Gurney Genealogy Library Updated 4 August 2026 by Allen Gurney

These research notes are provided as-is and contain supplementary working research.

Thomas Gournay II (G20) Notes

Research notes for g20-thomas-gournay-ii-fact-sheet.md. See .claude/rules/research-files.md for the paired-file rule.

Working Notes

Thomas II’s seal — Hunstanton Hall deed (DG-Supp Note 126)

2026-04-18 — DG-Supp Note 126 (p. 814) records a deed of feoffment dated 8 June 1445 (20 Henry VI): Sir Thomas Kerdeston, Sir William Oldhalle, Thomas Gurnay, Esq., and others, to John Wode of Berston and others, of the manor called Waldgraves in East Barsham.

“The seal of Thomas Gurnay on the fifth label is a poor impression in red wax of what must originally have been a beautiful signet. The legend is scarcely discernible.”

The deed survives in the charter room of Hunstanton Hall. This is a primary source — a surviving document sealed by Thomas II in 1445. The Hunstanton connection (the Le Strange family seat) suggests the Gurneys were part of the north-Norfolk gentry network centered on the Harpley/Barsham area.

Significance for dating: The 1445 deed proves Thomas II was active in 1445, adding a data point beyond the existing range. The Boking fine (DG-Supp Note 123) implies Thomas I was dead before 1444. So Thomas II was acting as head of the family by 1444–1445.

Jernegan of Somerleyton — Danish origins and Spelman correction (DG-Supp Note 127)

2026-04-18 — DG-Supp Note 127 (pp. 815–816) provides detail on Thomas II’s wife Margaret’s family:

  • The Jernegans’ Danish tradition “does not appear to rest upon any documentary evidence; but is nevertheless very likely true, as these traditions are generally founded on fact.”
  • No Jernegan in Domesday Book, but in the Liber Niger Scaccarii (1167), “Hugh de Gernegan held one knight’s fee of the honor of Eye.” This Hugh was son of the original Jernegan.
  • The Jernegans of Somerleyton are ancestors of the Jerninghams of Cossey — “the only one existing at the present day.”
  • Critical: Margaret, daughter of Sir Thomas Jernegan, was wife of Thomas Gurney II. DG proves this by: (a) John Jernegan’s letter to Margaret Paston (DG-I p. 391) — the primary text of that letter is now recovered and transcribed below (see “John Jerningham’s 1458 letter”); (b) Elizabeth White’s legacy to “her niece Margaret wife of Thomas Gurnay” (DG-I p. 395).
  • Spelman correction: “Sir H. Spelman is therefore wrong in stating, at page 318, that Margaret Jernegan married John Gournay V.” She married Thomas II, not Sir John.

The 1471 will — register text recovered; three witnesses reconciled

The register copy of Thomas II’s will complex — testament, ultima voluntas (the “last will” disposing of lands, paired with the testament that disposes of goods and soul), and probate — is now imaged and read at expert level: Norwich Consistory Court register Jekkys, fo. 211v–212v, under the rubric Testamentum Thome Gurnay Armigeri.[1] The will treatment below reconciles the three witnesses: the register images, Daniel Gurney’s English extracts (DG-I pp. 280–282), and Blomefield’s full English summary (quoted in the Blomefield-extract section further down).[1][2]

What all three witnesses (or two, where DG is silent) agree on:

