“During all my genealogy research I have found only one set of families named Gayleard in Canada so far.”

~ Wilfred Gayleard

William Henry Gayleard was born on July 13, 1857 to George Gayleard, mariner, and Ann Pearce in Portsea, Hampshire, England. As on the previous post or page, William can be found in the 1861, 1871 and 1881 census.

In 1878 William Gayleard married Harriett Hicks, daughter of John Hicks, mariner and Jane Hicks. Although it lists William as being 25 he is only 21 years of age. And Harriet Hicks was born in 1845 making her 33 years of age. However it seems that throughout the course of their marriage and travels together Harriett would most times be recorded as 1 or 2 years younger than William. It was the same with William’s mom Ann and his sister Mary Ann, all 3 women recording their ages as much younger, and sometimes by as much as 10 years.

Harriett Hicks was born in 1845 to John and Jane Hicks of Portsea. John is also a mariner.

Here is Harriett with her family in the 1851 census in Portsea

Jane Hicks however had passed away in 1871 before Harriett married William Gayleard.

In 1879 William and Harried had their first and only child born, William John Gayleard, my grandfather.

In the 1881 census William, Harriett and their son William can be found living with Harriet’s father John Hicks in Portsea

William Henry Gayleard was a mariner much like his father and brother, here he is in 1880 listed as working about the ship the Elizabeth Ray. Both William and his brother George can be found on the crew lists that are currently being digitized and transcribed. Although the name appears misspelled in many occasions I have managed to find a few instances of them on the crew lists. Then after 1884 they both disappear, I did mange to find George Gayleard living in New Zealand and marrying in 1884.

This is, so far, the last ship I could find William H Gayleard working on, it in the year 1884 and the name of the ship is Zeus.

By 1891 William, Harriett and William John were living in Rosario, Argentina. When they moved to her is hard to say in 1885 John Hicks passes away. Did they move just before or after I cannot say.

“…all those with in Western Canada with the spelling “Gayleard” either related to William Gayleard or they married into the family.”

~ Wilfred Gayleard

Why they moved I have never found out, however at this point his mom Ann Pearce, now Ann Barnes is still alive and living in Portsmouth with her daughter living in Wales, her oldest son living in New Zealand and her youngest child William her only grandchild William John living in Argentina.

In 1895 the Gayleard family show up in the only census records that I can find in Argentina. However it is interesting to note that Harriett at least has her age close to being correct. According to family stories they lived in Argentina for a bit and Willliam John Gayleard got worked on the railway and got his engineer’s ticket. I have not found this documentation yet, but at it will be interesting to see it. However…..

After doing some searching in Argentina I found this. This is from Rosario Central a soccer team from Rosario. And they have documented a bit of their history that can be found on a few sites across the web. What basically happens in that a gentleman, Colin Calder, organized along with others a soccer team formed around the Central Argentine Railway company. At first they only had railway workers playing for them. Their first few matches were recorded and in them you can see William Gayleard listed as one of the players. He played the first three games and then disappeared.

There is a little bit of a discrepancy in the time frame in which the Gayleard family come to Canada and in one census it says 1901 and the other is 1899. And according to family stories they stopped in England on the way over. So which is true? So far I have only found the name Gayleard found only a few times in Argentina before 1900 so in my searching I finally found this.

In June or July of 1899 I found a Mr and Mrs Gayleard along with their son Arthur listed as passengers on the ship Iberia coming from Chile to Liverpool. It fits in the time line and the ages are correct for Mr Gayleard to be William and Arthur to be William John. Even though the professions might be wrong the ages are right. So I am thinking that this must be them coming from South America over to England.

The Gayleards move to Canada

During all my genealogy research I have found only one set of families named Gayleard in Canada so far. There are families with the name Gaylard or Gaylord or other spellings but only one spelled Gayleard. There might have been those with that name that have visited but however nothing so far in census records as having lived here. Of course there are still instances of the misspelling of the name but as time progresses the name becomes spelled correctly more often. This makes all those with in Western Canada with the spelling “Gayleard” either related to William Gayleard or they married into the family.

William, Harriett and William John leave England on August 3rd, 1899 on the ship Cambroman for Canada. However William is listed as Henry, but since his name is William Henry Gayleard he might have gone by Henry for a bit of time. Of course the age is list as “24” but that will soon be correct. It does have William J Gayleard listed and the age is correct.

They of course arrive in Canada on the same ship Cambroman in August of 1899 and the spelling of Gayleard is correct and they put their place of residence will be Winnipeg.

Around this time a few photos were taken but I am not sure of where and when.

This is most likely in the late 1890’s. William John should be 20 years old in 1899 and this looks close. The photo looks like it had a chemical spill or something because edges of it look awful. I edited it down so it would look better.

Here is an example of a couple of photos I have from this time frame. Unfortunately nothing is written on it so it makes it hard to find out information. However after doing a bit of searching I found a name on the paper that the picture is on. It is a heavy piece of paper meant to help keep the original photo from tearing or being damage. The name of it led me to a photography company in Argentina that sold or rented photography goods. I believe William or his son bought the paper to ensure that their photos stayed safe. However it is quite possible that the photo of the 3 of them was actually taken in Argentina also.

