Crealock of Devonshire

1500 - Present

There are 1530 individuals and 475 families representing 375 surnames in this database.

I have made a few changes by adding the original spelling of the last name to the Crealock name. In some cases thee were three separate spellings to the same person but only one was added.

This family tree is traced back to the early 1500's to Devon, England. . At present, the majority of the Crealock descendants live in Canada. It has been determined that all Crealock's are related to each. As in most trees, there are bound to be mistakes or omissions and I welcome any corrections or additions. I would like to thank the numerous people who have helped me put this together.

Some of the variations in the spelling that were found are CREALOCK, CREALOCKE, CRELOCKE, CRALOCK, CRALOCKE, CRAYLOCK, CREYLOCK, CRYLUK, CRELLOCKE, CRELAKE, CRELLECK, CRELLECKE, CRILLICKE, CRILLICK, CRELICK, CRELUCKE, and CROWLOCKE.

The name Crealock is very difficult to trace back before they began keeping records in local parish churches. In the various letters that I received there seems to be different origins to the name.

 They may be descended from El Cid, Rodrigo (or Ruy) Diáz de Vivar, a commander under King Alfonso VI of Castile in the eleventh century who conquered northern Spain.     

The name was derived from CRELAGH, a Irish name. A crelagh, a traditional basket - shaped like a rugby ball - used for spinning     

Crealock was derived from Kroeloque a Norman or Norwegian origin.

They are related to the Stradling family of St. Donats castle in Wales.

eastern Canadian Crealocks

There were at least five Crealocks that came to eastern Canada from England. John Crealock came to Toronto around 1820. John and Richard Crealock immigrated around 1870 and one woman came to Quebec in 1848 but her first name remains unknown. John settled in what was known then as English Settlement, Kings Co., New Brunswick. He came over on the steamship “Acadia” and landed in Saint John, New Brunswick. Joseph Parsons and his wife Hannah Crealock came from Littleham to Margate PEI Canada with their children around 1840.

English settlement was previously settled around 1820 by emigrates from Cumberland Co. England. It is by coincidence that my gg grandfather Richard Smith was one of them. Names like Pearson, Murray, Kierstead, Carmichael, Kincaid and Gibbon are just a few that are found in local cemeteries or their descendants are still living there. The area is still a rural farming community with mainly large dairy farms.

 John Crealock

 Joyce Crealock McKnight (John's daughter) who was in 90th year wrote the following letter about John Crealock (My great-grandfather)

 Dated Dec. 29 1969 

My grandfather was William Crealock who married Joice Brent. They had five children; William, Mary, Richard, Ann and John. Their mother died shortly after John was born. That was in Bideford, Devonshire England. After her death their grandmother took care of them and William had a nurse look after him. As the story goes the nurse took William to the beach. A wave came in and took him out to sea, another wave brought him back but she missed getting him, and again he was taken out and then brought him back and that time she got him.  

John never tried to smoke, but once. The hired man went to church Sunday morning and left his pipe ready to smoke when he came home; but father smoked most of it and was very sick. They never knew why he was sick, but the hired man joked with him about it. That was first and last smoke!  

When in his teens he went to Wales and worked for 5 years for Lord Talbot taking care of his horse. The hired men went out to town, and on the way home they stopped at an inn to have a drink. They had never seen father the worse for liquor, so they mixed ale and porter and that made him very sick and drunk. Lord Talbot said “I’ll look after my own horse tonight” He thought “ I’m not fit even to feed his horse”. That was his last drink. 

After five years in Wales, he and a friend came to New York. When the boat landed, a man came aboard and asked for “John Crealock”. He had registered as a farmer and the man hired him and took him to his home on the Millstream, Kings Co. NB where he worked for a time. 

On the boat coming over, a man asked them to have a game of cards. So the three of them played and since this man was a card shark, they both lost most of their money. Then John bent over a tiny corner of his card and won a lot of it back and some for his friend. That was all the card playing he did. 

He had an uncle, Mr. Brent and his daughter who had come to Canada and were living a short distance down from Coles Island on the Lake Road. John came to see them and worked there. My mother, Margaret Ann Keys was working for this family. They met there and later got married. They rented a farm next to her fathers’ for a time. Archie and I were born there. Then they moved to English Settlement and worked for Dr. Murray on his farm. Brother Will was born there. Mothers’ father Archibald Keys died so father bought the farm and moved in one part of the house and took care of grandmother Keys, till she died. That was in Goshen, which was 5 miles away. Hedley, Lillian and Everett were born there. Archie has bought the Dr’s. farm while Will bought one near by. 

Father sold out his farm in Goshen and moved back to English Settlement, now called Pearsonville and bought a farm across the road from Archie. That was their home until mother passes away in 1926. 

Note: From the information that I found, John Crealock came to Saint John, New Brunswick and not New York City. (ACS)

The following article was taken from the Kings County Record February 5 1970.

Everett, Lillian, Hedley, William, Joyce, Archibald

At Crealock reunion in 1942

Richard Crealock (John's brother) settled in Queens County, New Brunswick

DEDICATION AT COLES ISLAND (Write-up in a newspaper dated Feb.5 1970)

A dedication ceremony of wide interest in the area was conducted by Rev. Albert Fowler at Coles Island United Church when a plaque was presented to the church in memory of Richard Crealock (1845-1911) on behalf of his 12 grandchildren. He built and did the ornamental carving on the pulpit. According to church records, the church then Methodist was dedicated in April 1897, by Rev. I. N. Parker.

 Mr. Crealock, a cabinet maker by trade, and his wife, Elizabeth, farmed the north side of Washademoak Lake. Mrs. Crealock died in 1931 in Moose Jaw at the age of 85. There were six children- Annie, Moose Jaw; Elizabeth (Mrs. William Gourlay), Cody’s; Margaret (Mrs. Charles Roberts), Cody’s; May, who died in infancy and Samuel, Winona Ont. Bertha, who was the last surviving member of the family, died in Ottawa in 1956. 

All 12 grandchildren are living and reside in Canada between Sackville and Gold River, Vancouver Island, B.C. Three of them were in attendance at the ceremony, Mrs. William Walling (Jean Gourlay) Norton; Arthur Roberts of Sackville, and Leonard McBride, Ottawa. Of interest to the congregation was a box of carving tools which Mr. Crealock used to do the ornamental work on the pulpit, and a letter of condolence written to Mrs. Crealock at the time of Mr. Crealock’s death by a former employer of his, A. O. Skinner who was an importer of carpets and house furnishings at 58 King Street, Saint John. The tools and letter were made available by Mr. McBride.

Note: The pulpit has now found a new home at the Woodland United Church in Pearsonville, New Brunswick.

 There is an HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF THE CREALOCKS IN MANITOBA written by Ruby J. Crealock which tells mainly of the life and times of living in Manitoba. I hope to someday get permission to post this book on my site.

These WWW pages were produced on Thu Jul 06 13:15:21 2006.

INDEX

Surname List

Unconnected List

Database Owner Contact Information

This page, and all genealogical data contained on it are © 2006 Allan C. Smith (crealock@gmail.com).

This page was produced by GED2WWW version 0.31 compiled on Sep 27 1999 at 13:23:34. GED2WWW © 1996-1999 Leslie Howard. GED2WWW is free software, distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License. For more information about GED2WWW or the GNU General Public License visit the GED2WWW webpage at http://www.lesandchris.com/ged2www .