These research notes are provided as-is and contain supplementary working research.
Evidence
Adam Winthrop's diary records the 1605 deaths of Martha (Lewkenor) Gurney's Denham parents
Adam Winthrop - John Winthrop's father - recorded in his diary the deaths of Sir Edward Lewkenor of Denham and his wife on 3 October 1605: 'Sir Edwarde Lewkenor of Denham in Suff[olk] Knight died of the smalpocks. Vir bonus et doctus fuit et patriae amans. The lady his wife died 2 dayes before him.' The couple were Sir Edward Lewkenor (d. 1605) and Susan (Heigham), the parents of Martha (Lewkenor) Gurney - so the Winthrop family personally memorialised the widowed Mrs. Gurney's own parents, in warm terms, a generation before the 1627 Gurdon-Winthrop letter carried a Gurney suit to John Winthrop's chamber.
Date: 3 October 1605 (deaths of Sir Edward Lewkenor and Susan (Heigham) of Denham)
Why this conclusion
- Supports Finding The senior West Barsham branch inside the founders' Court-of-Wards network, 1623–1641The Winthrop family's personal memorial of Martha (Lewkenor) Gurney's parents in 1605 shows the senior branch's Denham kin standing inside the Winthrops' own circle a generation before the 1627 letter, deepening the documented tie between the branch and the Massachusetts founders.
Sources
- Adam Winthrop, diary/almanac note, 3 October 1605 (deaths of Sir Edward Lewkenor of Denham and his wife Susan), in Winthrop Papers, vol. I, 1498-1628 (Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 1929), p. 153., Winthrop Papers, vol. I, p. 153 (Adam Winthrop's diary/almanac, 3 Oct. 1605)
Topic file location: Origin — wardship and patronage network
Technical details
- Research item:
G13-RI-000186 - Graph revision:
244 - Machine-readable JSON:
/assets/g13-graph/findings/G13-RI-000186.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.