The Queen's Beasts

 The £5 coin issued in 2021 contained the Queen's Beasts

                             

 

In the autumn of 1952, the Minister of Works, in preparation for the coronation, called upon the Royal Academician and sculptor James Woodford, OBE, to create ten new beasts similar in form and character to the ten at Hampton Court but more particularly, appropriate to the Queen. Exact replicas of those at Hampton Court would have been unsuitable for the occasion, for some of them would have little connection with Elizabeth II's own family or ancestry.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Queen%27s_Beasts

Sir George Rothe Bellew (1899–1993) was a long-serving herald at the College of Arms in London. Educated at the University of Oxford, he was appointed Portcullis Pursuivant in 1922. Having been Somerset Herald for 24 years, he was promoted to the office of Garter Principla King of Arms in 1950, the highest heraldic office in England and Wales. He served in that capacity until his resignation in 1961. As Garter, he oversaw the funeral of George VI, proclaimed the late King's daughter, Elizabeth II, as Queen and took a leading role in the organisation of her Coronation in 1953. He advocated (in opposition to most of the Coronation Executive Committee) the broadcast of the service on television and designed the heraldic statues which guarded Westminster Abbey's doors during the ceremony. He was appointed a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order in 1953 in recognition for his service during the Coronation.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Bellew

The 2021 £5 coin that shows the ten beasts.

Bellew's successor as Garter, Sir Anthony Wagner, referred to him in his 1988 memoirs; he wrote that Bellew seemed "in early years a temperamental, combative Irishman not easy to live with though always possessed of great feeling for ceremonial and heraldic design and a skillful pen and pencil. In later years I have found him ever more charming". Bellew enjoyed creating colourful grants of arms, drew inspiration from medieval heraldry ...as Garter, he managed the financial affairs of the College well, maintaining "a firm hand on the tiller".

Richard Montesquieu Bellew ()

https://www.dib.ie/biography/bellew-richard-montesquieu-a0562

Bellew, Richard Montesquieu (1803–80), second son of Sir Edward Bellew and Mary Anne Bellew (née Strange; d. 1837) of Rockwell Castle, Co. Kilkenny. Richard's elder brother Sir Patrick Bellew (1798–1866), 1st Baron Bellew and MP for Co. Louth (1831–2, 1834–7), stood aside to allow Richard to be elected. He held the Co. Louth seat (1832–52, 1859–65). It appears that he had an interest in heraldry as there are decorative coats of arms in the ceiling of his bedroom. He was known as Montequieu, the origin of his name is interesting and he was namaed after the well-known French philosopher.

Richard's grandfather, Richard Strange was a cousin (first, I think) of Mary Geoghegan who was married to Charles Louis de Secondat Baron Montequieu in 1796. Charles died in 1824 at Bridge Hill House near Canterbury aged 74. He was son of Jean-Baptist de Secondat de Montesquieu (1716-1796) who married Marie Thérèse de la Tour de Mons. He was son of Charles Louis de Secondat (1689-1755) Baron de Montesquieu married in 1715 Jeanne de Lartique (1695-1770) the well-known French Philosopher. 

When their second son was born in 1802, Baron de Montesquieu was asked to be his godfather and he was given Montequieu as his second name, perhaps an attempt to mollify the Montequieus, and certainly as an indication that the Bellews intended that their Gepghegan inheritance should be a provision for him.

Below is the contribution to the Queen's Coronation Booklet in 1953: