George Brydges Rodney, the most famous of the great generation of English admirals who raised the navy to the level at which Nelson found it, was by descent a Somersetshire man. The family was one of considerable antiquity--of more antiquity indeed than fame. From the reign of Henry the Third until far into the seventeenth century they were established as owners of land in and about Stoke Rodney, at the foot of the Mendips, in the valley of the Axe between Draycott and Wells. The history of the house was summed up by Sir Edward Rodeney, the last of them who held the family estate, in words which I do not presume to think I can better, and shall therefore quote. Their faults whatsoever are n…
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