Early Life
Victor George Hayward was born 23 October 1887 at 5 Manor Park Road, Harlesden, North London. He was the 12th of 14 children of Francis Checkley Hayward and Mary Jane Fairchild. His father became a senior executive of the London and North Western Railway. Hayward was educated at an Essex boarding school, and after attending a London business college was employed as an accounts clerk in the City. From an early age he had been fascinated by stories of adventure, a particular favourite, acquired as a Sunday School prize, being R M Ballantyne’s The World of Ice, or Adventures in the Polar Regions. Unprepared for a life of "bourgeois complacency", Hayward took leave from his employers to spend seven months working on a ranch in northern Canada. On his return he found settling back into an office routine difficult, and applied to Shackleton’s office for a position on the newly announced Trans-Antarctic expedition. His offer to "do anything" secured him his place in the Ross Sea party.
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