Alexander Rae Murdoch was born on the 17th of March 1885 at Glenshalloch Place, High Street-Dalbeattie. The son of John Murdoch and Isabella Walker. Family trees say Isabella died in 1885, but I now have her death certificate and she died from peritonitis aged 43 on the 20th of June 1886 on her husbands ship (The Brig Mayfield) which was berthed at Tyne Dock (Westoe) South Shields.

Alexander's auntie Elizabeth Murdoch raised him and in 1928 when she died; she left him £5 pounds in her will, in to today's money that is worth £200 pounds.
Alex went to Dalbeattie Primary and High school and was considered very academic. In those days you wrote in class on a slate with chalk.

He won a scholarship, but wasn't interested, salt was in his blood. His brothers John and James would tell him many stories of what it was like as a master mariner and the adventures they got up to while away at sea and he would sit there fascinated.
When he was 16 years old, he was very upset when he found out his brother John was lost at sea and was never found. This would put a lot of men off, but every sailor knows the risk you take when you head out to the open sea.

Usually many male members of the Murdoch family started going to sea as a boy aboard a vessel under the command of a relative and Alex aged 14 started his seafaring experience under the watchful guidance of his father John. He served his apprenticeship with ship-owners J & J RAE of Liverpool. Alex was known to have said "These new steam ships will never catch on!"......

He sailed with his father first for some time on the schooner 'Resolution.' On the 1901 census on the Resolution, Alexander was with his father at Silloth Dock, Cumberland. He afterwards joined the 1709 ton barque 'Chipperkyle,' trading between Liverpool and Australia. He also served on the 'Solway.'

He was appointed second officer on the barque "Bengairn" also belonging to Messrs Rae.

His 2nd cousin Samuel Murdoch Crosbie who wrote "The story of the Scaur" said that Alex joined the minesweeping branch of H.M. service and was placed in charge of various vessels of this type materially assisting to clear the mines from the North Sea. Some family trees also state that Alex was a sea captain. I have not found any documents as yet to indicate he became a skipper.

Archives of the Central Index Register of Merchant Seamen 1918-1941 show that Alexander Rae Murdoch's CR10 Identity Card for the period 1918 to 1921 show that up till 1921 he was officially rated as 2nd Mate.

His RNR records state that in January 1906 Alexander left Dalbeattie and travelled the 120 miles north to Greenock in Renfrewshire to take his second mates certificate which he passed on the 22nd of the same month. Alexander was 20 at the time and must have been pleased that he now had this rating.
They also state that he was 5 feet 9 inches tall, had sandy hair, a 40 inch chest, grey eyes, fair complexion and tattoos (or a tattoo - it's not too clear) on his upper right arm.

While working for J. & J. RAE he would have visited Liverpool on many occasions (later to settle there and bring up his family) Aged 26 Alexander's wedding certificate shows he was ships officer- He got married in Dalbeattie in 1911. When he moved to Liverpool with his family they first lived at rooms at 223 Upper Parliament Street and his RNR records say in 1922 he was living at 30 Acheson Road, West Derby.

In 1912 while serving as an officer the captain called him into his office and said "Murdoch I've got bad news to tell you, "your cousin William has gone down on the Titanic."
Some family trees are hard to read and say Alexander left the sea at the end of WWII, but his son Angus said his dad swallowed the anchor at the end of WWI. He married Pearl Coutts on the 25th of July 1911 at Dalbeattie, he was aged 26 and Pearl was 20.
For Pearls family click here.

When Angus got married in 1955, he stated on his marriage certificate that his father was a ships rigger.

Alexander was a Freemason, but later left and was sorry he did because when his wife Pearl had her accident and lost a couple of fingers, she did not get any compensation from the council. In those days you did not sue, not like today when everyone is suing each other. If Alexander stayed in the Freemasons, they would have had a whip round and Pearl would have been given some money, the Freemasons look after each other in this way.

