On June 22, 1881, he moved to St. John's, Newfoundland (now a province of Canada) to work as a clerk for the fish exporting firm Harvey and Company.

[1] Shortly after arriving in Newfoundland, Gosling met his future wife Armine, the headmistress of the Church of England Girls' School in St. John's.

In 1910, this chapter was expanded into a published book, "Labrador: its discovery, exploration, and development", which remains an authoritative source on the subject today.

[1] Prior to his entry into municipal politics, Gosling led a fundraising effort to rebuild an Anglican cathedral which had been destroyed by fire, and in 1908 became the vice-president of the newly founded Association for the Prevention of Consumption.

Governing the city for two years, the commission, of which Gosling was chairman, instituted a range of reforms, including a reorganization of water and sewage services and a new method of collecting and spending revenue.