“…after living in the hospital for about 12 years…”

~ Wilfred Gayleard

Back when I started this blog I had a few goals, one was to put together all the research that I have done and the second was to get it out to my family so they too would have the same information. Key pieces are still missing and certain things are guess work and I have also been fortunate to have a little help along the way. It has also led me to focus on this one family where from everything I have flows. And that is the family of William Gayleard and Elizabeth Ashford. Although they had several children only 4 reached adulthood. William, George, Sarah and Henry.

So let me introduce you to Sarah Gayleard, although I had her on the William and Elizabeth page it is now time to give her her own page. There is a letter I have that has Mary Ann Gayleard, Aunt Polly, writing to my great grandfather and father about my aunt’s upcoming birth. In it she says how excited her father would be to have her named after his favorite and only sister, Sarah. So this gave me another branch of the tree to focus on. As on the other page Sarah is born and baptized in 1815.

The next record I can find is her marriage in 1836 to John Pearce/Pierce

They appear to get married in February of 1836 in Portsea and it lists John Pearce as being either a Royal Marine or in the Royal Navy. And within the same year they have a son named John and baptized on November 23rd.

This is so far the only child I have found. And I cannot seem to find either Sarah or her husband John or her son John in the 1841 census. I do find Sarah living with he mother in the 1851 census living in the Portsmouth area.

Here they are both living as widows so we cannot find any more information on John Pearce other he is a sailor. It is also unfortunate that I couldn’t find them in the 1841 census to see where they had lived or if they had moved at all. Sarah’s son John I can’t seem to find however I did find a merchant mariner ticket for him in 1850. And with some of the census records you don’t find those who are aboard ships and they are listed already in the crew lists.

Sarah Pearce shows up in the 1861 census as a patient in Fareham Hospital. So I sent away for some more information to guess if it was indeed Sarah Gayleard or not.

Here is her medical certificate filled out showing she went into the Hospital as a patient due to mental health issues caused from the death of her husband.

And that her name is Sarah Gayleard and her mom is in an alms house, which Elizabeth Gayleard nee Ashford was.

Sarah passed away on December 5th, 1868 after living in the hospital for about 12 years outliving her two younger brothers. In both her records from the hospital and her death certificate she is listed as living on King street in Portsmouth and that she is a widow of a sailor.

Currently I am still searching for records of her husband’s death and what happened to her son.

This is so far my best guess for her son, John. It is a merchant mariner tickets and it has him listed as being tickets in London on December of 1850. It does have him being born on November 22nd of 1836. There is also the question of the spelling of his last name, it appears as Pierce instead of Pearce. But so does the marriage certificate of his parents, Pearce is spelled Pierce and Gayleard is spelled Gayler. But it could all be misspellings.

It also give me something more to add on to. However at this point it is a bit more of a struggle to find this John Pearce or much more information on his father. But at some point I believe I will find something. For now I am glad to have rounded out the life of Sarah Gayleard.