In
my post of October 21, 2014, I wrote on a story told by a new acquaintance,
John Farnham, about changes to the rules about driving on the left-hand side of
the road in New Brunswick, Canada. John also told me about an experience his
sister, Shirley O’Neill had with respect to reuniting a family with a long-lost
piece of family history. The details of that event were published in the Friday,
May 21, 1999 edition of the Saint Croix
Courier in St. Stephen, New Brunswick.
A
few years before, Shirley had come across an old family Bible in an antique
store that had been converted from an original old school house. The Bible had
been donated to the school and left on the preserved teacher’s desk. In
examining the Bible, Shirley found it contained a number of names written in
the family statistics section for the family of William and Margaret (Purdy)
Murray. She copied the names from the Bible and took them to the Charlotte
County Archives, where she had been volunteered her services. Unfortunately
there was no match to any name in the registers. But Shirley hung on to the
piece of paper on which she had written the names and filed it away with her
own genealogical information. For years, she kept asking anyone named Murray
about the family but never found a connection.
Then
one day in 1998, a letter arrived at the archives office from Carole Confar of
Santa Barbara. California. Carole was looking for information about her
great-grandfather, Alexander Murray who was married in 1885. On checking the
list again, Shirley found the marriage had been recorded in the Bible. Instead
of just writing to Carole, Shirley telephoned her to let her know she had come
across the family Bible. Carole was so excited she phoned all of her relatives
up and down the coast of California.
Many
stories about the Murray came to light through conversations with Carole.
According to the article in the courier, “[a]pparently three Murray brothers –
William, Alexander and James – came to Canada from Scotland and their father
gave them the family Bible to bring with them.” They eventually settled in the
St. Stephen area and operating businesses together and in partnership with
others. William died on board a ship while returning to Scotland around 1888.
Alexander moved to Winnipeg after the First World War. James stayed in St.
Stephen where he raised a family of 12 children. One of the Murray children, a
son Hugh, became an insurance agent. He was the last family member living in
the area and appears to also have been the last to have possession of the Bible.
Hugh had no children of his own and it was turned over to an antique dealer,
with his other effects, after his death.
Carole
contacted Marcie Garrymore, owner of the antique store, and they came to an
agreement about obtaining the bible. In May 1999, Carole and an aunt, Patricia
Sharp, travelled to St. Andrews to collect it. During their trip to New
Brunswick, Carole and Patricia met with Shirley, Marcie and other members of
the community, including Joe Flewelling, owner of the insurance business
previously run by Hugh Murray. He had many stores to tell them about the
family. The Mayor of St. Stephen, Allan Gillmor, had them to dinner at his own
home, which coincidentally had once been occupied by Hugh Murray. Both Carole
and Patricia were overwhelmed by both the discovery of an important part of
their family history and by the kindness and hospitality shown to them by all
the people they met.
This
is one of those real, feel-good stories that genealogists often experience,
putting people together with important memories and memorabilia of their
history.
Wayne
Shepheard is a volunteer with the Online Parish Clerk program in
England, handling four parishes in Devon, England. He has
published a number of articles about various aspects of genealogy and is a past
Editor of Chinook, the quarterly
journal of the Alberta Family Histories Society. Wayne also provides
genealogical consulting services through his business, Family History Facilitated.