  • Burial alternative. “…corpusque meum ad sepeliendum infra cancellum ecclesie parochialis Sancti Laurencij martiris de Harpele si me ibidem obire contigerit vel in ecclesia fratrum minorum Norwici” — burial in the chancel of St Lawrence the Martyr, Harpley, if he died there, or in the Norwich Greyfriars church if he died at Norwich. Three residences (West Barsham, Harpley, Norwich St Gregory’s) stand behind the alternative, as DG-I p. 280 explains: “every manor had a residence for the lord.”
  • Community legacies. The register adds a pair Blomefield does not itemise: 12d to every householder (“vocati householder”) within West Barsham and a smaller sum (6d?) to the householders of Harpley — a living-community legacy to both home parishes — beside the high-altar gifts (Harpley 13s 4d, West Barsham 6s 8d) and the Norwich friary legacies (Greyfriars repairs 40s; Austin friars, Dominicans, Carmelites 20s each).
  • Walsingham devotion. His gold ring with a turquoise (“a precious stone called in turkeys”) to the chapel of Blessed Mary at Walsingham, never to be alienated; and in the ultima voluntas, construction money to the prior and convent so that “me et uxorem meam in specialiori memoria habeant ut fratres et sorores” — a confraternity/beadroll provision for Thomas and Margaret (Blomefield: £10 “towards a new work there”).
  • Wife Margaret, surviving executrix. The probate clause — “Probata fuerunt presens testamentum una cum ultima voluntate eiusdem … xxvij die mensis Julij Anno domini M CCCC lxxj Et commissa fuit administracio … Margarete executrici” — was granted 27 July 1471 with administration to Margaret. The register supports DG’s textile clause (the woollen and linen cloths made by Margaret and her servants left to her) and her jewels (“jocalia”) and books; the exact Latin sequence awaits a final edition before verbatim fact-sheet use.
  • Son William, under a conditional clause. William benefits only if he “bene fideliter et humiliter… gesserit erga dictam Margaretam matrem suam” — bears himself well, faithfully, and humbly toward Margaret his mother — and observes the charters of Thomas and Margaret; fo. 212v adds a payment/security schedule (sums including £40 and 20 marks to Margaret). The clause is strikingly guarded, but it should not be overread as proof of a personal rupture: it is fair evidence of controlled succession or concern about William’s conduct, and the manuscript states no quarrel.
  • Son Edmund. The ultima voluntas seals charters to “Edmundo filio meo” concerning Depeden (the Wauncy-inheritance Suffolk manor) — image-verified, confirming Blomefield’s summary against the published pedigree, which records only William.
  • Co-executor John Jernegan/Jernyngham, armiger (Margaret’s kinsman — the Jerningham alliance), with probate language apparently reserving like commission to him; supervisor John Heydon (the register read agrees with Blomefield).
  • Swathings, Hardingham. The ultima voluntas directs the disposal of “lands called Swathings in Hardingham lately bought” — the ancestral junior-line manor Thomas had re-purchased late in life (Blomefield: “which he bought of Catherine Sturmer”). See the landholdings note below.

Where the witnesses diverge (exposed, not silently reconciled):

  • Swathings/Norwich disposal. The register as read says Swathings is “to be sold by the executors” for the will’s performance and pious uses; Blomefield says Swathings and the Norwich tenements were “to be sold to William his son for 80 marks.” The two may reconcile in unread clauses (a directed sale naming William as purchaser), but neither reading is preferred until the final Latin edition.
  • Son John. Blomefield names “his sons, John and Edmund” in the Depeden grant confirmation; only Edmund is image-verified in this pass — whether “Johanni filio meo” appears in the crowded ultima-voluntas clauses is a specific final-edition question. If John is confirmed, an adult direct-line John existed in the 1450s–60s, which bears on the unplaced “King’s squire” John Gurnay of Westminster (see the collateral-network topic).
  • Third executor. Blomefield adds Edmund Bokenham, Esq. to Margaret and Jerningham; the register read secures only Margaret and Jernyngham. (An “Edmundo Bokyngham” appears with T. Gurnay in Friar Brackley’s October 1460 proposed-commission list, below — the same circle, whichever spelling is right.)
  • “Senior” styling. Blomefield and the register’s catalogue row style Thomas “senior”; the manuscript rubric reads simply Testamentum Thome Gurnay Armigeri, with no “senior.” The styling belongs to the derived descriptions, and the will names no Thomas junior — the senior/junior question rests on the 1450s deed layer (MS 11995, 3 Jan 1454, letter of attorney to “Thomas Gurnay senior, esq.”; MS 11994, 26 Jan 1456), not on the will.
  • Will date. The register testament is dated xviij die mensis Marcij Anno Domini M CCCC lxx with the Edward IV regnal numeral not independently settled from the image; Blomefield’s “March 18th, in the 9th of Edward IV” (= 18 March 1469/70) remains consistent with the image read.

Wars of the Roses context

2026-04-18 — Thomas II died and was buried during the closing weeks of the Wars of the Roses. Will proved 27 July 1471 — about twelve weeks after Edward IV’s decisive victory at Tewkesbury (4 May 1471). No record of Thomas’s alignment. His son William IV served as Escheator under Edward IV (1466) and was feoffee for Lord Scales (1497) — both Yorkist connections (DG-Supp Note 129). This suggests the family was Yorkist, though Thomas II’s own position is undocumented.

