68978

Generation: D

William Buchanan

Sewage Engineer, Glasgow. Died aged 61. Bachelor, gay. Kind to his sister Kate.

I seem to remember that in my boyhood days he came once or twice to our house, and that compared to me, then, he was big and strong. He also, to a certainty, had the Buchanan smile.

I met him again, as a complete stranger, at my father's funeral in Glasgow. He was in the FIRST carriage! So I very soon found out who he was. Of course, I should have guessed he was a relative. We had indeed quite a talk. He was then, I think, manager of the Glasgow Corporation Sewage Works at Dalmuir or was it Dalmarnock? So he lived I think in a house in the grounds. He told me he was a bachelor. On looking at him he showed himself as a fine, strong, companionable chap, good looking. I said to him: "How have you managed to avoid the women for so long, Willie?". His reply, brightly delivered was "Oh. I fall, whiles!"

He died suddenly, probably in his sixties, and from a cerebral haemorrhage. That would be perhaps ten years ago - 1958.

His sister, Kate Grant, described him as one of her best friends. Indeed, she may have kept house for him after her own husband died.

Frank Macdonald's description: "Willie Buchanan was just a lump of good-nature" perhaps sums him up well.