Introduction to the Wagstaff Family of the Intermountain West

This blog deals with the history of Wagstaffs who migrated to the Intermountain West, their descendents and their ancestors. It is intended to be preliminary to and supportive of a more formal website being built by Craig Shelley. This blog will be whatever we of the family make of it. I, Jess Wagstaff, start this acting only in my own name and invite anyone interested to input.


Wagstaff is an uncommon, though by no means rare, surname that is widely distributed in the English speaking world. In England, the country of its origin, the name is concentrated in Yorkshire, Warwickshire, and Bedfordshire. In the United States the name was found in Colonial Virginia and since is mainly in North Carolina, Texas, and Utah. The North Carolina and Texas people are not related to the family in Utah.


There is speculation that the name is of Saxon origin, but Saxon migration to the British Isles ended centuries before the first mention of the name. One theory is that it is a military name referring to the staff of a spear akin to the name Shakespeare. Another high brow idea is that it refers to the staff or scepter denoting the authority of one in power. However, few Wagstaffs were of the gentry class while fewer still were nobility and none were royalty. Rather it seems likely that it refers to a shepherds staff, i. e., our people were sheepherders.


In the Cary Grant movie, My Favorite Wife was Helen Wagstaff. Groucho Marx played Professor Wagstaff in Horse Feathers. One of my favorite cartoons is a dog with a man’s head being rebuked by a man in a white laboratory coat, "Wagstaff these experiments have got to stop." Other than these fictitious examples, few have obtained prominence but rather they formed part of the foundation of our culture - solid contributing citizens. Regardless of the meaning of the name, the members of the family have mainly been workers - farmers, coal miners and railroaders. It is only within the present generation that the majority of them have left the farm, mine and railroad to seek other employment. They have turned from coal and cabbage to computers. Cattle ranchers and onion farmers became a land appraiser, veterinarian, and wild seed picker, then wrestling coach and aeronautical engineer.


Many of the Wagstaffs of Western America descend from emigrants from Bedfordshire, a small mostly rural county about an hour north of London. Located on main roads such as the Great Northern Road, there were several fords over streams giving rise to the name of the county, Bedford, and some of its parishes, e. g., Great Barford and Little Barford. Although the area was fought over by the Danes, it seems to be mainly of Saxon extraction. The northern end of the county was a hotbed of nonconformity. John Bunyan, one of the best known nonconformist preachers, came from this area. Wagstaffs were largely located in Wilden in the 1500s and early 1600s. Gradually the name appeared in moderate numbers across the northeastern part of Bedfordshire somewhat overlapping into western Cambridgeshire. Few of the family lived in towns such as Bedford or Biggleswade and fewer still were craftsmen. They were largely rural agricultural people.


As a youngster I heard family lore that all of the Utah Wagstaffs were descended from three brothers who joined the LDS Church and migrated to Utah in the mid 1800s. They are William Wagstaff (1809-1897) of Salt Lake City, John Wagstaff (1816-1901) of Salt Lake City and Samuel Wagstaff (1820-1897) of American Fork, Utah. Gradually I became aware that these brothers had four sisters and a mother who also migrated. They are Rachel Eleanor Wagstaff Hayes (1829-1884) of Pleasant Grove, Utah; Sarah Ann Wagstaff Sears (1824-1902) of Salt Lake City; Mary Wagstaff Bone (1811-1875) of Lehi, Utah; Ann Wagstaff Juchau (1826-1904) of Brooklyn, New York and the mother Mary Bathsheba Gillions of Lehi, Utah. Still later while taking a genealogy class at the Logan Branch Genealogical Library the instructor asked if I were related to Mary Peterson of Brigham City, Utah. Her maiden name was Wagstaff but she was from a different branch than the three brothers. Her immigrant ancestor is Henry Wagstaff (1862-1947) of Brigham City, Utah.


