Blazon:

Arms:  Party per chevron Or and Gules, three bows bent and strung palewise, two and one, Counterchanged.

Crest:  On a mound Vert, the trunk of an oak tree couped Proper, a cross botony thereupon Argent, suspended from the Second in sinister by a belt Sable, a quiver Gules, full of arrows Or, and flighted of the fifth

Motto:  Pro Verus Res Intentio (For True Things Aim)

Design Rationale:

The bows and arrows are a cant on the origin of the surname -- a bowman, an archer, one skilled in the use of the bow Three bows signify that the armiger is descended from a family of three ancient ancestral branches, two in Scotland and one in England. The tinctures, Or and Gules, are derived from those of earlier arms granted to Bowman forebears in Scotland and England. The oak trunk in the crest signifies England as the particular branch from which the armiger is descended. The cross botony expresses the armiger's Christian faith. The style of the cross --botony-- is taken from the second and third quarters of the arms of Maryland, and commemorates the arrival in Maryland (1720) of Edmund Bowman (1700-1769), of St. Giles Cripplegate, London, Middlesex, England, the first ancestor of this line of Bowmans to come to America.

The motto beneath the shield is a charge to pursue true and trustworthy things, and alludes to the Apostle Paul's admonition in his Philippian epistle, Chapter 4, verse 8: "Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."