Landholdings

Place Period Notes
West Barsham, Norfolk c. 1430–1471 Primary family seat
Harpley, Norfolk c. 1430–1471 Secondary residence; burial option in will
Norwich (St Gregory’s parish) c. 1430–1471 Town house — one of three residences
Hardingham/Swathings, Norfolk re-purchased by 1470 Ancestral junior-line manor (G30–G23), out of the family by the early 15th century; Thomas II bought Swathings back from Catherine Sturmer late in life, and his ultima voluntas directed its sale — see the will treatment above and hardingham.md
Depden, Suffolk c. 1430–1471 Wauncy inheritance
West & East Lexham, Castleacre, Newton, Great Dunham, Norfolk (feet-of-fines concord, 15th c.) A final concord, “Thomas Gurnay, Armiger, and Margaret his wife” v. Nicholas Bokkyng and John Aleyn of Castleacre, in West Lexham, East Lexham, Castleacre, Newton, and Great Dunham (Rye, Feet of Fines for Norfolk, Pt II, entry 200). The rank “esquire,” the named wife Margaret, and the West-Norfolk cluster on the West-Barsham/Harpley axis fit Thomas II and Margaret Jerningham; the fine is now dated 23 Henry VI (1444/45) from Rye’s reign sub-header, which fits Thomas II’s mid-15th-century floruit and effectively excludes a 14th-century namesake (Thomas Gournay I, G21, was militarily active in 1418 and so elderly or dead by 1444). The querents Nicholas Bokkyng and John Aleyn of Castleacre recur as professional feoffees throughout the surrounding 23 Henry VI Norfolk fines (the Oldhall, Fastolf, Yelverton, Heydon, Inglose and Calthorp circle), so the concord is an enfeoffment-to-use settling the Gurnay West-Norfolk manors — placing Thomas II squarely within the Fastolf–Paston gentry affinity already visible elsewhere in the line (the Harling-retinue and Heylesdon–Fastolf threads), lead L-167 (and L-164).[3]

Open Questions

  1. Hunstanton Hall deed: Can the 1445 deed (with Thomas II’s seal) be photographed or examined? It survives in the Le Strange charter room.
  2. Margaret Jernegan’s monument: DG-Supp Note 127 describes Sir Thomas Jernegan’s monument in Somerleyton church (Suffolk). Does it survive? Arms: Jernegan impaling Appleyard.
  3. Will final edition: the register copy (Jekkys fo. 211v–212v) is now imaged and expert-read (see the will treatment above); the remaining questions are final-Latin-edition items — the ultima-voluntas day and regnal year, whether son John is named, the third-executor line, the godson’s surname, the Swathings vendor, and Margaret’s jewels/books clause verbatim.
  4. Namesakes distinguished: Thomas II is distinct from Thomas Gurnay of Great Ellingham, dead intestate by 5 August 1454 leaving a widow Alice (NCC act book, act fo. 19v — see great-ellingham.md), and the identity of the “Thomas Gornay, clerk convict” of the Christmastide 1462/January 1463 Norwich murder scandal remains open — Thomas II is one of the live candidates; the analysis is on norwich-gurney-collateral-network.md.

Sources Consulted

  • NCC will register Jekkys, fo. 211v–212v (will complex register images, FS film DGS 008470476; expert read 2026). [nro-ncc-wills-registers]
  • DG-I, pp. 280–282 (will extracts: three residences, textile bequest, burial directives). [DG-I]
  • DG-I, p. 286 (pedigree). [DG-I]
  • DG-Supp, Note 126 (p. 814): Thomas II’s seal on 1445 East Barsham feoffment at Hunstanton Hall. [DG-Supp]
  • DG-Supp, Note 127 (pp. 815–816): Jernegan of Somerleyton — Danish origins, Liber Niger entry, Spelman correction, marriage proof. [DG-Supp]
  • DG-Supp, Note 128 (p. 816): A “Thomas Gurnay” presented to Rushmere living 1435 — identity unknown. [DG-Supp]
  • DG-Supp, Note 129 (p. 816): William IV as Escheator, Scales feoffee — Yorkist leanings. [DG-Supp]
  • Blomefield, History of Norfolk, vol. vii, pp. 42–47 (West Barsham). [Blomefield]
  • Suckling, History of Suffolk, part V, p. 55 (Margaret Jernegan marriage proof). [Suckling]

Conflicting Information

Claim Source A Source B Status
Margaret Jernegan married… Spelman (DG-I p. 318): married John Gournay V DG-Supp Note 127: married Thomas Gurney II DG corrects Spelman. Proved by Jernegan letter and Elizabeth White legacy.

