ORIGIN: Crewkerne, Somersetshire
MIGRATION: 1630 in Mary & John
FIRST RESIDENCE: Dorchester
REMOVES: Windsor 1638
OCCUPATION: Planter.
CHURCH MEMBERSHIP: The claim has been made that William Gaylord was made deacon of the Dorchester church before the Mary & John sailed, and it seems to be certain that he was deacon as soon as that ship arrived in New England. In the earliest town records all the acts of the town were signed by four men: John Warham, John Maverick, William Rockwell and William Gaylord [DTR 1-7]. Warham and Maverick were the ministers of the church, and Rockwell and Gaylord would seem to be the deacons. Also on 26 August 1633 William Gaylord and William Rockwell were appointed administrators to the estate of John Russell who had died in Dorchester [MBCR 1:107], and this is a diaconal function. Neither William Gaylord nor his wife was admitted to the second church at Dorchester, organized late in 1636, clearly indicating that he retained his membership in the Warham church, where he continued as deacon after he moved to Connecticut.
FREEMAN: Requested 19 October 1630 (as "Will: Gallard") and admitted 18 May 1631 (as "Willm: Gallerd") [MBCR 1:80, 366].
EDUCATION: Signed his will of 31 January 1671[/2], but made his mark to codicil of 14 November 1672. His inventory included "a box of books & a case of bottles" appraised at £2 8s.
OFFICES: Petit jury, 9 November 1630 [MBCR 1:81]. Committee on boundary between Boston and Roxbury, 4 March 1633/4 [MBCR 1:113]. Deputy for Dorchester to General Court, 9 May 1632 (as "John Gallard"), 2 September 1635, 3 March 1635/6, 1 August 1637, 2 May 1638 [MBCR 1:95, 156, 164, 200, 227].
Prior to the institution of selectmen in Dorchester, William Gaylord was one of the four men to sign town orders, 21 January 1631/2 through 2 June 1634 [DTR 1-4, 6, 7]. Chosen selectman, 2 November 1635 [DTR 13] (and attended meeting of 27 June 1636 as "Goo[dman] Gaylard" [DTR 16]); chosen selectman 2 January 1636/7, for a six month term [DTR 19]; chosen selectman 2 January 1637/8 [DTR 25]. Appointed assessor, 2 January 1636/7 [DTR 20].
Deputy for Windsor to Connecticut General Court, 1639-1647, 1649-1662, 1664 [CT Civil List 20].
ESTATE: Ordered to build twenty feet of fence in the marsh, which implies ownership of one cow, 3 April 1633 [DTR 2]. Granted two acres of meadow, 1 February 1635/6 [DTR 15]. Granted two acres of meadow near Goodman Greenway, 27 June 1636 [DTR 16]. Granted two lots, of five and a fraction acres each, in the Neck and in the Cow's Pasture, 18 March 1637/8 [DTR 31]. Granted Lot #76, six acres, in the meadow beyond Naponset [DTR 322]. (On 24 May 1642 John Wiswall sold to Christopher Gibson "6 acres of meadow at Naponset ... being the 76 lot as it is recorded" [DTR 48].)
In the Windsor land inventory on 25 December 1640 Walter Gaylord had a homelot of twenty acres; sixteen acres of meadow; fifty-eight rods in breadth by three miles in length over the Great River; thirty-nine acres near Pine Meadow; and a twenty acre woodlot upon the plains toward Paquannick (which he exchanged with Bigod Eggleston for eighteen acres adjoining to Rocky Neck) [WiLR 1:25].
In his will, dated 31 January 1671[/2] (with codicils dated 14 November 1672 and 18 December 1672) and proved in September 1673, "William Gaylord of Windsor, seriously considering my age," bequeathed to "my son John Gaylord, his heirs & assignes" all my housing and home lot and orchard bounded by "my daughter Hoskins" provided my son John freely resigns up his propriety in his own dwelling house & barn & orchard & land to "my grandson John Birge ... his heirs and assigns"; if "my son John" refuse to make the exchange, then "my grandson John Birge" to enjoy my house and homelot as it is bounded; to "my beloved son John Gaylord & my beloved grandson John Birge" sixteen acres of meadow in the Great Meadow divided between them; to "my grandson John Birge" ten rods breadth in the parcel of land I bought of Mr. Hanaford on the east side of the great river; to "Hezikiah Gaylord my grandson (who now lives with my son John)" four rods breadth in the land over the great river "that lieth next to the land I gave his father"; to "my son Walter Gaylord" ten rods breadth in the land over the great river; to "my son Samuel Gaylord" ten rods breadth in the land over the great river; to "my son John" the remaining part of my whole lot on the east side of the great river with the barn standing thereon; to "my daughter Elizabeth Hoskins, of whose dutiful & tender respect to me I have had good experience & great comfort in having by this my will disposed of part of my estate to her son John (who hath and is a great help in supporting of me in my old age), I am not able to do for her as otherwise I would, but as a token of my love to her I give her one of my great kettles, the brass or copper one, which she pleaseth"; son John Gaylord sole executor; Capt. Benjamin Newberry and John Allyn of Hartford, overseers. In a codicil dated 14 November 1672 "the Lord having lengthened out my life longer than I expected" he bequeathed "as a testimony of my fatherly affection to my daughter Elizabeth Hoskins one of my cows and household goods"; to my grandchild John Birge my bay mare and the great table and form in the fire room below. In a codicil dated 18 December 1672 he bequeathed to "his grandson John Birg" tools; to "my daughter Birge" a white and black hog [Hartford PD Case #2140].
