Whitman's Pond (Fresh Pond)
Place research page generated from the structured place spine and the companion place markdown.
John Gurney Sr. (G13) was entitled to great lot no. 16 in the division ordered 2–3 February 1651–52, laid out on the east side of the pond 'next to Mrs Richards mill' and running east toward the Hingham line (Nash, Historical Sketch of Weymouth, Appendix C, p. 282). The pond is Whitman's Pond — called Fresh Pond when the town bounds were set in 1636 — in East Weymouth, near the early mills; the History of Weymouth's summary of this grant as 'east side of Great Pond' conflates it with the larger South Weymouth pond of that modern name.
Linked ancestors
- G13 John Gurney Probable landholding / property reference
Research notes
What we know. John Gurney appears as great lot no. 16 in the 2–3 February 1651–52 division of great lots, listed in Gilbert Nash’s Historical Sketch of Weymouth, Appendix C (p. 282). The order describes the lots as “ordered to be laid out on the East side of [the] Pond next to Mrs Richards mill … which great lots are to but on Hingham line on the East and on the great lots on the west, with a sufficient drift-way between the two divisions.” So John’s lot lay in a strip running from the east side of the pond eastward to the Hingham town line, next to a mill.
Which pond. The pond is Whitman’s Pond, which was called Fresh Pond when the town bounds were set in 1636 and took the Whitman name after John Whitman Jr. settled on it; the Bates Mill was built on it in 1640. It sits in East Weymouth near the Hingham line — the geography the grant describes. Nash’s main text (p. 281) reads the pond as “Fresh Pond”; the History of Weymouth summary calls the Gurney grant “east side of Great Pond,” conflating it with the larger, separately-named South Weymouth Great Pond reservoir (which is well west of the Hingham line and has no mill cluster). The Fresh-Pond / Whitman’s-Pond reading is preferred here on the geography.
What we don’t. John’s specific lot no. 16 within the strip is not individually surveyed, so the coordinate is a representative point east of the pond toward the Hingham line (medium precision).
See the John Gurney (G13) case file and the verbatim grant extracts in nash-…-gurney-extracts.md.