Thomas II’s 1471 will — full Blomefield extract (West Barsham parish entry)

Blomefield’s West Barsham parish entry preserves the complete English-summary text of Thomas Gurnay’s 1471 will — fuller than Daniel Gurney’s extracts at pages 280-282 of the Record, and now one of three witnesses reconciled against the Jekkys register images in the will treatment above:

“Thomas Gurnay, senior, Esq by his will, dated March 18th, in the 9th of Edward IV. appoints his body to be buried in the chancel of St. Laurence the Martyr, of Harple, if he dies there; and if at Norwich, in the Friar-minors church to whom he gives 40s. to the Austin-friars, Friars-preachers, and Carmes there, 20s. each; to the manors of Walsingham 40s.; to the chapel of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin at Walsingham his gold ring, with a precious jewel set in it, called a turkeys; to Margaret his wife all his utensils, and then to William his son, after her death; appoints his wife, John Jerningham, and Edmund Bokenham, Esq. his executors; and John Heydon, supervisor; his sons, John and Edmund, to whom he confirms all grants made to them out of his manor of Depeden; to the prior of Walsingham 10l. towards a new work there, on condition they remember him and his wife in their beadroll, as brother and sister of that priory; all his manor, or tenement, called Swathyns, in Hardingham, which he bought of Catherine Sturmer, and all his tenements in Norwich to be sold to William his son for 80 marks. This house was in St. Gregory’s parish at Norwich, and John Bernard, a minor of Norwich, was his confessor. This will was proved July 27, 1471.”

New material beyond Daniel Gurney’s summary:

  • Will dated 18 March 1469/70 (9 Edward IV), not just “1471” (which is the probate date). The register image supports the 18 March day-reading; its regnal numeral is not independently settled.
  • Sons John and Edmund named alongside William IV, with grants confirmed out of the Depden manor in Suffolk. The published Gurney pedigree records only William IV. Edmund is now image-verified in the register’s ultima voluntas (“Edmundo filio meo”); John awaits image verification in the crowded final clauses.
  • John Heydon of Baconsthorpe as supervisor. Same Heydon documented in the Paston Letters as William de la Pole 1st Duke of Suffolk’s chief East Anglian agent and joint Duchy of Lancaster steward with Sir Thomas Tuddenham. The 1471 supervisor role places a working Gurney-Heydon alliance 13 years before G18 William V’s 1484 marriage to Anne Heydon.
  • John Jerningham as co-executor — most plausibly Margaret’s brother, anchoring the Jerningham-of-Somerleyton tie.
  • Edmund Bokenham Esquire as co-executor — Bokenham family of Old Buckenham; foreshadows William IV’s daughter Constance’s later marriage to William Bokenham (per the published Gurney pedigree).
  • Catherine Sturmer of Hardingham sold Swathings to Thomas II at an unrecorded earlier date — a new name in the Hardingham descent chain.
  • Norwich house in St Gregory’s parish sold to William for 80 marks (about £53) — the first quantified valuation of any Gurney urban property.
  • John Bernard, a Friar Minor of Norwich, as Thomas II’s confessor — direct tie to the Norwich Greyfriars community.

The Walsingham bequests — 40 shillings to the manors of Walsingham, the gold-turquoise ring to the chapel of the Annunciation, £10 toward a “new work” in exchange for beadroll membership — supplement the family’s earlier 1385 Walsingham grant (Edmund G23 with Calthorpe, Hales, Shelton) and Sir John V’s 1406 Walsingham grant for the Reynham memorial, giving a three-generation pattern of priory patronage at England’s principal Marian pilgrimage shrine.

Full Blomefield West Barsham parish entry (including this will text and the wider Gurney manorial descent) preserved at sources/corpus_supplement/blomefield-norfolk-vol7-pp42-47-west-barsham.md.[2]

1422 “John Gurnay” man-at-arms in Sir Robert Harling’s retinue — Pont Meulan (tentative)

A single 1422 muster in the AHRC medievalsoldier database records “Gurnay, John, Man-at-Arms, Garrison of Poissy / Pont Meulan, Captain Sir Robert Harling (d. 1435), 1 November 1422, Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS Français 25766, no. 816.”[4] Sir Robert Harling of East Harling, Norfolk, was killed at the siege of Saint Denis in 1435.

