72614

Generation: D

William Campbell Murray, Senior

Gertrude Naylor

Children:

• William Campbell Murray, Junior

Married twice, second wife Gertrude. Local Government Officer.

Now living at 98, Willows Road, Accrington, Lancs.

I had had some pleasant correspondence with William, whom I had never met before. Indeed I did not know of his existence until I had started to pursue the Lancashire Murrays listed in the share-out of China Bill's estate in 1915. And they were all dead long ago. But my chance letter to W.H.Palmer, and his chance remembrance of a distant relative of his grandmother, ultimately provided the contact.

I visited his house at Accrington on 15th June 1968 and was entertained by his wife Gertrude and himself most pleasantly.

William lost his first wife some years previously from Disseminated Sclerosis, and later married Gertrude Naylor, whose age might be 60. By his first wife he had one son, William Campbell Murray, Junior, who is a diamond driller in the district.

We got quickly down to business, for William had all his papers and photos laid out for me to see. My letters to him were filed, and he had questions ready for me too.

William and his two brothers and two sisters had a pretty severe upbringing, the parents having died early. They were taken over by an aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Green. The photo of the Greens did show a severe couple.

William started life in a mill nearby, as a clerk. Thereafter he moved into the Rates Office at the Town Hall, and then into the Housing Department of which he became manager in due course. He seemed to be a man of principle, for he indicated that all political parties and all religions complained about his allocations of houses! He would not be moved by any Town Councillor! He seemed to know the history of everyone in the town.

He was a thin chap, rather serious in appearance, well dressed compared with me, for I had a short sleeved shirt, it being a warm day. He looked very active and wide-awake, for his 81 years. His handwriting was excellent. I was interested in his method of questioning, for he kept at a subject until he got the exact answer from me. My answers had to be adequate.

I think he is a Baptist, but in conversation he would occasionally use the words bugger and damn. His cousin, Alice Palmer, wrote "He leads a life speaking in all the places of worship". He himself wrote "I am 80, but I still do some singing and talking along with my wife, chiefly to the Old Folks' Associations. I asked him what was his main or favourite theme. He said it was to develp the personality. He repeated this as "Stand on your own hind legs" several times. He was always seeking a new introduction to his theme. He had a great interest in factory conditions so far as the workers were concerned.

He was critical of his medical attendant who had looked at his rodent ulcer for ten years without making a diagnosis. So William had gone to some health meeting and got the diagnosis, and happily the treatment elsewhere. But William was a very modest man of the world, with no boastings. He had no motor car, nor much in the way of luxuries. He very generously presented me with a spare copy of Robert Burn's poems, a good one.

William had five Murray aunts who each received, if I remember aright, about £1200, from China Bill's estate in 1915. Had William's father then been alive, he would have had a share likewise. The fact that the five aunts did nothing to help the five children of their deceased brother still rankles in memory.

This visit terminated by a call upon Alice Palmer, and her brother William, and a short meeting with young W.H. Palmer's wife, who, quite properly had come along to see what kind of a chap I might be. ? A crank!

In September this year, 1968, Margaret and I visited Bonar Bridge, coinciding with a visit there of William and Gertrude. We were there two days only. So we called early one morning for them, taking them to the Salmon leap at the Falls of Shin, then to the house at Lairg of Sandy Sutherland, who most kindly led us to the sites at Rhaoine and Inchure where are the ruins of the Murray ancestors we share in common. William was tremendously interested. He had out his paper and pencil all the time. Then we set him to finding the graves of John Murray and Ann Matheson at Rogart. By great good fortune it was he himself who first came upon them. Then lunch at Rogart, and over the hill road by Loch Buidhe to Achuan.

Did they bring the bodies of John Murray and of Ann Matheson by this road, or cart track to Rogart for their funerals? Or did they go round by Dornoch? My father was age 9 then. Did he ride on a cart? How long did it take? And the whisky and the funeral meats? Where did the mourners put up?

We speculated on the answers to those questions.

Then we visited the ruined crofts of Craigton and Ausdale, and at Achuan Kate Mackenzie gave us a fine tea. And I handed over to her a bottle of whisky from Jessie Petterson, and one from myself. Wasn't she just pleased!

Then we took William and Gertrude to their boarding house, both game to the end - and that bit tired.

They were most pleasant guests.

William lost a sister this year, Claira, age 83. His sister Alice is alive at 84 and his brother Tom at 80. William is 81. He lost a brother in the Somme fighting in 1918.

Perhaps the Greens, aunt and uncle, did not do too badly for this family, after all.

It did not occur to me to ask about the Green descendents. Maybe next time.