Last week we had the opportunity to speak with author Anita Hackley-Lambert about her new book, “F.H.M. Murray.” I’d now like to take this opportunity to review the book itself.
Murray came from a very interesting heritage. His father, John, was a Scot and his mother, Mary Bentley, was an Irish mulatto. When John married Mary, he “disgraced” his Scot heritage. His family was vehemently opposed to the match but John didn’t care. He was committed to the idea of defending his wife’s race and spent much of his time fighting for better treatment of the blacks in their area. He dreamed of building up a new branch of the Murray family – one that included African American blood.
He had one son, and then another, F.H.M. Life took a tragic turn, however, causing the deaths of both John and Mary. Little Murray’s older brother had run away, but Little Murray was taken in by Daniel Bentley, Mary’s father, and raised. Daniel was well-respected in the community and ran a station on the Underground Railroad, and he instilled in young Murray a love of freedom and equality.
Murray, as a young boy, looked very much like his Scot father, but as he grew a little older, his hair began to curl and his grandfather told him about his mixed blood. Even though he was the same boy he’d always been, his friends turned on him, not wanting to associate with him because he was part black. The fervor for equality that shone so brightly in John was passed on to his son, and Murray determined to do whatever he could to erase the color boundary.
He got his teaching certificate and went to teach in a small school for black children. He himself had attended a white school and he was shocked at how little these black children had in comparison to the things the white children had. This strengthened his resolve to do something about it.
He went into the newspaper business, and at that time met a lovely mulatto girl named Laura. They started their family, but her health was very poor and she got sicker with each pregnancy. Shortly after the birth of their fifth child, Murray asked her cousin Delilah to come stay and help tend the family. When Laura died, Delilah and Murray got married, and Murray found in Delilah the helpmeet he’d never found in Laura. Together they worked with the Underground Railroad in a house he had build specifically for that purpose, with color-coded stairways that led to secret hiding places.
Murray had a great deal to do with the Niagara Movement, the forerunner to the NAACP (of which he also had a great deal to do) and of modern civil rights. He was there in the thick of things, writing books, speaking to groups, and doing whatever he could for the cause.
He died in his nineties, having been hit by a car driven by an influential white doctor. The evidence at the scene contrasted sharply with the doctor’s testimony, but in the end he wasn’t punished at all. It leads one to wonder what kind of cover up took place.
The book is nonfiction and is not dramatized, but contains factual accounts from many different sources. The author obviously did her research and tells us not only about Murray but about his surroundings and his political climate as well. I did wish some of the information had been organized a little better, but the book was educational, interesting, and inspirational.
(This book was published in 2006 by HLE Publishing.)
Related Blogs:
Anita Hackley-Lambert: Writing as Therapy