William Arthur Moore (1880-1962)

William Arthur Moore (1880–1962) Keith Haines Odd things happen to one in the common way of living, but to me they have the misfortune to appear at the time quite ordinary and natural … Just ordinary days most of them seemed at the time. Arthur Moore, The Orient Express (1914), p. ix Front Cover Pic: Arthur Moore, c.1910 (Reproduced from Morgan Shuster, The Strangling of Persia (1911)) William Arthur Moore (1880–1962) Early Life Although the name of Arthur Moore has largely been forgotten, in the first half of the twentieth century he carved out a notable reputation as a highly-respected international journalist – as well as a traveller and adventurer. Although not a native of Newry, most of his formative childhood and teenage years were spent there, and he retained some affection for it: in his (unpublished) memoirs he wrote that “The people had reason to be proud of their town”. He was born on 21 December 1880 in the village of Glenavy, the youngest child of the curate, Rev. William Moore. He was known in adult life as Arthur but, interviewed in Newry in 1985 Elizabeth Holton (then aged 100), who had played on the streets with him, indicated that as a child he was always called Willie. Between 1884 and 1892 the family lived at Ballyward in Co. Down when the clergyman became rector at Drumgooland. In 1892, as a result of the patronage of Francis Charles Needham, Third Earl of Kilmorey, Moore was appointed to St Patrick’s Church in Newry, where he remained until his death on 4 August 1920. St Patrick’s Church, Newry Rev. Dr. William Moore (Courtesy of Keith Haines) (Newry and Mourne Museum Collection) The minister was born in Liverpool, where his father had worked in the Hydraulic Engineering Department of the Mersey Docks. He originally worked in the merchant navy but, having married Marianne Frizelle of Sligo in 1872, decided to train for the clergy. Although some historians have claimed that others such as Holy Trinity Church in Bandon, Co Cork, was in 1610 “undoubtedly the first edifice ever raised in Ireland for Protestant Worship”, the honour goes to St Patrick’s in Newry which dates to possibly as early as 1578. It was an appealing church to inherit as Moore’s predecessor, Rev. Dr Francis King, had had it re-roofed and re-carpeted, added two transepts and a vestry, and installed marble pillars, a pulpit of Caen stone and an organ. 1 William Arthur Moore (1880–1962) William Moore became a popular and respected minister. Even as early as mid-1894 his commitment of “twelve months of constant and unremitting care he has so willingly and ungrudgingly bestowed on the parish” was rewarded with three Sundays of “rest and recreation”. In 1902 he was presented with a bicycle and a purse of sovereigns and, similarly, a few months before his death in 1920 he was awarded a £25 bonus. Just as the news of Britain’s declaration of war on Germany was announced (4 August 1914), the local Newry Reporter revealed that St Patrick’s Church had appointed a new organist (J G Wilson), whose delight may have proved short-lived. Moore’s relationship with all his church organists appears to have been discordant. He had reprimanded one at Glenavy, and at Drumgooland the installation of new harmonium did not inhibit him from dismissing three organists in eight years. In late 1895 at St Patrick’s the organist, Mr Rolston, was chastised “in regard to the singing” and during Moore’s near thirty years’ incumbency there were to be at least five different organists/choirmasters. His first decade also witnessed a rather unseemly public disagreement in The Newry Telegraph with Rev. Samuel Smartt, vicar of the other Church of Ireland in Newry, St Mary’s. Until the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland in 1870 the latter had held a pre-eminence over its partner on the hill. Moore interpreted Smartt’s observations to imply that St Patrick’s was not a full parish church and there was to be an enduring correspondence between the two men in the letters column of the local press. Moore eventually endeavoured to end the wrangle in early 1901, and the Vestry minutes in 1902 rather mischievously recorded that “nothing but peace and goodwill has existed in the Church”! All was evidently forgiven for, when a ‘United Service of Prayer of All the Protestant Churches of Newry’ (in response to the outbreak of war) was held at St Mary’s on 19 August 1914, Moore was asked to give the sermon. The clergyman found the passing years difficult and challenging. Until the turn of the century the family lived at the parsonage on Canal Street, but by 1901 they had moved to 2 Corry Square, and in his final years he began to find the hill to the church much less accommodating. There were also increasing financial pressures upon the church. Probably with some irritation, he pointed out at the United Service that some people tended to turn to the