The man-at-arms rank places this John Gurnay at gentleman class, consistent with the Norfolk gentry Gurney line, but no identification with any named Gurney from existing pedigrees is warranted. Possibilities include an undocumented son of Robert G22 (a cousin of Thomas I G21) or an unrelated cadet-branch member. The 1422 date sits between Thomas I’s 1418 Harfleur garrison service and his 1441 Vere/York retinue, and reinforces the picture of a Norfolk Gurney military client network in France across Henry V and the early Henry VI minority.

23 April 1452 St George’s Day petition — Thomas II on the Paston-side coalition

A petition from Norwich to the Duke of Norfolk’s deputy at Framlingham, dated St George’s Day (23 April) 1452, signed by Thomas Gurnay (then about 22) alongside ten other Norfolk gentlemen:

SIR JOHN HEVENYNGHAM. JOHN FERRERS. THO. GURNAY. JOHN GROOS. W. ROKEWODE. JOHN BAKON, Senior. JOHN BAKON, Junior. J. PAGRAVE. ROBT. MORTIMER. NICHOLAUS APPILYARD.

The letter complains of “dyvers assaughtes and ryottes made be Charles Nowell and other ageyn the Kyngs lawe and peas, withowte any cause or occacion, up on John Paston and other of owre kynne, frendes and neyghborys.” Charles Nowell was a man of the Heydon-Tuddenham faction operating under William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, in East Anglia.

This places Thomas II on the Paston / anti-Heydon side of the 1452 East Anglian dispute — politically opposite to where he would land in 1471, when his will named John Heydon himself as supervisor. The intervening realignment is well documented: the 1461 Yorkist accession upended the East Anglian power map; the Suffolk-Heydon faction collapsed with the duke’s 1450 murder and the duchess Alice’s marginalization; Heydon paid 500 marks for a Yorkist pardon in 1462 and rebuilt his career in the new order. By 1471 the Norfolk gentry coalitions had reshuffled, and the men who had stood against Heydon as young adults were now content to use him as a senior legal supervisor.

Two of the co-signers reappear in the later Gurney record: Nicholas Appleyard (the same family supplies the feoffee on William IV’s 1505 trust) and John Groos (whose 1487 will would bequeath the Irstead manors that, through the Heydons, eventually anchor G16 Francis’s later “of Irstead” designation). The 1452 petition therefore preserves a snapshot of the Norfolk gentry network that, half a century later, would crystallise around the West Barsham estate in the 1505 trust deed.

Full letter text preserved at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-gurney-extracts.md §2.[5]

October 1460 and November 1461 — Thomas II across the Yorkist transition in the Paston letters

Two further Paston-corpus appearances bracket the 1461 change of dynasty and show Thomas II trusted on the Paston/Yorkist side of the Norfolk gentry at exactly that moment:

  • October 1460 — proposed county commission. On the eve of the October 1460 parliament (Warwick ascendant, his brother George Neville chancellor), Friar Brackley wrote to John Paston urging that a commission be directed “sub poena ligeanciae” to the sheriff, Sir Miles Stapleton, Sir William Chamberlain, Justice William Yelverton, “W. Calthorp, Johanni Twyre, Johanni Geney, T. Gurnay, Johanni Fyncham, Johanni Yelverton Juniori, Edmundo Bokyngham, Johanni Gros, Johanni Dam, Johanni Lomenour, Jacobo Arblaster, T. Denys” to arrest Sir Thomas Tuddenham, John Heydon, John Wyndham and their adherents. Thomas II is thus listed among the anti-Tuddenham/Heydon county worthies Brackley wanted armed with royal authority — the same side as the 1452 St George’s Day petition, eight years on, and in company with John Groos and an Edmund “Bokyngham” (plausibly the Edmund Bokenham, Esq., whom Blomefield names as a co-executor of Thomas’s 1471 will).[6]
  • 2 November 1461 — the Hellesdon parson sent “to Gurnay.” Margaret Paston reported to her husband: “I sent the Parson of Heylysdon to Gurnay to spek to hym of the same mater, and he seyth feythefully ther was no swyche thyng desyiryd of hym, and thow it had be desyiryd, he wold nowthyr a seyd nor done a yens yow. He seyd he had ever fownde you lovyng and feythfull to hym…” Fenn’s editorial note identifies this Gurnay: “Thomas Gurney of Norwich, Esq., died in 1471” — i.e. Thomas II, at his Norwich residence, professing standing goodwill to John Paston in the first autumn of Edward IV’s reign.[7]

Both items sit on the friendly, county-establishment side of the ledger; the reshuffle that ended with John Heydon supervising Thomas’s own will in 1471 came later, after Heydon’s 1462 pardon and rehabilitation (see the 1452-petition analysis above).

