94680

Generation: D

Alice Palmer

Born: 1883
Father: Jas Palmer
Mother: Janet Murray

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Born 15 Oct 1883. 7, Ashworth Street, Baxenden, Accrington, Lancs.

William Campbell Murray, age 81, her first cousin, suggested we might go along to see her. I think they had not met for a long time.

Her abode was in an Old Folks' bungalow about a mile away. Inside it was spotlessly clean and tidy. There were a few family heirlooms on the sideboard.

Alice was very deaf and wore a hearing aid. She would talk very loudly for a few sentences - put her hand on my knee - and shout louder, then go away to make a cup of tea or to hand over some more cake. She was overwhelmingly pleased and surprised to see us.

Her conversation reveals her well.

"I have to walk with a stick if I got to the Post Office. I have a hearing aid and my eyes cannot see small print.

I continually thank my Heavenly Father for strength to carry on. But I get very tired.

My mind is full of memories, and we've all been proud of our heritage.

I myself keep fairly well with the help of the Warden, and a home-help."

Alice then spoke of her mother, Janet Murray (1858-1948). "My mother used to say to me. 'Put down the babe and talk to me'. She loved the song by Robert Burns - My love is like the red red rose - she had a lovely voice.

My mother's eldest sister, Ann Matheson Murray (date?) was called Matheson after the preacher George Matheson, who wrote hymns, but I do not know the relation between them."

Alice's brother came in while we were there, and it was obvious she had a great affection for him. He was on a weekend visit from an Old People's Home in Manchester.

Alice remembered visiting the Buchanan Family in Glasgow in her youth. She acknowledged herself to be a great admirer of Burns' poems.

In her young days Alice had worked in a mill as a cotton weaver, then she became a shop-assistant, and later still a nurse, of a kind. A pleasant, careful, kindly woman, active for her 86 years in spite of lameness. Very pious, and assumed that I was equally pious, which made conversation a little bit more difficult for me. I think she would be a Methodist, and certainly not Church of England.

Alice has written several letters to me about the members of her family. She has indeed a first class memory, a capacity for detail and a desire for accuracy. Her notes displayed a sympathetic understanding of such difficulties as these relatives faced. No trace of bitterness. She had quite a number of little quotations interlaced, e.g. "Kind hearts are more than coronets and simple faith than Norman blud". I fancy Alice thought Kingsley had spelt "blood" that way, for the spelling in her letters to me is of high standard. Her writing too is very good for her age, thoroughly legible, though a little staccato and angular. When she wishes she would write Scotch dialect spelling with ease.

That was Alice as I saw her - a good brave spirit.

Later, Alice wrote: "My 85 years have passed quickly. Until I was 18 years old I was in the weaving mill, then at the counter of a high class confectioner, closed during the Depression. Then I worked at the Blackburn Orphanage for 3 years. Then 9 years with a helpless invalid with arthritis. I also had Mother for 10 years until she died at age 90".

In her half dozen letters to me she had never a grumble.


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