Steve Wharton, the Scunthorpe chairman, revealed the names as part of an online Q&A with Iron fans conducted through this site on Friday.
Bids were also made for Plymouth forward Joe Mason and Rotherham forward Ryan Taylor
Wharton was responding to a question asking which players had been approached as then manager Ian Baraclough sought to add to his squad.
He replied: "Will Hoskins, Conor Sammon, Michael Nelson, Paul Reid, Chris Taylor, Ryan Taylor, Andy Drury, Jason Pearce, Marvin Bartley, Joe Mason and I had Preston's permission to speak to Paul Hayes regarding a move or a loan.
"Paul's agent accused me of making an illegal approach and said Paul was unlikely to move back to Scunthorpe. I assured him I would never approach a player under contract without permission. Paul in fact would have come back to us on loan but by then his new manager would not sanction such a loan."
Wharton conceded his decision to quickly offer the manager's position to Baraclough following Nigel Adkins' move to Southampton was an error.
He added: "I do, and I must take most, if not all the blame for that decision. I encouraged the board to appoint from within and I had thought for a long time that Ian would be a good replacement for Nigel.
"I had known for some time that Nigel would relish the opportunity to move to a big club and we had built up a management structure and a culture at Scunthorpe United which seemed to be working well. Ian was beset by injuries, which didn't help, and maybe his choice of promoting Kevin Pressman to No.2 and Steve Parkin as coach, was not the best.
"We backed Ian to the hilt in January but it became apparent that we were changing quite drastically from the style of football that we all desired and the players themselves were unable to give of their best."