These research notes are provided as-is and contain supplementary working research.
This page expands an Evidence link in Origin — migration and reception network: the findings, sources, and qualifications behind the marked passage.
Negative result
No Gurney on the near-window Boston-area passenger lists
No John Gurney — or any Gurney/Gourney/Gurny variant — appears on the three surviving named passenger/settler lists nearest John's 1641 Weymouth appearance (the Bevis 1638, the Diligent of Ipswich 1638, and the Mary Anne of Yarmouth 1637, as transcribed by Drake and arranged by Banks), and no named Boston-area manifest survives at all for the 1639–mid-1641 window; John's ship and Atlantic crossing are undocumented.
Date: 1637–1641 (near-window passenger lists searched)
Search scope
- Searched: Banks (1930) / Drake (1860) compiled passenger lists — Bevis (1638), Diligent of Ipswich (1638), Mary Anne of Yarmouth (1637) passenger/settler lists
- Coverage window: 1637-01-01 to 1641-06-02
- Search: Searched each of the three near-window ship lists, plus the OCR text of Banks's Planters of the Commonwealth and Drake's Result of Some Researches, for John Gurney and every Gurney/Gourney/Gurny variant.
- Results reviewed: 0
- Limitations: Banks and Drake are compiled/transcribed secondary reconstructions, not original customs manifests; OCR of both Internet Archive texts is imperfect; no named Boston-area passenger manifest survives for the 1639–mid-1641 window when John most plausibly crossed
Why this conclusion
- Supports Finding Reception into an established Weymouth community, not a shared voyageJohn's absence from every surviving near-window passenger list is consistent with reception into an existing community rather than a documented shared crossing.
Qualifications and conflicts
- Qualified by Analysis Passenger silence is expected in the 1639-41 Great-Migration tailGreat-Migration timing explains the passenger-list negative: the 1639-41 crossing window is exactly when named lists survive worst.
Sources
- Banks, Charles Edward. The Planters of the Commonwealth: A Study of the Emigrants and Emigration in Colonial Times, to Which Are Added Lists of Passengers to Boston and to the Bay Colony, the Ships Which Brought Them, Their English Homes, and the Places of Their Settlement in Massachusetts, 1620–1640. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1930., arranged Bevis / Diligent / Mary Anne lists
- Drake, Samuel G. Result of Some Researches among the British Archives for Information Relative to the Founders of New England, Made in the Years 1858, 1859, and 1860. Boston: New England Historic-Genealogical Society, 1860 (reprinted from the New England Historical and Genealogical Register)., Bevis certificate; Mary Anne examinations; Cushing/Diligent list
Topic file location: Origin — migration and reception network
Technical details
- Evidence marker:
G13-PM-000050 - Primary research item:
G13-RI-000077 - Graph revision:
244 - Machine-readable JSON:
/assets/g13-graph/marker-bundles/G13-PM-000050.json