Church only in unsettled times. The congregation at St Patrick’s had been declining in the early years of the century, partly due to the fact that increasing numbers from Ulster were emigrating to such as Canada and Australia to find the employment which was not available at home. It was said that Rev. William Moore was a little pompous in his demeanour, perhaps brought on by frustration at the lack of promotion, but he had a kindly and charitable disposition. He raised five children of his own and, when his brother George died in Liverpool, he adopted his three nephews and raised them all on a salary which never exceeded £300. Despite his very limited income, when the school opened on 3 September 1894 Moore sent his younger son to board at the expensive Campbell College at Belmont in East Belfast, at which sons of clergymen received a ten per cent discount on fees. The young Arthur had probably demonstrated academic aptitude when he was educated at home “in the three Rs, English and classical history” by his aunt, Jane Frizelle, and at the Intermediate (or day preparatory) School on Downshire Road run by William (known as Larry) Stoops. A fellow pupil from the latter school, Chalmers Fisher, also joined him at Campbell – and both of them were to go to St John’s College, Oxford, on scholarships. Stoops sent his own son, Samuel, to Campbell in 1901; the latter taught English and Classics at his father’s school (1906 – 1913) before eventually becoming Headmaster at Kimberley Boys’ High School in South Africa. 2 William Arthur Moore (1880–1962) In 1900 Arthur went to Oxford on an Open Scholarship which, supplemented by a grant from Campbell, totalled half his father’s salary at the time. Amongst his undergraduate friends was Aubrey Herbert, whose half-brother discovered the tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922 and who was the model for John Buchan’s character, Greenmantle. Arthur took a particular interest in politics. Probably assisted by the innate Irish ‘gift of the gab’, he became an expert debater and, although it was very unusual for someone of his social background, in 1904 he was elected President of the Oxford Union, a post usually held by more prominent members of the social order. Arthur (seated centre) as President of the Oxford Union, 1904 (Courtesy of The Oxford University Union) He returned home to Ulster at Christmas 1902 and 1903, but soon after leaving university in 1904 he obtained the post of secretary to the Balkan Committee in London. Apart from his brief visit to Newry in September and October 1906 it is unlikely that he ever saw his parents again. His mother died in February 1917, while Arthur was serving in the Balkans, and his father passed away in August 1920 when Arthur was working in Persia (modern-day Iran). There is incidental evidence that, when he returned from India in 1952, he toured Ireland, and this would have been the only occasion on which he may have visited his parents’ grave in St Patrick’s churchyard. The Balkans The Balkan Committee had been formed by influential figures (such as Arthur Evans who had excavated the Minoan palace at Knossos on Crete) to publicise and defend the interest of the Christian population within the Ottoman (or Turkish) Empire. Arthur’s commitment as secretary was to herald a lifetime of dedication to the underdog – whether it be in the Balkans, Persia (modern-day Iran) or India – and of a readiness to badger, irritate, antagonise and alienate bureaucrats, officials, politicians, Government ministers and Viceroys, as well as his employers! Arthur first travelled to the Balkans in the summer of 1905, via the Orient Express, where he met King Peter of Serbia in Belgrade (although he embarrassed himself by asking the monarch for details of railway timetables). When he travelled to the rural areas, however, he discovered first-hand the grim, unrelieved poverty and violence which most peasants 3 William Arthur Moore (1880–1962) endured. In one village he noted: “I saw a babe of three of whose skull but a hollow fragment remained, and I cannot believe that the child was not clubbed”. At this stage he also made his first tentative, but unsuccessful, attempt to enter the mysterious Albania. He made a return visit to the Balkans in 1906, and then returned directly from Constantinople to Newry, where his father’s parishioners were regaled with tales of his travels. Participating in one of his father’s services in October, he mentioned that he had visited Philippi where St Paul had been imprisoned, probably drawing comparisons with the sufferings of contemporary Christians, and it cannot have been coincidence which caused him to choose, for the second Bible reading, 2 Corinthians VIII which begins with a reference to “the grace of God which has been shown to the churches of Macedonia … in a severe test of affliction”.

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