.
William Chester Minor was born in Sri Lanka, to a Church monasteries family from New England in 1880. Scared that his attractive caucasian looks would be a matter of distraction and he may fall into bad company, his father decided to send him to the US for studies. He was a brilliant student and soon founf himself in the hallowed School of Medicine at Yale. He completed his medical training at 20, and was posted in Union Army as a surgeon at the Battle of Wilderness in May 1984. The war was known for massive casualties, and solders were deserting the army. Minor was given the task of branding deserter by using a heated iron rod with D written on it, on the face of the soldier. This was a turning point of Minor's life.
He began hallucinating these soldiers who were mostly Irish would be hidden in his room and show up themselves late at night and force him to indulge in abnormal sexual activities. He even would hallucinate them coming from beneath the floor, and assaulting him sexually.
After the end of the Civil war, he went to New York. Probably due to the dementia and hallucination combined, he became promiscuous. He would regularly visit red light areas and his demeanour as well as behaviour became abnormal. When this came to the notice of his superior, he was transferred to a fairly insignificant position in Florida Panhandle. But his psychoatric condition gradually declines with hallucinations, compulsive obsessive disorders, etc raising their ugly heads and he was sent to a mental asylum in Washington DC. But a year and half treatment did show no improvement.
In 1871, he moved to the UK, settling down in a small town and a slum area in Lambeth. He was reticent, dissolute and lived a nondescrpt life. He almost everyday visited sex workers every day. But the paranoia od Irish people coming after him was really severe. Early on the 17th February 1872 after returning home late at night he woke up believing that someone was trying to get into his room. He chased after the intruder and shot at a man in the street. George Merritt, a 34 year old stoker at the Lion Brewery, was working an early shift starting at 2am and was walking down Belvedere Road when Minor fired four shots two of which entered his neck. Merritt was declared dead on arrival at St Thomas' hospital.
He was caught and sent to Horsemonger Lane jail but was found not guilty because of his insanity. He was incarcerated and sent to Broadmoor Asylum, in Cawthorne, Berkshire. As he was branded not dangerous to public and was a qualified doctor himself, he was provided with comfortable living in the asylum. His pension from the Army helped him to indulge in his favorite hobby - buying books and reading them. He also was remorseful for killing George Merret and apologozed profusely to his wife E;iza and parted with a substantial part of his earnings to support the bereaved family. A ty[ical example of Jekyll and Hyde!!! Eliza forgave him and used to visit him once a while with books.
Minor saw his calling in this. He applied.
James Murray was a genius in his own right. Thomas Murray. A precocious child with a voracious appetite for learning, he left school at the age of fourteen because his parents were not able to afford to send him to local fee-paying schools. At the age of seventeen he became a teacher at Hawick Grammar School and three years later was headmaster of the Subscription Academy there. In 1856 he was one of the founders of the Hawick Archaeological Society.[1]
Murray �spent a great deal of his youth seeking information on everything and anything he could get his hands on. By his early teens, he learned several languages, including Greek, French, Latin, Hebrew, Russian and Italian. He also took a great interest in archeology, geology, philology, politics, astronomy, botany, religion, history and geology. He amassed a remarkable amount of information in a relatively short period of time. Most of what he learned was self-taught.
Ada Murray
Murray was impressed with Minors accuracy, speed, efficiency and dedication to the job. In fact, according to a BBC article, Broadmoors Word-Finder, Murray considered Minors contribution to be so significant that he could easily have illustrated the last four centuries [of words] from his quotations alone. Consequently, many were surprised when Minor failed to show up at theOxford Murray knew the reason why Minor was unable to come to the event.
Furnivall then became editor; he was enthusiastic and knowledgeable, yet temperamentally ill-suited for the work.[13]:110 Many volunteer readers eventually lost interest in the project as Furnivall failed to keep them motivated. Furthermore, many of the slips had been misplaced.On 12 May 1860, Coleridge's dictionary plan was published, and research started. His house was the first editorial office. He arrayed 100,000 quotation slips in a 54-pigeon-hole grid.[16]:9 In April 1861, the group published the first sample pages; later that month, Coleridge died of tuberculosis, aged 30.
Murray �later described Minor in a letter to a friend as rational, cultured, intellectual, artistic and of high moral character. He was particularly impressed with the degree of remorse he felt for his crime and that he developed a friendship with the widow of his victim, whom he financially supported. Murray thoroughly enjoyed his visit and vowed to return.
Murray pitied his friend and tried on occasion to arrange his transfer to America, where he could be cared for by his brother. He believed that being locked away without any family contact was unfair and unjust treatment. In 1902, 68-year-old Minor was Broadmoors longest staying resident, having been confined there for 30 years. Murray doubted he would pose any harm to anyone or himself. Or would he?
William Chester Minor was born in Sri Lanka, to a Church monasteries family from New England in 1880. Scared that his attractive caucasian looks would be a matter of distraction and he may fall into bad company, his father decided to send him to the US for studies. He was a brilliant student and soon founf himself in the hallowed School of Medicine at Yale. He completed his medical training at 20, and was posted in Union Army as a surgeon at the Battle of Wilderness in May 1984. The war was known for massive casualties, and solders were deserting the army. Minor was given the task of branding deserter by using a heated iron rod with D written on it, on the face of the soldier. This was a turning point of Minor's life.
He began hallucinating these soldiers who were mostly Irish would be hidden in his room and show up themselves late at night and force him to indulge in abnormal sexual activities. He even would hallucinate them coming from beneath the floor, and assaulting him sexually.
