David,
The trip Wilson took sometime between January and April 1912 was clearly not the trip to study golf courses that these writers mentioned. Maritime Insurance matters was his profession, and I'm quite sure that after taking an earlier lengthy voyage, having spent the past year on building the course, and getting it ready for seeding in the fall he would have been behind in business matters.
It would make no sense for it to be for any number of reasons, not the least of which is can you imagine a bleaker time of year to go study golf courses in Great Britain?
Or a more dangerous time of year to travel for recreational purposes?!?!
The written accounts say he spent the summer months, not the winter.
I'm also sure it was "downtime" in the construction of Merion East as it was also the middle of WINTER in Philadelphia during those months. I'm quite sure that work progressed as normal in Philly here...probably into December, but generally, after living here for 20+ years, January, February, and March get pretty ugly weather-wise.
I'm quite sure the course got seeded in the fall, and everyone was waiting for spring to continue the work.
I could go back and address each of your questions one more time, including the absolutely ridiculous one that Evan's is talking about Merion West, but instead I'll willl say this;
The only reason that Tom MacWood found the Crump manifest in the 1910 article is simply because he had a travelling companion who was found...not because somehow, miraculously, Crump turned up on a search engine.
If Crump had travelled alone neither you or Tom would have EVER found that record. If it's that touchy, or that faulty, then we surely cannot judge our inability to find a Hugh Wilson manifest as remotely near sufficient burden of proof. How do we know he's not one of the 800+ "H. Wilson's" leaving England between 1908 and 1912?
If your entire theory rests on the hypothesis that Wilson didn't sail before 1912, as I was afraid that it might, and you have to rely on us believing that William Evans was talking about the Merion West course in his 1913 article, or that "some years ago before Merion was constructed" actually means less than a year ago (you claim that Merion West was constructed in spring 1913...you can't have it both ways), then I think the other "new evidence" you say you have had better be really, REALLY good.
You might need actual video footage at this stage.