The inventory of "the estate of Deacon Willaim Gaylor who deceased July 20, 1673," was taken 2 August 1673 and totalled £296 17s. 6d., of which £230 was real estate: "his housing, homelot & pasture adjoining," £59; "16 acres of land in the Great Meadow," £80; "land on the east side of the Great River being 34 poles in breadth by the river," £68; "18 acres of land by Rocky Hill," £3; and "39 acres of land near Pine Meadow," £20 [Hartford PD Case #2140].
BIRTH: By about 1590 based on estimated date of marriage (and perhaps a few years older if his age at death as given by Grant is not an exaggeration).
DEATH: Windsor 20 July 1673 [CTVR 27 (and from inventory)]. (Grant records among the 1673 deaths, without day or month, "Deacon Gaylar.88.old" [Grant 84].)
MARRIAGE: By about 1615 [Mary WALTER]; she died at Windsor 20 June 1657 [CTVR 43; TAG 61:95-96].
CHILDREN:
| i ELIZABETH, b. say 1615; m. (1) Windsor 5 October 1641 Richard Birge [Grant 26]; m. (2) Windsor 20 April 1653 Thomas Hoskins [CTVR 41]. (Note that in the second codicil to his will, dated 18 December 1672, William Gaylord referred to this daughter as "Elizabeth Birge," even though she had been a Hoskins for nearly twenty years.) |
| ii WILLIAM, bp. Crewkerne, Somersetshire, 28 December 1617 [TAG 61:96]; m. (1) Windsor 24 February 1641[/2?] Ann Porter [Grant 41]; m. (2) Windsor 9 February 1653/4 Elizabeth Drake [CTVR 41]; d. Windsor 14 December 1656 (from inventory [Hartford PD Case #2139]). |
| iii SAMUEL, bp. Crewkerne 19 December 1619 [TAG 17:72]; m. Windsor 4 December 1646 Elizabeth Hull [Grant 42]. |
| iv JOHN, bp. Crewkerne 24 February 1621/2 [TAG 17:72]; m. Windsor 17 November 1653 Mary Drake [Grant 43]. |
| v JOSEPH, bp. Crewkerne 27 December 1624 [TAG 17:72]; no further record. |
| vi WALTER, b. say 1626; m. (1) Windsor [blank] April 1648 Mary Stebbins [Grant 42], who d. Windsor 29 June 1657 [CTVR 43; TAG 61:95-96]; m. (2) Windsor 22 March 1659[/60?] Sarah Rockwell [Grant 42]. |
ASSOCIATIONS: In 1910 J. Henry Lea and J.R. Hutchinson published the 19 April 1634 will of Joan Patten of Crewkerne, in which she makes a bequest of £5 to "William Gaylard in New England"; based on this will they abstracted several Gaylord wills, mostly from the Taunton registry [NYGBR 41:183-90]. These abstracts are especially valuable as the originals of these wills were destroyed in the bombing of Exeter in 1942.
Lea and Hutchinson argue that Joan Patten and William Gaylord could not have been siblings, and suggest that she was his aunt, and that William Gaylord was somehow connected to the Gaylords of Pitminster, Somersetshire. Thirty years later John Insley Coddington noted that the will of Joan Patten pointed directly at Crewkerne, and there he found the baptism of three of the sons of the immigrant [TAG 17:71-74]. (Coddington missed the baptism of one son, which was found many years later [TAG 61:96].) Coddington further notes that the surname Gaylord was common in the West Country and brands as "sheer nonsense" the ascription to the immigrant of noble French ancestry.
Benjamin H. Gaylord commissioned further research in England, the results of which he published in 1982 [TAG 58:218-23]. While he did not solve the problem, Gaylord did dispel a number of myths, eliminate a few possibilities, and provide a solid foundation for future research. Like Coddington he warns against focussing only on the Pitminster Gaylords.
Richard Treat of Wethersfield had married in England in 1615 Alice Gaylord, daughter of Hugh Gaylord of Pitminster; any connection between her and William Gaylord would seem to be remote [TAG 58:220].
Col. Charles Edward Banks suggested that William Gaylord was of the family of Chilthorne Domer, Somersetshire, but without citing his evidence [Topo Dict 140]. In 1628 Ann the wife of William "Gaylerd" of Whitchurch, Dorsetshire, was taxed as a "recusant convict" [TAG 26:7]; nothing connects this William Gaylord with the New England man.
COMMENTS: On 1 May 1639 "William Gaylard of Windsore upon the river of Kennecticot in America, planter," acted as agent for JOHN WARHAM and his wife in arranging the lease of lands in Dorchester [Lechford 124-25]. On 29 July 1639 "Will[ia]m Gaylard" of Windsor, planter, was surety for Thomas Marshfield of Windsor [Lechford 136-37].
Several sources speak of a John Gaylord in Dorchester early, and make him brother of William. The only evidence for this is a colony record of 9 May 1632 in which "Will[ia]m Felpes & John Gallard" are the Dorchester delegates to a meeting which would form the beginning of the House of Deputies [MBCR 1:95]. Since William Gaylord was after this date regularly deputy from both Dorchester and Windsor, the more likely explication is that this is a scribal error for William Gaylord, and that a John Gaylord did not exist in Dorchester or in Massachusetts Bay at this time.
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