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In "Colonial Families of America", Vol. 2, p. 93, is found: So widely accepted an authority as Burke's Heraldic Register" gives the origin of the Willard family as Caen in Normandine, France....

Willard Arms

(From Willard Memoir, by Joseph Willard (1858)

Argent on a chevron sable between

three fish weels proper, five ermine

spots.

Crest

A griffin's head erased Or.

Motto

"Gaudet Patentia Duris".

Charles Henry Pope is his Willard Genealogy of 1915 gives the line:

1. Richard Willard of Benchley, yeoman made his will September 18, 1558.

2. Symon Willard, of Gwthurst, Co. Kent, yeoman, will proved Feb. 26, 1584.

3. Major Simon Willard. Sylvester D. Willard, born May 2, 1863, a physician, while residing London in 1902, erected a tablet in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral, bearing the following inscription:

In Memoriam

Major Simon Willard

Born 1604 ----Died 1676

EXACTLY ONE HUNDRED YEARS BEFORE THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, A KENTISH SOLDIER AND AN EARLY PIONEER IN THE SETTLEMENT OF THE BRITISH COLONY OF NEW ENGLAND AMERICA 1634. HE MADE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE BRITISH FORCES AGAINST THE HOSTILE INDIANS. HE WAS DISTINGUISHED IN THE MILITARY LEGISLATIVE AND JUDICIAL SERVICE OF THE AMERICAN COMMONWEALTH OF CANTERBURY 1218 AND ANOTHER WAS BARON OF THE CINQUE PORTS, 1377, AND HIS DESCENDANTS TO THE PRESENT DAY HAVE HELD EMINENT POSITIONS IN THE UNITED STATES.

Major Simon Willard, founder of Concord Mass., Deputy to the General Court 1636-54; Governor's Assistant, 1654-1676, Commander-in-Chief of the Expedition of the United Colonies against the Ninigret 1755; led the relief at the Battle of Brookfield; commanded the Middlesex, Mass.