Angus said "his dad was a big talker and people would gather around him listing to his stories, but when he had his stroke, he went really quite and withdrawn." One day Alex was sitting in his favourite chair in the parlour and said to his wife "I'm really cold," he was suffering from hyperthermia, he was shivering that much, that pearl put a blanket around him and turned the fire up full and all of a sudden he just keeled over and died aged 70. He was buried on his birthday 17/3/1956, at 10am at Everton Cemetery and is in the same grave as his wife in section 5 grave 499.

My Grandparents had 10 children.

(1) Some Family trees say that Alexander was born in 1909; this is not the case as his son Ian has told me otherwise. Alexander Gordon Murdoch was born on the 11th of June 1911 at Dalbeattie. He married Edna and they have one son called Ian.
Alexander first went to sea with his uncle James. He was in the merchant navy and was torpedoed more than once during WWII. In one instance he and some other survivors covered half a dozen life-rafts with a tarpaulin and put a flag pole in the middle of it to resemble a four-inch gun. In doing so they managed to frighten off a German Submarine that was threatening them. He served aboard "The Empress of Asia". Alex was awarded the Atlantic Star with ribbon. Africa Star with ribbon. Pacific Star with ribbon. War Medal with ribbon. Italy Star with ribbon and Clasp. Alex died on New Year's Day in 1990. He was in a film called "Western Approaches". The film tells the story of a small group of merchant seamen lost in the Atlantic in a small life boat and of their rescue by a merchant ship. There is a short clip on my Video page.

Scotsman Newspaper - Saturday, 13th June 1942
FLAGSTAFF GUN

Scot Tells How U-Boat Was Frightened Off.

In a letter home, Alexander Murdoch, Dalbeattie, tells how he and other two
survivors from the Empress of Asia frightened off a German submarine which
attacked a Chinese flat-bottomed river boat carrying several hundred troops
and 500 tons of bombs to Colombo recently.

"The first intimation we had of the attack was two torpedoes speeding under
our shallow craft," stated Murdoch. "A large submarine surfaced to survey
her kill, I and her commander must have been dumbfounded when he saw us
making at him. I was at the wheel, and was determined the submarine would go
with us if the bombs which we were carrying were exploded by torpedo or
shell fire. The submarine submerged as quickly as she could and we made off
at full speed. We knew she would rise again, and my two companions got busy.

When the periscope poked up astern of us, there was an efficient looking
4-inch 'gun' leaning over our stern, which was made by covering the half
dozen life-rafts with tarpaulins, through the centre of which they thrust a
flagstaff' to resemble a cover with gun attached. The Germans took notice of
this and vanished. We did not dismantle our ' gun' until we reached port. It
was only a dummy, but it saved us." Food was so scarce in, Hong-Kong after
the surrender - that captives ate dog flesh. This is disclosed among letters
recently received by relatives of escaped prisoners, says the British Red
Cross and St John Organisation.

(2) Isabella Murdoch worked for Jacobs Biscuit Factory at Aintree and died of TB.

(3) John James Murdoch, known to the family as Jack was born on the 7th of June 1914 at Toxteth, liverpool and died aged 80 in July 1994 of Cerebral Hemorrhage. (A form of stroke that occurs when a blood vessel in the brain ruptures or bleeds) Jack got meningitis when he was young and his mother bought him a guitar to cheer him up and his dad would get fed up with the racket he made while practising. So his mum told him to go in her bedroom and practice in there away from his dad. Later on Jack would give guitar lessons to people living in Acheson Road. Aged 13 he first went to sea with is uncle Captain James Murdoch to South America and Norway etc. Before that he was always a fussy eater and when his mum would make him meals he would say "I'm not eating that, that's horrible." When he came back from sea, he was never fussy anymore. His brother Angus said "during the war Jack was in the Army and worked as an interpreter." A bomb went off by Jack and he became deaf after this. To communicate with him you would write down the question you wanted to ask and he would tell you the answers. This did not stop him from leading a very active life.
He married Nita and their children are. John who lives in Canada, Sylvia, Jean, Lynne, Pauline sadly deceased, Beryl and Alan.

