Gurney Genealogy Library Updated 15 July 2026 by Allen Gurney

Richard Gurney (c. 1630 – October 1691)

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Weymouth, Massachusetts settler and Freeman of 1681; son of the colonial emigrant John Gurney; his brother died in the Mendon massacre of 1675.

Born
c. 1630–1634, England. Came to Massachusetts as a young child with his father John Gurney (G13). 1
Died
By 27 October 1691, Weymouth, Massachusetts. He left no will (intestate); the court at Boston granted his sons Richard and Zachariah the authority to settle the estate, his eldest son John declining. 2
Status
Admitted a Freeman of Massachusetts Bay, 12 October 1681 — the colony's enfranchised, church-approved class, entitled to vote and hold office. 3 Granted six acres of Weymouth common land in 1683 "to build a house & fence." 5
Marriage
Rebecca Taylor — daughter of John and Rebecca Taylor of Weymouth; named in her father's will, proved 1688. 4

Highlights

  • A six-acre homestead by Great Pond. In 1683 the Weymouth town meeting voted Richard six acres of common land on the west side of Great Pond "to build a house & fence to dwell thereon with his family" — the lot recorded at his death as "a dwelling house & barn with about six acres of land adjoining," set with the plain goods of a working farmer. The family's earlier Weymouth land — "the East field," "the mill field," "the east side of Great Pond" — had been his father's, granted in 1651–52 and soon passed to others. 5, 10
  • King Philip's War struck the wider family hard. Richard's brother John was among the dead in the Mendon massacre of 14 July 1675 — the first major bloodshed of the war — and a second brother, Peter, a soldier in Captain Isaac Johnson's company, was killed in the fighting late in 1676. Richard himself stayed at Weymouth; his teenage son Zachariah was caught up in the 1676 musters but survived, and all his children outlived the war. 6, 9
  • Admitted Freeman in 1681. Becoming a Freeman of Massachusetts Bay required formal church membership and entitled the holder to vote and hold public office. Richard's admission on 12 October 1681, after some four decades in Weymouth, marks his place in the community as a recognized adult member of the New England covenant. 3
  • The record that fixed his death date. Richard died without a will in the autumn of 1691, and the Boston court's grant of authority over his estate to his sons Richard and Zachariah — the eldest son, John, declining the task — is the document that finally separated him from the October 1719 death long misattributed to him from his same-named son. 2

Children

Name Dates Notes
John Gurneyc. 1654 – after 1691Married Elizabeth Green; as eldest son, declined to administer his father's estate in 1691. 7
Richard Gurney1656 – 1719Born 18 January 1656; died unmarried at Weymouth — the source of the 1719 date once mistakenly given for his father. 7
Zachariah Gurneyc. 1660 – 1732Married Mary Benson; as a youth he was swept into the 1676 musters of King Philip's War and came home; co-administrator of his father's estate in 1691. 7, 9
Joseph Gurney1664/5 – 1739Born 22 February 1664/5; died unmarried. 7
Mary Gurney1667 – 1736Born 9 September 1667; died unmarried at Weymouth. 7
Benjamin Gurneyc. 1676 – 1738/9G11 in the direct line; married Rebecca Staples. 8

Narrative

Richard Gurney is the second-generation American Gurney — brought from England as a small child by his father, John Gurney (G13), the colonial emigrant first recorded at Weymouth in 1641. Richard's adult life unfolded entirely at Weymouth, on the south shore of Massachusetts Bay. In 1681 he was admitted a Freeman of Massachusetts Bay, and in 1683 the town meeting granted him six acres on the west side of Great Pond "to build a house & fence" — a homestead local tradition placed toward East Street and Old Spain, running down to Back River. He married Rebecca Taylor — named in her father's will, proved 1688 — and the family lived through the convulsive decades of King Philip's War and its aftermath. The family's earliest Weymouth land was not his but his father's: the "East field," "mill field," and "east side of Great Pond" grants of 1651–52, which John Gurney never settled and which passed to others.

The most personal mark of those years on the family is bleak. His brother John was among the dead at the Mendon massacre of 14 July 1675 — the first major violence of King Philip's War, when Nipmuc fighters attacked the small frontier town of Mendon and killed several inhabitants — and another brother, Peter, a soldier in Captain Isaac Johnson's company, was killed in the war late in 1676.6 The war reached the next generation too: Richard's teenage son Zachariah was caught up in the 1676 musters — credited for service under Captain Johnson's company, and listed among the Weymouth men who failed to answer Captain John Holbrooke's call to muster at Concord that April — but he came home.9 Richard himself remained at Weymouth through it all, neither soldier nor displaced. He died intestate in October 1691, his estate administered by two of his sons, Richard and Zachariah, after the eldest son John declined the duty — the very record that finally untangles Richard from the 1719 death date long misattributed to him from his same-named son.