Margaret Gurnay (Jerningham) in correspondence with Elizabeth de Vere, Countess of Oxford

An undated letter from Elizabeth de Vere, Countess of Oxford, to John Paston (preserved in Gairdner vol. II) references prior personal correspondence with Margaret Gurnay:

And I sent a letter to Margaret Gurnay byfore Cristemesse of certeyn langage that I herd, wich plesed me nowght, and so I prayed my Lord to gif me leve to wrytte to hir; and therfore and ye here any thyng, answere, as my trust is in yow.

Margaret Gurnay is Margaret Jerningham, wife of G20 Thomas Gournay II — no other Margaret Gurnay is documented in the Norfolk gentry record of the period. Elizabeth de Vere (born Elizabeth Howard, daughter of John Howard 1st Duke of Norfolk) was Countess of Oxford as wife of John de Vere 12th Earl of Oxford, who was executed in February 1462 by Edward IV after the failed Lancastrian Oxford plot. The letter is therefore most plausibly dated pre-1462, late 1450s.

The Countess had written to Margaret personally about something Margaret said that “plesed me nowght” and had to ask her husband’s permission to do so — implying a real if delicate personal correspondence between the two women.

This extends the Vere connection beyond G21 Thomas I’s 1441 retinue service under John de Vere 13th Earl of Oxford into the women’s correspondence circle of the next generation. Gairdner’s editorial dating is provisional; the Davis revised edition would supply tighter dating.

Full letter text preserved at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-gurney-extracts.md §3.[8]

John Jerningham’s 1458 letter — the Gournay–Jerningham marriage seen from the Jerningham side

The single document Daniel Gurney rested his Gournay–Jerningham marriage proof on — “John Jernegan’s letter to Margaret Paston” (Record, p. 391) — is now recovered in full. It is Gairdner’s No. 369, written by John Jerningham to Margaret Paston on Corpus Christi day (1 June) 1458, and it is chiefly a first-hand account of the great sea-fight off Calais a few days earlier, in which the Earl of Warwick’s fleet engaged a Castilian/Spanish fleet (“xxviij sayle of Spaynyards… xvj. grete schippis of forecastell”). Jerningham himself boarded and took a 300-ton ship, was then boarded and captured in turn, and “was prisoner with them vj. houris, and was delyvered agayne for theyr men that wer taken beforne… ther was not so gret a batayle upon the se this xl. wyntyr.”

The genealogical weight is in the closing commendation. Jerningham asks Margaret Paston to recommend him “unto my ryght reverent and wurchipfull cosyn your husband, and myn ownkll Gournay, and to myn awnte his wyfe.” A Jerningham calling Thomas Gournay “my uncle” and Gournay’s wife “my aunt” means his own blood aunt — a Jerningham daughter — had married Gournay; that aunt is Margaret Jerningham, wife of Thomas Gournay II. The letter therefore confirms the marriage from the Jerningham side and fixes it as established by 1 June 1458, and it embeds the Gournays in one intimate cousinage with the Pastons and Jerninghams: Jerningham writes to Margaret Paston as “cosyn,” and greets her husband John Paston (also his “cosyn”) and his uncle-and-aunt Gournay in a single sentence.[9]

Full letter text preserved at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-gurney-extracts.md §4.

Armstrong 1781 — 1447 Berningham’s attorney-delivery of seisin

Mostyn John Armstrong, The History and Antiquities of the County of Norfolk, vol. 5 (Norwich, 1781), in the Gallow Hundred entry for East Barsham’s Berningham’s / Knold’s / Waldgrave’s Manor, records that on 10 March 25 Henry VI (1447) Robert Mompynson of Wisbich and Catherine his wife (widow of William Hunt of East Barsham) enfeoffed John Wode of Honingham, Margery his wife, and their son Robert in four messuages and four tofts at East Barsham and Snoring called Berningham’s. “At the said time, a Thomas Gurney, esq. their attorney, to deliver seisin to John Wode and Margery, and to Robert, son of the said John and Margery.”