This photo is also roughly in the same time frame, you can see that William John is quite young. So making it either in Argentina or Canada, or perhaps taken on the trip to England. The photo was in a little rough shape so I edited it down.

This is the 1901 census showing Winnipeg, you can see that they actually state they have been in the country for 2 years already and both William and William John are working as labourers.

Around 1900 William Henry Gayleard applies for a homestead grant and succeeds in getting one.

By 1906 they had moved were now farming. So you can see they have one horse, 3 milk cows and 4 other “herded or meat cattle”

Here they are again in 1916, the image is of poor quality.

They are still farming according to the 1916 census. What is interesting that in all the previous and current ones is that they have that all 3 can read and write. What also is very interesting in the this one is the religion. Here it says that William Henry is Methodist, that Harriett is Baptist and that William John is Anglican.

Harriet Gayleard, nee Hicks died on September 10th, 1917 and is buried at St James Anglican Cemetery in Poplar Park.

By 1921 census it was just William Henry and his son farming, the census record is hard to read as it is a little messy.

Both William and his son are still farming together in 1926, very few stories exist from this time frame.

However William John Gayleard was in the position of Sec-Treasurer for the local school board as we can find him placing ads looking for teachers.

Not only in 1919 but in 1924 as well.

At age 48 William John Gayleard finally married to Martha Ellen (Nellie) Dennett daughter of Peter Dennett and Catherine Lawson. The following year their first child was born, Sarah Gayleard in 1928. I have a letter and it is written by Rebecca Davies nee Davey around Christmas or New Years of 1927/28. “over quite choked when you or rather Nellie that the baby name was Sarah for one as it took her back at once to her father favorite and only sister she said I bet my brother chose that name for her so she is all excitement now”. So Aunt Polly is talking about her father, George Gayleard who passed away in 1867. So we know that George has a sister and that William Henry and Aunt Polly had an aunt named Sarah. How much of a relationship they had, I don’t know, but it ties into a theory I have for later.

Henry James Gayleard is born in the following year of 1929, however the Gayleards decide to pull up roots and move to some place warmer.

In 1929 William John Gayleard and his family, wife Nellie, daughter Sarah, son Henry and his father William Henry crossed over the US border of Ranier, Minnesota on the way to Cuba and the Isle of Pines. The Isle of Pines has been renamed to the Isle of Juventud since then. They do include a bit of information, like their ages, 48, 22, 1 1/2, under 1 and William Henry being 66. Also their hair colour and eye colours.

They stayed there for about a year and then moved back to Canada. They story is that Nellie Gayleard found the weather too hot for her so they came back in the spring of 1930.

Here is them landing in New York on April 26th, 1930 on the ship the Monterey. Again they give detailed descriptions of all of them and what is interesting is under the Country of Nationality they are all listed as British even though Nellie, Sarah and Henry are born in Canada.

The Monterey or Ward lines is the only ship I really found any amount of information on. Ward Lines ran ships for about 1840 to 1950. As you can see they ran a lot of ships down to Cuba and Mexico area. So a 4 day trip from Cuba to New York.

William Henry Gayleard passed away October 2nd, 1930 in St John, New Brunswick, he was 73 years old.

William John and Nellie Gayleard lived in New Brunswick for a few years after that giving birth to Wilfred Merrill in November of that year and Alfred Thomas in 1933. They moved back to Manitoba and had three more children, Elizabeth, Edward and Margaret. Currently all 3 daughters are still alive while all the sons passed away, Wilfred in 1950, Henry in 1984, Edward in 1996 and Alfred in 2000.

William John Gayleard passed away in June of 1939 and is buried next to his mother Harriett at St James Cemetery at Poplar Park.

Nellie (Martha Ellen) Gayleard, nee Dennett passed away in April of 1977 and is buried next to her sons Wilfred and Alfred at the Garson Community Cemetery.

This is the obit I could find with a picture of Wilfred Gayleard who passed away in 1950. It is the only good photo I can find of him.

I haven’t included many details on this generation of Gayleards in this blog as some of them are alive and a lot of them having living children and grandchildren. I am hoping that this blog may show them some of the Gayleard genealogy in their family trees and hopefully they enjoy it, however without proper permission I won’t publish it.

However that does leave me with some lose details. I started off trying to find as much genealogy and information I could find about the Gayleard name in Hampshire. There is more that could be dug up. There are gaps in information, mostly a marriage certificate of George Gayleard and Ann Pearce. Marriage certificates after 1837 in England became more standardized as you can see, it includes the names of the parents, and occasionally not correctly. However it is generally correct. The name is often misspelled Gaylard, Gaylord or Gayland just to name a few. However there are families at the same time living in Hampshire with those exact same spellings. So how to separate them. That is for the next posts when I put in two more Gayleards living in the Portsmouth area online.

Thank you for reading.

Continue Reading: 6. The Gayleard Connection