2.1.2 Mabel Murray (1875-1950) Background and Youth (-1897)

2.1.2 Mabel Murray (1875-1950) Background and Youth (-1897)

Blanche’s mother, Mabel, was brought to Australia as a baby by her parents, John and Mary Anne nee Birt Murray, in 1875. Mabel was just nine months old when the ship arrived in Western Australia.

Before their marriage, Mabel’s parents were servants in the house of a lord in the north of England. John was a coachman, a position of some prestige since it involved the management of the stables and the maintenance of equipment as well as actually driving the lord’s coaches. John was a square-built man with mutton-chop whiskers and an air of genial authority. His bride-to-be was a lady’s maid, a position calling for dependability and nice manners. In contrast to John, she was rather thin, almost frail in appearance.  The couple were subject to the convention of Victorian England, that once they were married they were no longer eligible for service in a grand household. They had either to seek employment in some less congenial situation in Britain, or emigrate. They chose the uncertainties and opportunities of a new life in Australia. (The above is from recollections of portraits, now lost, and conversations with Mabel about 1941.)

John became a victualler, also called a waterman, in the Western Australian goldfields near Kalgoorlie. He used a horse-drawn wagon to take supplies to the miners and prospectors during the gold rush of the 1880s. Much of his business was carrying water for the camel teams, which were the chief means of heavy transportation in the arid parts of the state. He operated a water condensing plant at Kanowna, then an important gold-mining center.

In this period the Murrays had one other child, Eva.

When the easy gold findings petered out, Kanowna fell into decline and with it John Murray’s business. He envisaged switching to vegetable farming in the temperate south-coastal part of the state near Albany, with a view to supplying the scurvy-ridden goldfields with much-needed fresh produce. But the time for leisurely planning expired with the outbreak of typhoid fever in the Kalgoorlie area in 1897, and the family was obliged to head south for reasons of safety as well as business.

Mabel Christina Murray and George Edward Harrison, married at St. John's Mission Church, Kalgoorlie, January 6, 1897.

In January of that year, 1897, Mabel had married 28-year-old teamster George Edward  Harrison, also of Kanowna. He was a son of Charles Harrison, farmer, and his wife Sarah nee Woodward Harrison. George's business was much like that of John Murray, except that George had a team of camels rather than horses for carting water in the goldfields.

Tragically, George Harrison died of typhoid fever only three weeks after the wedding, and Mabel joined her parents in their trek south. They carried their belongings on the wagon and walked the 300 miles to Albany, camping along the way. Already pregnant, she rode some of the way on the wagon. 

The baby was born in Albany and named Arthur.

The Murray family started a farm four miles out of Albany on what was then called the Denmark Road, now the South Coast highway. The homestead site is on the right side going towards Denmark, 100 yards before the entrance to the dump on the left.

John Murray’s brother, Albert Murray, also had a farm in the area. It was located on Lancaster Road, a mile or so to the north of John’s farm.

Sources

Most of the material on the Murray family is from a 1980 interview with Bert and John Gittins by J. A. Genoni, published in the "Albany Advertiser." The material on George Harrison, including  the wedding photo, was kindly supplied by Lucy Harrison via Jennifer Marchment, and expertly restored by Matt Marchment.

---

Continue reading: 2.2 Tambellup

---

Previous Topics

2. Blanche Gittins (1910-1987) Background and Youth (-1929)

2.1 Albany

2.1.1 Charles Gittins (1863-1926) Youth (-1897)

This Topic

2.1.2 Mabel Murray (1875-1950) Background and Youth (-1897)

Next Topic

2.2 Tambellup

---