Daniel Gurney’s Supplement records that G21 Thomas Gournay I was probably dead before 1444; the 1447 attorney is therefore most parsimoniously G20 Thomas Gournay II, supplying a dated attestation that fills the gap between the 1445 Hunstanton seal (Daniel Gurney Supplement Note 126, p. 814) and the 1452 St George’s Day Norwich petition to the Duke of Norfolk’s deputy (already in the G20 fact-sheet narrative). The Berningham’s transaction also confirms the persistence of the Catherine, widow of William Hunt of East Barsham through into a remarriage to Robert Mompynson of Wisbich — the same Catherine who released her right to John Wode in the 1440 Woolterton’s confirmation Thomas Gournay also brokered (see G21 companion).[10]

Nicholas Bokkyng, the #200 feoffee — a man of Fastolf’s service

The querent on the 1444/45 fine that settled the Gurnay West-Norfolk manors (Rye Part II #200), Nicholas Bokkyng, was not merely a feoffee who happened to recur in the surrounding Fastolf-circle fines. The Dictionary of National Biography records that “a Nicholas Bocking was also in Sir John Fastolf’s service,” the family being seated at Ash Bocking, Suffolk, and holding property at Longham, Norfolk — a parish in the same West-Norfolk orbit as the Lexham / Castleacre / Newton / Great Dunham lands of the fine.[11] Reading the #200 feoffee as a member of Fastolf’s own service circle tightens Thomas Gournay II’s placement within the Fastolf–Paston affinity: the enfeoffment-to-use of the Gurney manors was drawn up through Fastolf’s man, of a piece with the 1452 St George’s Day petition on the Paston side and with the Heylesdon–Fastolf and Harling-retinue threads documented above. Bokkyng recurs across the 22nd–24th Henry VI Norfolk fines beside Yelverton, Paston and Sir Henry Inglose, and is styled “Armiger” at Rye Part II #185.[11]

  1. Norfolk Record Office, Norwich Consistory Court will register Jekkys, fo. 211v–212v, will complex (testament + ultima voluntas + probate 27 July 1471) of Thomas Gurnay, armiger, of Harpley/West Barsham; register images FamilySearch film DGS 008470476, images 366–367 (arks 3:1:3Q9M-C39Z-H951-D, 3:1:3Q9M-C39Z-H9R9-L), expert paleographic read July 2026. Verified clause-level transcription at sources/corpus_supplement/ncc-jekkys-211-thomas-gurnay-will-complex-1471.md. NRO catalogue row “NCC will register Jekkys 211” (nrocatalogue.norfolk.gov.uk). Source ID: nro-ncc-wills-registers. ↩︎ ↩︎

  2. Francis Blomefield, An Essay Towards a Topographical History of the County of Norfolk, vol. vii (London: William Miller, 1807), “Gallow and Brothercross Hundreds: West-Barsham,” pp. 42-47, British History Online. Source ID: blomefield-norfolk. Full per-parish extract at sources/corpus_supplement/blomefield-norfolk-vol7-pp42-47-west-barsham.md. ↩︎ ↩︎

  3. Walter Rye, A Short Calendar of the Feet of Fines for Norfolk, Part II (Internet Archive ashortcalendarf00ryegoog; full OCR text at sources/corpus/rye-feet-of-fines-norfolk-part2.txt), entry 200, under the reign sub-header 23 Henry VI (1444/45); the surrounding 22nd–24th Henry VI Norfolk fines supply the Bokkyng/Aleyn feoffee and Fastolf-circle context. Harvest and recovered regnal years at sources/corpus_supplement/norfolk-feet-of-fines-gurnay-entries-rye.md. Underlying TNA CP 25/1 (Norfolk), AALT. A contemporary NRO copy of the same fine survives as NRS 7500 — catalogued (nrocatalogue.norfolk.gov.uk) as “Copy Fine. Nicholas Dokking and John Aleyn … Thomas Gurnay, esq., [and] Margaret,” 1444–45; Rye’s “Nich. Bokkyng” = the catalogue’s “Dokking” — a second, orderable witness to the fine, and independent corroboration of the wife Margaret whom the 1471 will’s probate confirms as executrix. Source ID: rye-feet-of-fines-norfolk. ↩︎