At a much later time I learned that there were additional branches of Wagstaffs that migrated from England. William Wagstaff (1809-1893) migrated to Preston, Idaho. John Wagstaff (1836-1914) migrated to Almy, Wyoming near Evanston not for religion but for coal mining. More recently I have uncovered records of Edwin Wagstaff from Scotland who was cremated in Provo, Utah in 1978 and Mary Ann Wagstaff who married a Bullock in Bedfordshire before they migrated to Utah. Even more recently I have discovered that Mary Ann had a sister Elizabeth Wagstaff who married a Shupe and migrated even before Mary. And even more recently still I have discovered a John Wagstaff who emigrated from England to the Evanston, Wyoming area and later moved to Croydon, Utah. There are probably still other lines waiting to be discovered. The fact remains that even though a high percentage of the Wagstaffs in Central Utah descend from the three brothers, that there are several other branches of the family. A branch is here defined as those people descended from an English immigrant individual or nuclear family. The confusion increased after 1991 when temple submissions were no longer accompanied by any documentation. With the advent of NewFamilySearch we became aware of many records of family relationships some of which are erroneous.


I have nicknamed the Wagstaff family branches as the following.
Almy John
American Fork Samuel
Brigham City Henry
Brooklyn Ann
Croydon John
Lehi Mary
Ogden Elizabeth
Pleasant Grove Rachel Eleanor
Preston William
Provo Edwin
Salt Lake John
Salt Lake Sarah Ann
Sugar House William
Warren Mary Ann


As individual members of the Wagstaff family were converted to the LDS Church they recorded the names of members of their immediate family members and ancestors they knew. They performed temple work for themselves and known ancestors in the Endowment House and in the Logan, Manti and Salt Lake temples. Little research for records of people beyond their personal knowledge seems to have been done in the 1800s. In fact little actual research was done until the 1920s and 1930s and then not much. Annie Kimball, a descendant of William Wagstaff (1808-1897), did some research and organized a Wagstaff Reunion which met annually for several years. It lasted only a few years after her death. In addition to Annie Kimball, two other women Mary Wagstaff Peterson and Virginia Wagstaff Bushman were prime movers for a number of years. Others involved in research include Howard Logsden, David Wagstaff, Noreen Wagstaff Taylor, Ellen Kurr, Brian Leese and Linda Johnson Maxfield.


Actual research by family members peaked in the 1960s and 1970s. Mary Peterson led an effort to extend the Wagstaff pedigree in Bedfordshire. She hired Brian Leese, a professional genealogist, who researched the family and issued at least 9 reports of which some are in 2 parts. Later Leese was accused of fabricating pedigrees. However, there is no indication that work he did on the Wagstaff line is not trustworthy. Roger Ward, a Bedfordshire Wagstaff descendant residing in that area of England, has evaluated the Leese reports and considers them to be accurate in most regards. However, Maureen Hall, another Wagstaff descendant living in that area, does not agree with Roger on all points. The Hayes family and Willis Peterson have maintained contact with Roger. Linda Maxfield, a Hayes descendant, has Roger’s hand-written evaluations and will type them up and share. Roger has been working on a book of Wagstaff genealogy for many years. The status of this book is unknown. Howard Logsden employed Ellen Kurr to research the family. Brian Leese disagreed with the pedigree that she researched.


Wagstaff is part of the One Name Organization. Barbara Kent is a prime mover for Wagstaff in that organization. Harold Jacklin is in the final stages of publishing a book that will include some Wagstaff family history. The personal history and descendancy of Henry Wagstaff has been published in two volumes by the Brigham City Branch. Websites known to contain some Wagstaff family history include those by the Hayes family, the Juchau family and Craig Shelley. The Wagstaff family presently has no formal organization. After a meeting of some of the family on 28 Sep 2009 at the Bountiful home of Wayne and Clarissa Wagstaff, Craig Shelley agreed to create a Wagstaff website. He is working on the technical aspects. Jess Wagstaff is working on content. This blog is intended as preliminary and supportive of that website development. Several other people have family history information and are willing to share. These include Wayne and Clarissa Wagstaff and Linda Maxfield, a descendant of Rachel Eleanor Wagstaff Hayes. There are probably other people willing to research information and to write or revise sections.