Biographical Summary
Degory Priest deposed that he was 40
years old in a document signed in Leiden in April 1619; this would place
his birth at about 1579 in England. On 4 November 1611, he was
married to Sarah (Allerton) Vincent, the widow of John Vincent, and the
sister of Mayflower passenger Isaac Allerton; Isaac Allerton was
married to his wife Mary Norris on the same date.
It has been suggested that Degory
Priest of the Mayflower may have been the Degorius Prust,
baptized 11 August 1582 in Hartland, Devon, England, the son of Peter
Prust. However, given that the baptism appears to be about 3 years
too late, and the fact that none of the Leiden Separatists are known to
have come from Devonshire, I doubt this baptism belongs to the
Mayflower passenger. Degory Priest was one of the earliest to
have arrived in Leiden, so it is more reasonable to suspect he is from
the Nottinghamshire/Yorkshire region, the Sandwich/Canterbury region,
the London/Middlesex region, or the Norfolk region: all of the early
Separatists in Leiden appear to have come from one of these centers.
Degory and wife Sarah had two children,
Mary and Sarah. Degory came alone on the Mayflower,
planning to bring wife and children later after the colony was better
established. His death the first winter ended those plans.
His wife remarried to Godbert Godbertson in Leiden, and they had a son
Samuel together. Godbert, his wife Sarah, their son Samuel, and
his step-children Mary and Sarah Priest all came on the ship Anne
to Plymouth in 1623. |