  4. John Gurnay, Man-at-Arms, Garrison of Poissy / Pont Meulan, Captain Sir Robert Harling (d. 1435); Muster Roll Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS Français 25766, no. 816; 1 November 1422. AHRC-funded Soldier in Later Medieval England Online Database: www.medievalsoldier.org. Source ID: medievalsoldier-database. ↩︎

  5. James Gairdner, ed., The Paston Letters, A.D. 1422-1509, 6 vols. (London: Chatto and Windus, 1904), vol. II, letter dated St George’s Day (23 April) 1452, written from Norwich to the Duke of Norfolk’s deputy at Framlingham. Project Gutenberg vol. II: www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/40989/pg40989.txt. Source ID: paston-letters-gairdner. Full extract preserved at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-gurney-extracts.md §2. ↩︎

  6. James Gairdner, ed., The Paston Letters, A.D. 1422–1509, 6 vols. (London: Chatto and Windus, 1904), vol. III, No. 416, Friar Brackley to [John Paston], [October 1460] (printed pp. 226–228; Gairdner’s marginal date “[Oct.] 1460,” the letter addressed to Paston “in principio parliamenti”). Retained full text at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-vol3-fulltext.txt (list at file lines ~12534–12550). Source ID: paston-letters-gairdner. ↩︎

  7. James Gairdner, ed., The Paston Letters, A.D. 1422–1509, vol. IV, Margaret Paston to John Paston, 2 November 1461 (printed pp. 2–3), with Fenn’s note “Thomas Gurney of Norwich, Esq., died in 1471.” Retained full text at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-vol4-fulltext.txt. Source ID: paston-letters-gairdner. ↩︎

  8. James Gairdner, ed., The Paston Letters, A.D. 1422-1509, 6 vols. (London: Chatto and Windus, 1904), vol. II, undated letter from Elizabeth de Vere, Countess of Oxford, to John Paston Squire, signed “OXENFORD / ELYZABETH DE VEER,” dated “the first day of February” with no year. Project Gutenberg vol. II: www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/40989/pg40989.txt. Source ID: paston-letters-gairdner. Full extract preserved at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-gurney-extracts.md §3. ↩︎

  9. James Gairdner, ed., The Paston Letters, A.D. 1422-1509, 6 vols. (London: Chatto and Windus, 1904), vol. III, No. 369, “John Jernyngan to Margaret Paston,” addressed “Unto my ryght wurchipfull Cosyn Marget Paston,” written “on Corpus Christi day” (1 June) 1458; the sea-fight is dated by Fabyan to Trinity Sunday/Monday (28–29 May) 1458. Closing commendation names “myn ownkll Gournay, and… myn awnte his wyfe” (= Thomas Gournay II and Margaret Jerningham). This is the letter Daniel Gurney cited as marriage-proof at Record p. 391. Source ID: paston-letters-gairdner. Full extract at sources/corpus_supplement/paston-letters-gairdner-gurney-extracts.md §4. ↩︎

  10. Mostyn John Armstrong, The History and Antiquities of the County of Norfolk, vol. 5 (Norwich, 1781), Gallow Hundred entry for East Barsham — Berningham’s / Knold’s / Waldgrave’s Manor: “In the 25th of Henry VI. March 9, John Hines, of Swaffham in Norfolk, sells to John Wode the manor of Berningham for fifty marks; and on the 10th of the said month, Robert Mompynson, of Wisbich, and Catherine his wife, late wife of William Hunt, of East-Basham, enfeoffed John Wode, of Honingham, and Margery his wife, &c. in four messuages, four tofts, &c. called Berningham’s, in this town, and Snoring… and, at the said time, a Thomas Gurney, esq. their attorney, to deliver seisin to John Wode and Margery, and to Robert, son of the said John and Margery.” Internet Archive item bim_eighteenth-century_history-and-antiquities-_armstrong-mostyn-john_1781_5. Source ID: armstrong-norfolk-1781. ↩︎

  11. “Bocking, Edward (d.1534),” Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 5 (London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1886), appended family note: “A Nicholas Bocking was also in Sir John Fastolf’s service,” the Bockings of Ash Bocking, Suffolk, holding property at Longham, Norfolk, in the 15th–16th centuries. The Bokkyng/Aleyn feoffee context of the surrounding 23 Henry VI Norfolk fines (Yelverton, Paston, Sir Henry Inglose at Rye Part II ##185, 196 ff.) is preserved in sources/corpus/rye-feet-of-fines-norfolk-part2.txt. Source ID: dnb-bocking. ↩︎ ↩︎