Richard is the hinge between the family's first foothold at Weymouth and the Plymouth County farming country where the line settled for the next century. His youngest son, Benjamin (G11), carried the Gurney name south to the farms along the Abington–Bridgewater line and on to Middleboro; from Benjamin the line ran through Cummington, into New York, and eventually further west. The land Benjamin worked there he bought for himself a generation later — it was never Richard's — but without Richard's line of descent none of those later American chapters would exist. 8

Citations

  1. Born c. 1630 in England, probably a son of the colonial emigrant John Gurney (G13). Jean Gurney Rigler, The Gurney Family from Aaron to Zuinglius: A Genealogical Dictionary, rev. ed. (Honolulu: J. G. Rigler, 1994), Richard-2 entry. For G13's emigration and family see the John Gurney case file. Source ID: rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994. ↩
  2. Died by 27 October 1691, Weymouth, Massachusetts, intestate. The registry copy of the administration grant — County Court at Boston, 27 October 1691, power to administer the estate of "Richard Gurney late of Waymouth decd intestate" granted to "Zechoriah Gurney & Richard Gurney two of the Sonnes of the decd, John Gurney the Eldest son refusing to administer" — is at Suffolk County Probate Records 1636–1766 (registry volume), image 448 of 585, FamilySearch ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-C9Y5-GKGB; it confirms the bond reported in Rigler, Gurney Family from Aaron to Zuinglius, Richard-2 entry. Rigler notes that the 1719 death date given in the History of Weymouth belongs instead to Richard's same-named son. Source IDs: rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994; history-of-weymouth. ↩
  3. Admitted a Freeman of Massachusetts Bay, 12 October 1681, his residence given as Weymouth, in Lucius R. Paige, List of Freemen of Massachusetts, 1630–1691 (Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1849), keyed to the colony records (Records of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England, vol. 5, pp. 320–321); also noted in James Savage, A Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England, vol. 2, p. 325, via Rigler. Admission as a Freeman required approved church membership and conferred the right to vote and hold office. Source IDs: paige-list-freemen-massachusetts-1849; rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994. ↩
  4. Rebecca Taylor, daughter of John and Rebecca Taylor of Weymouth; her father John Taylor's will (Suffolk County Probate 6:13, written 6 January, proved 22 May 1688) names "his daughter Rebecca, wife of Richard Gurney." Rigler, Gurney Family from Aaron to Zuinglius, Richard-2 entry. The History of Weymouth gives the mother's name as Phebe rather than Rebecca; the two readings conflict. Source IDs: rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994; history-of-weymouth. ↩
  5. The 1683 town-meeting grant of six acres on the west side of Great Pond "to build a house & fence to dwell thereon with his family," and the note that Richard settled "possibly on East Street towards Old Spain, and extending to Back River," both rest on the History of Weymouth, Massachusetts (the 1923 four-volume town history), p. 251, quoted in Jean Gurney Rigler's Richard-2 entry. The earlier "East field," "mill field," and "east side of Great Pond" grants — dated 3 February 1651–52 and afterward granted to others — were made to Richard's father, John Gurney Sr. (the same town history, John Gurney Sr. entry, citing Weymouth Land Grants 258, 270, 278, 282), not to Richard. Source IDs: history-of-weymouth; rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994. ↩
  6. The Mendon massacre of 14 July 1675 opened King Philip's War. The John Gurney killed there, and Peter Gurney, "a soldier in Johnson's Co.… killed in King Philip's War, Dec. 1676," were sons of the emigrant John Gurney-1 (G13) — Richard's brothers, not his sons — as shown by Rigler's John Gurney-1 children and by the eldest son John of Richard being alive to refuse administration in 1691. Peter's service is documented at primary level in George Madison Bodge, Soldiers in King Philip's War (Boston, 1891), p. 114, which lists "Peeter Gurnay" under Weymouth in Captain Isaac Johnson's company at the Dedham muster of 10 December 1675; he is absent from that company's December 1675 casualty list, consistent with his death later in 1676. See the John Gurney case file and Rigler, Gurney Family from Aaron to Zuinglius. Corroborated for the John Gurney-1 family group by Sprague, Genealogies of Braintree. Source IDs: bodge-soldiers-king-philips-war-1891; rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994; sprague-braintree. ↩
  7. Children of Richard Gurney from the Weymouth vital records, as compiled in Rigler, Gurney Family from Aaron to Zuinglius, Richard-2 entry: John (b. c. 1654, m. Elizabeth Green), Richard (b. 18 January 1656, d. 1719, unmarried), Zachariah (b. c. 1660, m. Mary Benson), Joseph (b. 22 February 1664/5, d. 1739, unmarried), and Mary (b. 9 September 1667, d. 1736, unmarried). The Weymouth death register's "Mary, 14 Feb. 1736" is read here, with Rigler, as Richard's unmarried daughter; the History of Weymouth alternatively took it for Zachariah's wife Mary (Benson). Source ID: rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994. ↩
  8. See the Benjamin Gurney (G11) fact sheet for the Abington-line continuation; Rigler gives his marriage to Rebecca Staples. Source ID: rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994. ↩
  9. Zachariah's war service is recorded in George Madison Bodge, Soldiers in King Philip's War (Boston: Printed for the Author, 1891): page 113 credits "Zachariah Gurny" under Captain Isaac Johnson's company (24 July, £2 14s), and page 236 lists "Zacha-ry Gorney" of Weymouth among the men who failed to appear at the 29 April 1676 Concord muster of Captain John Holbrooke's company. Bodge's index (p. 364) groups the surname at pp. 113, 114, 236. This matches the King Philip's War soldier carried in the Gurney family records compiled by Rigler. Source IDs: bodge-soldiers-king-philips-war-1891; rigler-gurney-family-aaron-zuinglius-1994. ↩
  10. The inventory of Richard's estate is headed "A Dwelling house & barne with about six Acres of land adjoyning," followed by the modest goods of a working farmer — chests, rugs, six chairs, a flock bed and feather bolster, flax, and pewter; the administrators Zechariah and Richard Gurney made oath to it in the County Court at Boston, 3 November 1691. Suffolk County, Massachusetts, Probate Records, registry copy vol. 21, p. 294 (FamilySearch image 504, ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-C9Y5-GK2S); original file papers no. 1890. Source ID: familysearch-fulltext-search. ↩