Editing Gerald Gardner (section)

===Childhood: 1884–1899===
Gardner's family was wealthy and [[upper middle class]], running a family firm, Joseph Gardner and Sons, which described itself as "the oldest private company in the timber trade within the [[British Empire]]." Specialising in the import of [[hardwood]], the company had been founded in the mid-18th century by Edmund Gardner (b. 1721), an entrepreneur who would subsequently become a [[Freedom of the City|Freeman]] of [[Liverpool]].{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|pp=6–9}}

Gerald's father, William Robert Gardner (1844–1935) had been the youngest son of Joseph Gardner (b. 1791), after whom the firm had been renamed, and who with his wife Maria had had five sons and three daughters. In 1867, William had been sent to [[New York City]] to further the interests of the family firm. Here, he had met an American, Louise Burguelew Ennis, the daughter of a wholesale stationer; entering a relationship, they were married in [[Manhattan]] on 25 November 1868.

After a visit to England, the couple returned to the US, where they settled in [[Mott Haven]], [[Morrisania, Bronx|Morrisania]] in New York State.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|pp=11–18}}  It was here that their first child, Harold Ennis Gardner, was born in 1870. At some point in the next two years they moved back to England, by 1873 settling into The Glen, a large Victorian house in [[Blundellsands]] in [[Lancashire]], north-west England, which was developing into a wealthy suburb of Liverpool. It was here that their second child, Robert "Bob" Marshall Gardner, was born in 1874.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|pp=18–19, 23}}

[[File:Gardner and Com.jpg|right|thumb|upright|Gardner with his Irish [[nursemaid]], Com, during the 1880s]]
In 1876 the family moved into one of the neighbouring houses, Ingle Lodge, and it was here that the couple's third son, Gerald Brosseau Gardner, was born on Friday 13 June 1884.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=13|Heselton|2012a|2p=28}}  A fourth child, Francis Douglas Gardner, was then born in 1886.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|p=29}}  Gerald would rarely see Harold, who went on to study law at the [[University of Oxford]], but saw more of Bob, who drew pictures for him, and Douglas, with whom he shared his nursery.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=13|Heselton|2012a|2p=29}}

The Gardners employed an [[Irish people|Irish]] nursemaid named Josephine "Com" McCombie, who was entrusted with taking care of the young Gerald; she would subsequently become the dominant figure of his childhood, spending far more time with him than his parents.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=14|Heselton|2012a|2pp=29–31}} Gardner suffered with [[asthma]] from a young age, having particular difficulty in the cold Lancashire winters. His nursemaid offered to take him to warmer climates abroad at his father's expense in the hope that this condition would not be so badly affected.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=14|Heselton|2012a|2p=32}}

Subsequently, in summer 1888, Gerald and Com travelled via London to [[Nice]] in the south of France.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|pp=32–33}} After several more years spent in the [[Mediterranean]], in 1891 they went to the [[Canary Islands]], and it was here that Gardner first developed his lifelong interest in weaponry.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=15|Heselton|2012a|2pp=33–34}} From there, they then went on to [[Accra]] in the [[Gold Coast (British colony)|Gold Coast]] (modern [[Ghana]]).{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=17|Heselton|2012a|2pp=35–36}} Accra was followed by a visit to [[Funchal]] on the Portuguese island of [[Madeira]]; they would spend most of the next nine years on the island, only returning to England for three or four months in the summer.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=18|Heselton|2012a|2p=36}}

According to Gardner's first biographer, [[Jack Bracelin]], Com was very flirtatious and "clearly looked on these trips as mainly manhunts", viewing Gardner as a nuisance.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=17|Heselton|2012a|2pp=34–35}} As a result, he was largely left to his own devices, which he spent going out, meeting new people and learning about foreign cultures.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|p=39}} In Madeira, he also began collecting weapons, many of which were remnants from the [[Napoleonic Wars]], displaying them on the wall of his hotel room.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|pp=39–40}}

As a result of his illness and these foreign trips, Gardner ultimately never attended school, or gained any formal education.{{Sfn|Heselton|2012a|p=31}} He taught himself to read by looking at copies of ''[[The Strand Magazine]]'' but his writing betrayed his lack of formal schooling with eccentric spelling and grammar.{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1p=19|Heselton|2012a|2p=40}} A voracious reader, one of the books that most influenced him at the time was [[Florence Marryat]]'s ''There Is No Death'' (1891), a discussion of [[Spiritualism (movement)|spiritualism]], and from which he gained a firm belief in the existence of an [[afterlife]].{{Sfnm|Bracelin|1960|1pp=19–20|Heselton|2012a|2pp=40–41}}