Saturday 24 February 2018

A letter - answered!!

When I wrote a note to Arthur McArthur, I never thought I would get a reply. But, very recently, I did get a reply .... from the other side.

Yes, I know, it's a bit unreal. I had the opportunity to see a clairvoyant recently and out of the blue, Arthur barged his way into my session indicating that I was looking at the family tree. At first I was confused about an Arthur because I personally have no Arthur's in my family but then I realised that it could only be Arthur McArthur.

So, with great hesitation, I asked him some questions (through the clairvoyant of course) and here are his answers and my thoughts:

DP: What happened to you?
AM: Ship Madagascar although this was said as a sort of word game and the letters could be jumbled. There was also Madeline.
I have since found that the Madagascar ship did sail from London to Melbourne in mid 1853 but Arthur would only have been 13 years of age. There were plenty of 'children' on board ships in those days so it is not unrealistic to think that Arthur could have been on this ship. There is also the conundrum that his parents cannot be found in the 1851 England Census - there was a cholera outbreak in London in 1849 when some 14,000 Londoners were killed and there were mass burials. His parents could have died then which would have made him an orphan. However, there is a family story that Arthur walked the halls of Guys Hospital in London - his father was a tailor and Arthur may have done this as a very young boy, delivering clothing to the hospital. It is certainly possible. It is also possible that he may have been on that ship. More work is needed.

AM: Arthur then indicated a date circa 1898.
Well, it was around 1900 that I have 'lost' Arthur which was around the time of the death of his father-in-law who's Will stated categorically that Arthur was not to receive anything from his Estate.

DP: Why did you leave?
AM: To escape the tyranny of injustice. He also said he feels remorse about leaving.
As mentioned earlier, the injustice could have been with regard to the Will.

DP: Can you give me some names? (I thought here that he would say Esther, his wife)
AM: Adelaide. Josephine Montgomery. Bethany, Ann, Joseph. He also said "Unrequited love".
I can understand the Adelaide reference as this comes out also in his son, George's life. George enlisted in Adelaide and we don't know why. Perhaps he was with his father in Adelaide? Certainly there are McArthur's in Adelaide but we haven't established a link or found anything else here.
With regard to the names, they are names I have never heard before and I will do more research to see if I can find anything. But...

It's still a mystery to be solved - I hope.

1 comment:

  1. I didn't realise that you were blogging Diana. Thanks to Congress I found you!! Now following so I won't miss a post.

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