Murray, Albert Victor (1890-1967)

zoom

Primitive Methodist Magazine 1932

Early years

Victor was born in 1890 at Choppington, Northumberland, to parents John and Elizabeth. John was a grocer.

As a boy Victor attended Morpeth Grammar School, and from there won an exhibition to Magdalen College, Oxford. At Oxford, he read history and theology.

Academic life

For a time Victor was a travelling secretary of the Student Christian Movement. On leaving the S.C.M. he was appointed a lecturer in education at the Selly Oak Colleges. In 1927, a travelling scholarship gave him the opportunity to spend a year in Africa studying native education.  Some of the results of that year were recorded in his book – The School in the Bush. Victor was later conferred with the Oxford L.L.B for a thesis on ‘Abelard’. He achieved the rank of professor.

Contribution to the Connexion

Victor was Vice-President of Conference in 1932 and 1947.

Literature

Victor authored the following.

Abelard and St. Bernard: a study in twelfth century modernism.

The school in the bush: a critical study of the theory and practice of native education in Africa, 1929

The cause and the individual, 1933

Are missions up to date? 1934

Personal experience and the historic faith: an essay, 1939

The school and the church: the theory & practice of Christian education under the Butler Act, 1944

Security of church and state: being the Vice-Presidential address at the Methodist Conference, Newcastle, 1947

How to know your bible: a guide to biblical study, 1952

Education into religion, 1953

Truth and certainty, 1954

Teaching the Bible, especially in secondary schools, 1955

Natural religion and Christian theology: an introductory study, 1956

The state and the church in a free society, 1958

A Northumbian Methodist childhood: an autobiographical account of family, community and chapel life in Choppington and Berwick-upon-Tweed around the turn of the 19th century, published 1992

Family

Victor married Winifred Seares (1899-1985) in the summer of 1923 at Prestwich, Lancashire.

• Christine H (1926-1933)
• John S (b1931)
• Winifred Ruth (1935-1984) – married John M Carter in 1960
• David R V (b1939)

Victor died on 12 May 1967 at Skipton, Yorkshire.

References and further reading

Primitive Methodist Magazine 1917/311; 1932/505

Milburn, G.E., Albert Victor Murray 1890-1967: an outline chronology, 1991

Census Returns and Births, Marriages & Deaths Registers