THE MANY SPELLINGS OF MY LISK/LEASK/LEISKS FAMILY OF NORFOLK, ONTARIO

My first roadblock in my search was the spelling of the surname; variations include Leisk, Liesk, Lisk, Lesh, Laesk, Lask, Lesk, Leysk, Laysk, and Lusk.  Even online search engines are not very flexible with multiple spellings of a surname.  Although my family used Lisk for the most part, for simplicity's sake I will use Leask in this article.  Leisk and Leask are the more common variations I have found in the Ontario records.

My great grandmother Luella Griffin was born in Windham, Ontario.  In the early 1980's I was sent a transcription of her parents marriage record - Ellen Lisk & Peter Smith Griffin. The marriage records listed Ellen Lisk's parents as James Lisk and Jane St. Clair; and stated that Ellen was born in the Shetland Islands.(Bill Yeager, Archivist at the Norfolk Museum and a Griffin descendant was most helpful in my early research.)

 

My research very quickly came to a dead end; I could not get past the information on the marriage certificate.  I then looked at everyone else in the Windham area with the same surname, hoping this would expand my research. 

I found wills for Abram and Samuel. Although these wills listed spouses and children I was no closer to confirming that they were siblings of my Ellen.

Ellens mother Jane was living with the Goodlets in the 1861 and 1871 census in Windham so I knew Marion was a sister.  Jane was listed as a widow. 

1861 census Windham, Ontario

 

1871 census Windham, Ontario

From a site developed by John Cardiff http://www.nornet.on.ca/~jcardiff/ I located an obituary for my 2x great grandfather Peter Smith Griffin and in the obit was the following

“His wife was Ellen Leask, a sister of the late Capt. Abram Leask of Windham.” 

Finally, I had confirmation tying my Windham Leasks to Abrams family.

A note to John and I discovered that he was a descendant of Captain Abram Leask.  He was able to provide me with information which further helped with my research.

From John I learned that Jane’s husband James was thought to be a fisherman, the most common occupation of his neighbours in Burra, Shetland Island. John had also learned from another Leask descendant living in the Windham area that James and his second son drowned (an all too common death for Burra fishermen of his day), presumably together, presumably while fishing, some time prior to his widow and surviving children coming to Canada.

Searching for my Leask family in Shetland has been a bit of a needle in a haystack until I found the marriage of Abram and Mary.  Previous family members had failed to discover Mary’s surname so research in the Shetland islands had not proceeded.  All documents I had previously found for these two, where a maiden name should have been included, always showed Marys last name as Leask.  The conclusion many Leask researchers made was that her maiden name was unknown.

  I purchased credits for Scotlands People and did a bit of searching.  I found the marriage record for Abram and Mary. It turned out Mary was also a Leask which explained why her surname in various records was recorded as such.

Abram Leisk Minn and Mary Leisk Gussigirth married     17th February 1842

 Although parents names were not mentioned in this marriage record I learned location though.  Mary was from Gussigarth and Abram from Minn; two very small settlements on Burra, and a very short distance from each other. 

 This led me to census records where I found there were two families in Gussigarth and three in Minn.