Rev John White 1575-1648
- Feb 1
- 2 min read
John White was the younger brother of my 11x great grandfather, Josias.
He was baptised (1) at Stanton St John in Oxfordshire on the 6th January 1574/5, the second son of six children of John White senior (1550-1618) by his wife Isabel Bawle (1552-1601). He had been born towards the end of December in the two storey Rectory Farm House which was situated just across the street from the 12th Century parish church of St John The Baptist which lies 5 miles from Oxford.
John White obtained a BA degree at New College, Oxford on 12th April 1597 and this was followed by an MA on 16th Jan 1600/1.
Following education he remained in residence at New College but was admitted into holy orders being ordained deacon and priest on 7 March 1602 in St Peter in the East in Oxford (20) and became a frequent preacher around Oxford. (1) During this time events of considerable importance to Puritanism took place. One of these, the translation of the Bible, would have had a particular interest for White. Two Fellows of his college were among those appointed to undertake this task - one of them, John Harmer, had been his schoolmaster at Winchester. On the 11th November 1605 John White was presented to the King and given the living of Holy Trinity in Dorchester where he was appointed Rector, a post he took up the following year.
Shortly after his arrival in Dorchester he married Anne Burges. Anne came from a staunch puritan background and was to bear him four sons who are referred to in his will, but she is not mentioned and presumably died prior to 1646.
About 1623 he was involved in plans to send out a colony of Dorset men to settle in North America, allowing nonconformists to enjoy liberty of conscience. The attempt by the Dorchester
Company to plant a colony at Cape Ann at what would become Gloucester, Massachusetts did not prove at first successful; in the previous decade, only about 500 English colonists had established a foothold, and this Company was wound up by 1625. White then recruited emigrants from the western counties of Dorset, Somerset and Devon, who set sail a few years later as a better-supported expedition and organised church aboard the ship Mary and John.
On the death of Robert Pinck in November 1647, White was made warden of New College, Oxford but declined to go to Oxford because of bad health. His death took place on 21 July 1648, and he was buried in the porch of St Peter's Chapel (belonging to Trinity)