William and Charlotte Gilson

From Pioneers and Prominent Men of Utah, p.889 (on the Infobases LDS Family History Suite CD-ROM, 1996 edition):

GILSON, WILLIAM

Married Charlotte King (daughter of John King and Fanny Watkin of Nottinghamshire, Eng.), who was born 1810. Their children: Frances, m. Richard Gibbs, m. John Stock; Reuben, m. Caroline Liberty; Edward, m. Cynthia R. Drake; Elizabeth, m. Ebenezer Richardson; Ann, died; John King, died; Martha Ann, m. William H. Hall Nov. 22, 1869. Family home Melton, Leicestershire.

Seventy. Died 1877, Lynn ward, Ogden, Utah.

According to their daughter Martha Ann, the Gilsons moved to South Africa in 1845. John King and Martha Ann were baptized at the Wesleyan Methodist church in Uitenhage in 1847 and 1849. Uitenhage (pronounced yoo-ten-eyg) is on the Zwartkops river near Port Elizabeth. On April 18, 1853, the first LDS missionaries arrived in Cape Town (Jesse Haven, William H. Walker, and Leonard I. Smith). One of them must be the missionary that taught the Gilsons. By 1855, there was a branch in Port Elizabeth and a conference was held. Some sources show that William was baptized in 1853 and Frances in January 1855. More information is available in The Encyclopedic History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, by Andrew Jensen, click here to see the entry.

William and his family left South Africa from Port Elizabeth and arrived in Boston, Massachusetts on 19 May 1859 aboard the bark (ship) "Alacrity". They are listed as Mr Gilson, Mrs Gilson, Miss Gilson, and Edward Gilson. The ship's manifest does not appear to list any children 16 or under, which may explain why Martha Ann and John King aren't in the list. Why Frances and Reuben aren't listed is less clear. Here is the scanned image of the passenger list

Their daughter Martha Ann (Gilson) Hall was interviewed in 1938. This interview has information about the family and their immigration from England to South Africa and then to Utah. Utah Pioneer Biographies, Martha Ann Gillson Hall