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The Gaillards of Normany early embraced protestantism, and, suffering from the Huguenot persecutions of the sixteenth century, fled to England for refuge in 1550. There they have continued to reside ever since, making for themselves an honorable record in affairs of church and state. Industrially the Gaylords were weavers, and that industry still appertains to the family, just as other trades are handed down from generation to generation in England.
In 1630 William Gaillard left his home in Devonshire, and settled 1n Dorchester, Mass., removing to Windsor, Conn. in 1638. He was elected to the General Assembly forty-one times, semiannually, a fact that speaks well for the esteem in which he was held by his fellow townsmen. He died in 1673. From William many of the Gaylords of Connecticut are descended, adopting the English form of their name during the eighteenth century.
It may be interesting to state that the French Gaillard and the English Gaylord mean precisely the same thing, or just what the English orthography indicates, a day lord.
William's Son Walter lived in Waterbury; his son Joseph was one of the first settlers of Durham. John Gaylord, second son of
Joseph, was a resident of Waterbury, afterward removing to Wallingford, where he died about 1753, leaving estates in
Wallingford and Farmington valued at 2,500 pounds. His son Edward came to New Cambridge, now Bristol, in 1737, and purchased
the Brownson land, west of Goose corner, now owned by Eliada S.Tuttle, and built a house upon it.
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