(4) Pearl Murdoch worked for Jacobs's biscuit Factory at Aintree and died of TB. She married Walter Miller and her only son Alan has never married and lives in Australia. Alan said about his mum "He has always felt her with him and he knows that Pearl is protecting him and watching over him." Angus said Pearl was a very kind and generous person and when she died he was heartbroken.

(5) Jessie Marie Coutts Murdoch was born on the 15th of May 1920 at 223 Upper Parliament Street, Liverpool. She is known by the family as Marie. She is not in the best of health and has carers coming in each day to care for her. She had to give up the cigarettes uncase of a fire and she misses them very much. She married Harry and their children are Anne, Elizabeth and Margaret.

(6) Winifred Gladys. E Murdoch was known to the family as Winnie, and was born at Liverpool on the 4th of May 1923, and died of Cancer aged 68 in Jan 1992. She married Reginald Zulch and he was born in South Africa, they lived there for 14 years and Winnie became home sick so they moved back to Liverpool. Winnie could not get pregnant for years and was worried about this, but eventually she did and had two children, Heather and Reg.
Winnie worked part time for 14 years at Jacobs's biscuit Factory.

(7) William Louis Murdoch, known to the family as Billy was born in 1925 in Liverpool and died aged 70 in Sep 1995. When his mother died, Billy stayed living in Acheson Road. He married Evelyn and they have five children, William, Lorna, George, Debbie and Gordon.

(8) Lorna Ianthe Murdoch was born in Liverpool 1927 and married Bob Heavyside. She went on holiday once with Bob and a couple of their children to Dalbeattie and stayed in a caravan. Angus and Alice were camping there with their children and they all went for a drink to the pub and Bob got up to give a song. Angus said "Bob had a lovely voice." Lorna died of Cancer aged 67 in 1995. Lorna and Bob's children are Pauline, Rachel, Robert, Janet, Colin and Dawn. Many years ago Lorna told my mum that on Christmas day her children came running inside her bedroom to open all their presents. Lorna said at the bottom of her bed she could see her deceased dad Alexander looking at her, he looked at each of his grandchildren with a huge smile on his face and then looked back at Lorna. Lorna said her dad only appeared for a couple of minutes.

(9) Douglas C Murdoch was born in 1930 in Liverpool and died aged 3 and 11 months of diphtheria in 1933.

(10) My father Angus Murdoch was born on the 16th of April 1932 in Liverpool and he worked as a Ships Engineer. He was evacuated to North Wales with his sister Lorna and remembers coming back home aged 11 and said Liverpool did not look the same again with all the damage the bombs had done. The back garden in Acheson Road had an Anderson shelter.

He married Alice Perry on the 24th of Dec 1955; she was born in 1935.
The local Catholic Priest who married them was not too pleased with Angus, because he was a Protestant and with Alice being Catholic, he thought you should marry your own kind and after the wedding, Angus went to shake his hand and thank the Priest for the lovely service but he slammed his Bible shut and just walked off without saying a word. This deeply hurt Angus, it was after all his wedding day, a day for happiness and celebration. They first lived for many years with Angus's mother at 30 Acheson Road, and eventually got a council house in Huyton. They moved from here just up the road to a much bigger house which they bought.

They have 10 children, Pearl Marie Murdoch, Rory 1957-1978, Douglas, Carol, Julie, Gary, Dawn, Glen, Wendy (Myself) and Donna.

Angus would take his children on holiday to Dalbeattie. Once there and very relieved, he had the task of setting up the tent, Alice would be trying to cook the family a meal on the single burner calor gas stove, how she managed to cook for all those hungry mouths is a miracle! Angus would be in his element talking to all the local residents about the history of this town and also if any of them remembered his parents. All of the children would be running around playing safely in Coniston Park, right next to the tent in Islecroft camping site which is still there today.

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