Author: NAYLOR, William
Biography:
NAYLOR, William (1782-1868: ancestry.co.uk)
He was the fifth child of Thomas Naylor (d 1808) and Esther Holroyd (d 1820) who had married in Doncaster, Yorkshire, on 6 Jan. 1771. William was born on 8 May 1782 and baptised on 18 June. Nothing is known about his early education and, unlike other Methodist preachers, Naylor did not write an account of his life and conversion. He married Stewart Graham Panton of Alyth, Angus, in Edinburgh on 12 June 1807. She died in Sunderland, Durham, in 1810. Naylor then married Mary Dixon on 17 June 1811 in Bishopwearmouth, Durham. Their daughter, Elizabeth Esther, was born on 11 Oct. 1812; Naylor is described in her baptismal record from 30 Oct. as “Preacher of the Gospel South Shields.” They had at least four other children including a son, John Dixon, who died in infancy in 1814 and Edwin Young who was born at Liverpool in 1823. They moved to London where he served as a preacher for the Chelsea circuit. Mary died on 8 Sept. 1834 and was buried in the City Road cemetery near the vault containing the remains of John Wesley (q.v.) and other Methodist preachers. Naylor married a widow, Ann (Marriott) Early on 24 Nov. 1835; she died in 1842. No record has been located for his fourth marriage to Mary Ward; she was baptised on 30 June 1793 in South Witham, Lincolnshire. The 1851 Census shows William and Mary living with Edwin at 39 Sloane Square; Naylor is identified as minister at the Sloane Terrace chapel. By the time of the 1861 Census they had moved to Tipton, Staffordshire, where Naylor had responsibility for several Methodist chapels. Mary died in Tipton on 17 July 1862. Naylor was present in 1813 at the first meeting of the Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Society in Leeds and he preached at the jubilee meeting on 5 Oct. 1863 at Armley in Leeds. The book listed in this bibliography, Miscellaneous Musings, contains Naylor’s long poem, “The United Friends,” written to the memory of two of the society’s general secretaries. He died at Wednesbury, Staffordshire, on 10 July 1868, leaving effects of under £300. His other publications include sermons, The Visions of Sapience (1815; written with James Everett, q.v.), and Hymns for Personal, Domestic, and Social Worship (1850). (ancestry.co.uk 14 Feb. 2025; findmypast.co.uk 14 Feb. 2025; Charles William Hatfield, Historical Notices of Doncaster, Second Series [1868]; Wesleyan Missionary Notices 10 [1863], 161) SR