These research notes are provided as-is and contain supplementary working research.
Finding
C(ii)'s household stopped because his children were dying, not because he left
The younger Berkhamsted John was opened as a candidate on a departure-shaped gap in the record, and that gap does not exist. His household's last baptism is Francis in 1636/7; within the following two years the parish buried Joane (November 1637), Richard (June 1638), William (October 1638), Elizabeth (February 1638/9) and Francis (March 1638/9), and two of those are demonstrably his own children. A household that loses four or five members in eighteen months and then stops appearing in the baptism register is displaying mortality, not departure. The finding matters beyond this candidate: a departure-shaped gap is only evidence where the burial series for the same parish and window has been read and shown to be covered.
Why this conclusion
- Depends on Evidence Sixteen Gurney-variant burials at Great Berkhamsted, 1579-1643, five of them in eighteen monthsThe mortality reading is built on the burial roster's five entries of November 1637 to March 1638/9.
- Synthesized by Finding Standing: C(i) eliminated on age at about 1 percent, C(ii) held at about 4 percentThe mortality reading is why the household is not emigrant-shaped.
Qualifications and conflicts
- Conflicts with Negative result The head's missing burial falls inside a documented Hertfordshire register defect and is not evidenceThe household stops for a documented reason, while the head's own absence remains uninterpretable inside the register defect; the two must be read together rather than merged.
Sources
- Hertfordshire Baptisms, parish-register baptism records, Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies; served via Findmypast., The father-John baptism run ending at Francis 1636/7
- Hertfordshire Burials, parish-register burial records and images, Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies; served via Findmypast. Great Berkhamsted, 28 June 1638 burial entry on viewer page 165 of 175, record GBPRS/HERT/007567815/00277., The five burials of November 1637 to March 1638/9 in the Berkhamsted roster
Appears in
- John Gurney identity case file — Section 8.2, 'Why C(ii) does not rise higher: his household stopped because his children were dying, not because he left.'
Topic file location: Identity — Berkhamsted: Candidates C(i) and C(ii)
Technical details
- Research item:
G13-RI-000213 - Graph revision:
381 - Machine-readable JSON:
/assets/g13-graph/findings/G13-RI-000213.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.