====== Murray, Donald ====== (died 8 Jan. 1868, aged 86), physician. (Capt. Donald Murray) Born in the Isle of Skye, Scotland. He served in Burma in some military capacity, and received a military decoration. In 1864, he emigrated to Canada, with his wife and family. He settled in Kenyon Township, GC, “Where he practiced his Profession, as a Saddle Bag Doctor, to a large territory and much success in those Pioneer Days.” If the preceding dates and age are correct, Murray’s medical practice in Canada took place during his advanced age, and indeed lasted only a few years. Capt. Donald Murray’s residence was a “farm Cottage,” evidently known as “Gastho Cottage” or Gestoplace, on Lot 4, 7th Concession of Kenyon Township, near Laggan. The diarist Angus MacMillan, who was his near neighbour, recorded his death as “Donald Murray died No 4.7K.” The Montreal //Daily Witness// adds the detail that Capt. Donald Murray died at Gestoplace, Glengarry County. With Murray there came to Canada, it is said, his daughter Isabella. She was the widow of Donald MacLeod of Gastho (a form, presumably, of Gesto), and had by him children Neil K. and Nora (Normanda). If Isabella really accompanied her father to Canada in 1864, this was a return visit, for she and her husband had been resident on the Kenyon lot already mentioned when their children Neil Kenneth and Normanda were born in 1835 and 1839 respectively.The widowed Isabella remarried in 1850 to James R. McKenzie of Skye, Ont. (Also, McKenzie’s brother married her sister.) Nora married the Rev. Adam F. MCQUEEN. Neil K. married the daughter of Dr Stirling or Sterling of Vankleek Hill. Dr Murray had, reportedly, the degree of M.D. Little is known about his life in Glengarry. A small eroded stone in the Dunvegan Cemetery commemorates “Marion Murray, Eldest daughter of Capt. D. Murray, [native?] of the Isle of Skye.” Her death was on 13 Feb.1866 at the age of 54, and Angus MacMillan gives her place of residence or death as “No 4.7 Kenyon,” the same as for her father. Dr Murrray’s son John, who was a schoolteacher, and died 1873, aged 43, is buried at St. Columba’s cemetery, Kirk Hill. It may be noted that there was also a Dr Angus Murray (whose death, again, is noticed by MacMillan), a native of the Isle of Skye, and physician and surgeon, who died at L’Orignal, 16 or 26 April 1862, in the 45th year of his age. ---- MacMillan diary, 13 Feb. 1866, 8 Jan. 1868 * //Witness// 19 Feb. 1868 (misdates the death as Feb.) * photocopy, present author’s files, of single page of handwritten notes (QF), entitled “Captain Donald Murray M.D.,” by unknown author, but perhaps the grandson Neil K. or Catherine (Katie) MacSweyn * St. Columba CR 52, 73 * “son… schoolteacher”: MacMaster 328 * abstract index, registry office files for 4-7 Kenyon * Thomas 575 (Dr Sterling) * Dr Angus Murray: //Lovell 1857// 440; death: MacMillan diary, 26 April 1862, and //The British American Journal//, III (1862?), 159 [<6>]