very latest results of modern research.’  This was offered in the hope that ‘his labour of love (as it has truly been) will supply one more of those local histories which have become of ever-increasing interest of late years, and which are useful aids to recorders of the great events of English history.’

Godwin also wrote more generally on English church history and more specifically on Norfolk and the Maltese Islands.

Sources

Wikipedia

Portrait

The cover of George Godwin's book on 'The Green Lanes of Hampshire'

Contribution to county’s history

George Godwin was a founder member of the Hampshire Field Club and Archaeological Society (1885) and editor of Hampshire Notes and Queries from 1896–9. His ‘magnum opus’ The Civil War in Hampshire, 1642-45, and the Story of Basing House appeared in 1882, with a revised edition in 1904. He also compiled topographical and reference works.  

Relevant published works

Listed below are his publications in the first Southampton Records Series and are numbered accordingly:

• The Green Lanes of Hampshire, Surrey, and Sussex (1882).

• The Civil War in Hampshire, 1642-45, and the Story of Basing House (1904).

• (with Henry March Gilbert) Bibliotheca Hantoniensis (1891).

Critical Comments

Other Comments

Contributor

Dave Allen, August 2023

Key Words

Green Lanes, Hampshire Field Club, English Civil War, Basing House

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