Part of the Earley family tree (Great-great-great-grandfather)
Family background and early life
Giles Halliday was probably born at Sutton Veny, near Warminster, Wiltshire in early 1785. He was baptised, as Giles Halliday Gullifar, at St Leonard’s Church, Sutton Veny (now a ruin) on 17 April 1785; his mother was Sarah Gullifar (1738–c.1820) but his father was not named on the baptism register [probably Giles Halliday (1737–1827) who was born and died in Sutton Veny].
On or about his ninth birthday, on 22 February 1794, Giles Gullifar was indentured for seven years to Robert Ward, a peruke (wig) maker in Warminster.
Marriage and children
On 29 November 1829, Giles Halliday, aged 24, married 21-year old Rebecca Dicks in the Church of St Peter and St Paul in her home village of Heytesbury, two miles from Sutton Veny.
Their first child, William, was baptised at Heytesbury on 25 May 1810. There were at least four further children of the marriage:
Charles baptised at Knook (1½ miles south-east of Heytesbury) on 13 January 1812
Elizabeth baptised at Heytesbury on 6 February 1814
Giles baptised at Heytesbury on 1 October 1815
Eliza baptised at Heytesbury on 4 April 1817
There was a further son, John, born in about 1820; on the 1871 census, Charles was living at Dartmouth in Devon with his brother, John, aged 50. Nothing further has been found about John’s earlier life.
On the baptismal records for the last three children, Giles’s occupation is recorded as “Shoe maker”.
Turnpike gate keeper
When his daughter Elizabeth married John Earley at Fordingbridge on 25 December 1837, Giles’s occupation was recorded as “turnpike gate keeper”.
On the first national census in June 1841, Giles and Rebecca are recorded at “Awbridge hamlet” in the parish of Michelmersh, near Romsey. Aged 56, Giles’s occupation is officially recorded as “gate keeper”.
Ten years later, Giles is recorded as a tollgate keeper at the Turnpike Gate at Timsbury. At nearby Awbridge, his son Giles, described as a toll collector was visiting his aunt, Jane Dicks, also a toll collector, and his fiancée, Ann Hurst.
On 15 October 1857, Giles Halliday appeared at the Romsey magistrates court as the plaintiff in a claim against Revd. Allen Wake who had passed though “Lockerley Side Gate” without paying the legal toll. The defendant claimed that the gate was nearly 200 yards from the turnpike road and could not be seen from the road, so could not be considered to be on the turnpike road, as required under the relevant Act of Parliament. The magistrates found in favour of Revd. Wake, and the claim was dismissed.
On 21 April 1869, Giles Halliday was again in front of the Romsey magistrates as the defendant, when he was accused of charging an illegal toll from a “young man named Feltham” to pass the gate at Timsbury, on his way home from Romsey to Mottisfont, on his home-made four-wheel velocipede. The bench decided that a velocipede was not a wagon for the purposes of the act and hence the charge was illegal. Giles was ordered to pay a fine of 6d and return the toll of 2s 6d to Mr Feltham. The verdict was “received by a crowded court with applause, which was instantly suppressed”.
Giles and Rebecca continued to live at Timsbury and collect the tolls until Rebecca’s death in October 1871.
After his wife’s death, Giles lived with his eldest son, William at Wells in Somerset, where he died on 30 October 1875, aged 83. He was buried at St Cuthbert’s Church, Wells on 5 November 1875.
Turnpike locations
The main Timsbury turnpike gate was located at the junction of Yokesford Hill and Bunny Lane with the road from Romsey to Stockbridge at GPS co-ordinates 51.01594, -1.50227.
There were two tollgates at Awbridge: at the junction of Stanbridge Lane and Cook Lane (51.00903, -1.52284) and in Kent’s Oak (51.01566, -1.54477).
The Lockerley Side Gate was at Carter’s Clay on the road from Awbridge to Lockerley (51.02191, -1.56154).
