These research notes are provided as-is and contain supplementary working research.
Finding
'John Cheny' of the 1661 Braintree record = John Gurney
The 'John Cheny' of the 1661 Braintree marriage and wife-death lines is John Gurney. The fair-copy manuscript reads 'John Girny, Senior' in ink, with 'Cheny' only a later pencil margin annotation that the 1886 print mistook for text; Pope 1900 independently ruled the printed Cheny a typographical error; no John Cheney family is otherwise attested at Braintree in 1661; and the surrounding facts fit Gurney — Mary Gurney's death three weeks earlier, the officiant Peter Brackett (a documented Gurney associate), and John Gurney's 1663 Braintree probate. Confidence is roughly 85-90%, the residual being the ambiguous deaths-page letterform.
Date: 12 November 1661 (the marriage record read as Gurney)
Why this conclusion
- Supports Finding Second marriage: John Gurney m. widow Grizzell, Braintree 12 Nov 1661The resolved town-record reading corroborates the (independently attested) second marriage to Grizzell.
- Supports Finding First wife Mary (maiden name unknown), m. England by mid-1620s, d. Braintree 20 Sep 1661The resolved reading confirms the 20 September 1661 'wife of John' death line is Mary Gurney's.
- Supported by Published-source statement Pope 1900: printed Braintree 'John Cheny' a typographical error for John GurneyPope's independent 1900 records-based ruling that the printed 'John Cheny' is a typographical error corroborates the Gurney reading.
- Supported by Evidence Braintree manuscript: fair-copy ink reads 'John Girny'; 'Cheny' is a later pencil margin noteThe fair-copy manuscript's ink reading 'John Girny, Senior,' with 'Cheny' only a later pencil margin note, is the primary evidence that the record is Gurney.
Qualifications and conflicts
- Qualifies Evidence 1886 Braintree print: 'John Cheny' marriage & wife-death lines, 1661The reading finding reinterprets the printed 'Cheny' surname: it is a later pencil annotation the 1886 print followed, not the fair copy's ink, which reads Girny.
Topic file location: Family — wives and marriages
Technical details
- Research item:
G13-RI-000061 - Graph revision:
244 - Machine-readable JSON:
/assets/g13-graph/findings/G13-RI-000061.json
This is one research item from the John Gurney research graph; the fuller narrative treatment is in the linked topic above and the research library.