Member of the Gurney family of Quakers and bankers, based in Norwich. He became a partner in the family bank in 1805 and soon came to play a leading role in its operations. However, his sister was the prison reformer, Elizabeth Fry (1780–1845; DNB) and he spent much of his life campaigning to help prisoners, abolish capital punishment and end the slave trade. Gurney was also a key spokesman for evangelicalism within Quakerism.