The Wakefields of Ontario, Canada.

The story of the Wakefield side of our family picks up around 1805, in the town of Preston, Lancashire, England, with the birth of a baby boy named George.

George's parents were Joseph and Sarah Wakefield, and little more is known about his early life, except that as a young man George Wakefield somehow made his way several hundred miles south to Swindon, Wiltshire, where he courted and married Louisa Brown.

Henry & Ann Hunt Haines Wakefield

George and Louisa Wakefield's firstborn child, Henry, came into the world on February 21, 1828, followed quickly by two sisters. In 1832, when Henry was four years old the young family immigrated to Canada. Tradition holds that the middle daughter, whose name has been lost to history, died during the crossing and was buried at sea.  Young Henry's uncle, George's brother, is reported to have died when the ship he was returning to England.

Upon arrival in North America, it is believed that the Wakefields traveled overland from Boston, Massachusetts to Ontario, Canada, where they settled near a community called Arkell, roughly 100 miles west of Toronto.

Eight more children were born to George and Louisa Wakefield on the farm they carved out of the forest roughly a mile north of Arkell, five sons, and three daughters: William, John, George, Thomas, Edward, Esther, Jane, and Louisa.

In 1833 another group of immigrants sailed from England, most likely landing in New York. From there, Henry and Ann Haines traveled to Newark, New Jersey, where, two weeks later a daughter, Ann Hunt Haines was born. The Haines family also settled in the vicinity of Arkell, where Henry Haines built a large, two-story log home, part of which was reported still standing as late as 1950.

The estimated location of George and Louisa Wakefield's farm.

Ann Hunt Haines spent much of her childhood living in the home of a prosperous uncle, William Trentfield Haines, who remained in Newark. Ann lived a lavish life by all accounts, and only returned to her parents' wilderness home for brief visits.

It was on one of these visits that Ann must have been introduced to Henry Wakefield. On February 1, 1854, the pair were married by Reverend A. Palmour at Guelph. The first of  Henry and Ann's children, William Haines Wakefield, was born November 19, 1855, and over the next eighteen years, Ann would bear nine more children into this world.

One day in the Spring of 1860, George Wakefield trekked over the hill and across a swollen stream with his black dog to Arkell. The dog returned home alone that evening, and when George failed to appear in a timely manner the dog led the party to a hole in an ice dam blocking the ford. A search was made and the body of George Wakefield was found in the stream.

Upon completing his business in town, George Wakefield had turned toward home. When he reached the stream he must have tried to cross and slipped through the ice and drowned.  According to English law, this left Henry, his oldest son, in full ownership of the house and heir to the greater part of the estate. At the ripe old age of 32, Henry Wakefield found himself in charge of his father's profitable farm and other business affairs. A significant portion of the family income at the time derived from an apple orchard said to have still been producing fruit over a century later.

Henry Wakefield's home was near Varney, Ontario

Several years after George's death the house burned and Louisa moved away to Guelph, where she lived with her daughter, Esther, until the end of her life in 1882.  At that time, Henry settled the estate and divided shares equally among his siblings.

There is no record to tell us when Henry established his home some sixty miles north of Guelph, on a farm in Garafraxa Township, County of Grey, near a place today called Varney.

According to Wikipedia, "In some small townships in Ontario, the title reeve was historically used instead of mayor. In some other municipalities, "mayor" and "reeve" were two separate offices, with the mayor retaining leadership powers while the reeve was equivalent to what other municipalities called an "at-large councilor"."

According to The Family of Henry Wakefield, North Carolina, 1805 - 1950, in 1861, Henry Wakefield was elected Deputy Reeve. In 1862 he was elected Head Reeve, an office he held until 1865, and again in 1867, 69, and 1870.  The job is said to have included chairing the local school board, handling municipal business, and occasionally settling minor legal disputes.

The text further states that the "family lived in a log house for a number of years. This land was hilly and covered with stones, many of which he collected for burning to make lime, others to build a house. Sometime after 1866 Thomas Wakefield, a brother built the house for him. He too was a skilled workman, and the house is still standing in good condition. Later he built a barn, the largest in the township."

Friendship Township, Guilford County, NC, today.

Winters in Ontario were bitterly cold, and family tradition holds that Henry wanted to move the family to a warmer climate.  The Civil War in the United States ended in 1865, and federal troops were still occupying the treasonous southern states when Henry visited Friendship, North Carolina about 1870 and purchased a farm.

He returned to Canada, sold his farm, and in 1871 moved his family to their new home in the United States.  Livestock and furnishings were loaded onto a boxcar connected to a freight train leaving Guelph. Henry and his two eldest sons would travel in the boxcar, while Ann and the remaining seven children traveled by passenger train to Baltimore.

She and the children rented a hotel room and waited for Henry and the boys to arrive. When they didn't appear as scheduled Ann began to wonder what to do; she had run out of money and had no way to continue the journey. Just as she and the children were about to give up looking for Henry and the older boys, one of the younger sons, George, recognized a box through the open door of a freight car.

The children of Henry and Ann Wakefield
front row, left to right: Will, Ellen, Esther, Henry, Ann, George
back row, left to right: John, Alice, Jane, Tom

The family, reunited, embarked by boat that afternoon for Portsmouth, Virginia. From there they continued by rail to Greensboro, North Carolina. Arriving in the middle of the night, and reportedly walking the last several miles to their new home in a predominantly Quaker community still reeling from a war they never wanted.

Henry Wakefield established himself as a man of integrity in his new community. As if to cement the bond to their new home, Henry and Ann's tenth child, Ellen Carolina, was born August 26, 1873, in Friendship, North Carolina.  Henry became a naturalized citizen in 1880 and thereafter served as postmaster and express agent of the township for several years.

After many years of progressive farming and developing one of the most modern dairy operations in the county, Henry Wakefield died of a "heart ailment" on July 28, 1897. Ann spent her final years living in the home of her youngest son, Thomas, and died on January 12, 1920.