About
Bernard Juby is a retired medical practitioner with a life-long interest in heraldry.
He is an Honorary Fellow of the Heraldry Society and was made a Life Member of the Birmingham and Midland Society of Genealogy and Heraldry where he was in charge of heraldry for many years.
He has written and edited many Church heraldry guide-books including the late Chris Smith’s monumental, ”The Heraldry of Warwickshire Parish Churches” together with numerous articles and was the Editor of, “The Heraldry Gazette” (the quarterly in-house magazine of the Heraldry Society) for five years.
For several decades he has been an heraldic adviser to N.A.D.F.A.S. (The National Association of Decorative & Fine Arts Societies), now called The Arts Society.
He has written the definitive study of the National Trust’s, “The Heraldry of Baddesley Clinton” and has updated,“Ordo Sancti Lazari” – the record of the coats of arms of the knights of the Military and Hospitaller Order of St Lazarus of Jerusalem - as a 600+ page Armorial
“The Splendour of the Heraldic Artist” highlighted the different styles of the artists who worked mainly at or for the Officers of Arms at the College of Arms, London.
He has written a 6 volumeseries celebrating modern-day heraldic bookplate artists.
He is the founder of the facebook Group, “Heraldic Bookplates” which at the time of writing has over 2300 members worldwide. He is also a member of several heraldic Groups on Facebook.
He was born near Bow Bells, London and shortly afterwards the family moved north of the Thames to Palmers Green, N13 where he went to school at St Michael's & Tottenhall Road. At Glendale Grammar school, Wood Green, N22 he was a Prefect & a member of the choir. He was in the Chorus of The Mikado, The Pirate King in Pirates of Penzance & Sir Despard Murgatroyd in Ruddigore.
He is a Founder-Member of The North London Mountaineering Club and an ex member of The Plantagenet Society and La Ghilde de la Foreyst - both Medieval re-enactment groups.
He read Medicine at the University of Birmingham, where he formed a skiffle-group, the Auricular Fibrillators, playing washboard. He joined the Stoats, Mountaineering Club.
In late 1957 he met his wife-to-be, Pamela Yvonne Lines, then a Student Nurse at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. She later became a Staff Nurse & then Departmental Sister there.
His efforts to re-build Birmingham's old Market Hall Automata Clock fell on deaf ears, but when the old Victorian Moor Street Station was threatened by the re-development of the Bull Ring, he was a Founder Member and Chairman of The Moor Street Station Historical Society. As such he applied for and was granted Grade II Listed Building status, thus saving it from the bulldozers. A Commemmorative Plaque to that effect is now in the concourse.
He is married, with three children and now retired to France where he has dual nationality. Needless to say he is deeply involved in the heraldry of the old medieval fortified border town in Haut Anjou, where he lives.
The Military & Hospitaller Order of
St Lazarus of Jerusalem.
Originally founded by Crusader Knights to serve their leprous Brethren it is now a universal Order of Chivalry promoting charitable acts, including the treatment of laprosy.
Bernard is a Knight of Justice, a Commander of the Order of Merit and holds the Silver Cross of Merit, the latter due to his work on the Armotial mentioned above.
His fund-raising activities are aimed at the early diagnosis and treatment of Malignant Melanoma - a potentilly lethal form of skin cancer much more prevalent today with the advent of cheap travel to sunny climes. He likens it to the modern form of leprosy - but much more lethal.
He remembers being told at Medical School that he would probably never see a case during his life-time. When he started General Practice his first patient presented with a sore throat but he noticed a plaster on her leg near her knee. He asked to see it and there was a malignant melanoma. Despite treatment she was dead within six weeks.
Needless to say it left a lasting impression on him. The royalties from the sale of his Armorial go to help fund the early diagnosis and treatment of this dreadful disease.
As the Chancellor of the Commandery of Mercia.
His neck badge and breast star of a Knight, together with his Justice Cross - and below, his Commander of Merit Breast star and presenting a cheque to the University of Birmingham's Melanoma Research Unit.
Right: His coat of Arms as a Knight of the Order with his Justice Cross and Silver Cross of Merit (the latter awarded in 2022).
Below: His Badge as the Herald of the Internaional Grand Bailiwick.