After the end of the Civil war, he went to New York. Probably due to the dementia and hallucination combined, he became promiscuous. He would regularly visit red light areas and his demeanour as well as behaviour became abnormal. When this came to the notice of his superior, he was transferred to a fairly insignificant position in Florida Panhandle. But his psychoatric condition gradually declines with hallucinations, compulsive obsessive disorders, etc raising their ugly heads and he was sent to a mental asylum in Washington DC. But a year and half treatment did show no improvement.
In 1871, he moved to the UK, settling down in a small town and a slum area in Lambeth. He was reticent, dissolute and lived a nondescrpt life. He almost everyday visited sex workers every day. But the paranoia od Irish people coming after him was really severe. Early on the 17th February 1872 after returning home late at night he woke up believing that someone was trying to get into his room. He chased after the intruder and shot at a man in the street. George Merritt, a 34 year old stoker at the Lion Brewery, was working an early shift starting at 2am and was walking down Belvedere Road when Minor fired four shots two of which entered his neck. Merritt was declared dead on arrival at St Thomas' hospital.
He was caught and sent to Horsemonger Lane jail but was found not guilty because of his insanity. He was incarcerated and sent to Broadmoor Asylum, in Cawthorne, Berkshire. As he was branded not dangerous to public and was a qualified doctor himself, he was provided with comfortable living in the asylum. His pension from the Army helped him to indulge in his favorite hobby - buying books and reading them. He also was remorseful for killing George Merret and apologozed profusely to his wife E;iza and parted with a substantial part of his earnings to support the bereaved family. A ty[ical example of Jekyll and Hyde!!! Eliza forgave him and used to visit him once a while with books.
Merritt's wife Eliza was left with seven children ranging from 18 years to 12 months to bring up with another on the way. Times were very hard for her and her children but wealthy Minor helped out financially and Eliza even asked to visit Minor in Broadmoor. This highly unusual request was granted and following an experimental visit she started visiting him monthly and even undertook to collect books from various London bookshops for him.
These visits did not last very long as Eliza took to drink but seemed to have greatly helped Minor as it gave him a new occupation. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) editor Dr James Murray had an eight page flyer (a letter) inserted into several new books appealing for new readers to find words and quotations for the dictionary. One of these flyers found its way to Dr Minor in Broadmoor, perhaps in one of the books that Eliza brought him. He began reading and collecting books and turned one of his rooms into his library. This he put to good use, as he became a principal contributor of sixteenth and seventeenth century quotations to the first edition of the OED for over thirty years. Minor always signed his letters in the same way: Dr W.C. Minor, Broadmoor, Crowthorne, Berkshire and initially the OED editor, Dr James Murray, was unaware that Minor was insane but after many years he started regular visits to Minor in Broadmoor.
Minor saw his calling in this. He applied.
James Murray was a genius in his own right. Thomas Murray. A precocious child with a voracious appetite for learning, he left school at the age of fourteen because his parents were not able to afford to send him to local fee-paying schools. At the age of seventeen he became a teacher at Hawick Grammar School and three years later was headmaster of the Subscription Academy there. In 1856 he was one of the founders of the Hawick Archaeological Society.[1]
In 1861, Murray met a music teacher, Maggie Scott, whom he married the following year. Two years later, they had a daughter Anna, who shortly after died of tuberculosis. Maggie, too, fell ill with tuberculosis, and on the advice of doctors, the couple moved toLondon to escape the Scottish winters. Once there, Murray took an administrative job with the Chartered Bank of India, while continuing in his spare time to pursue his many and varied academic interests. Maggie died within a year of arrival in London. A year later Murray was engaged to Ada Agnes Ruthven, and the following year married her.
By this time Murray was primarily interested in languages and etymology. Some idea of the depth and range of his linguistic erudition may be gained from a letter of application he wrote to Thomas Watts, Keeper of Printed Books at the British Museum, in which he claimed an ‘intimate acquaintance’ with Italian,French, Catalan, Spanish and Latin, and 'to a lesser degree' Portuguese, Vaudois, Provençal & various dialects’. In addition, he was ‘tolerably familiar’ with Dutch, German andDanish. His studies of Anglo-Saxon and Mœso-Gothic had been ‘much closer’, he knew ‘a little of the Celtic’ and was at the time ‘engaged with the Slavonic, having obtained a useful knowledge of the Russian’. He had ‘sufficient knowledge of Hebrew & Syriac to read at sight the Old Testament and Peshito’ and to a lesser degree he knew Aramaic,Arabic, Coptic and Phoenician. However, he did not get the job.
By 1869, Murray was on the Council of the Philological Society, and by 1873 had given up his job at the bank and returned to teaching at Mill Hill School in London. He then published The Dialect of the Southern Counties of Scotland, which served to enhance his reputation in philological circles.
On 1 March 1879, a formal agreement was put in place to the effect that Murray was to edit a new English Dictionary. It was expected to take ten years to complete and be some 7,000 pages long, in four volumes. In fact, when the final results were published in 1928, it ran to twelve volumes, with 414,825 words defined and 1,827,306 citations employed to illustrate their meanings.
James Augustus Henry Murray was born in 1837 in Denholm , Scotland Murray
At the age of 17, Murray �became the assistant headmaster at the Hawick United School Reading , its Pleasures and Advantages. � He also lectured on language, phonetics and archeology.
In 1861, Murray �met and married a schoolteacher named Maggie Scott. Two years later, they had Anna, their first and only child. Not long after the birth, the young family was destroyed by a series of tragic events: Anna died in infancy and Maggie developed tuberculosis. The couple moved from Scotland to London where Murray secured a job as a bank clerk. They hoped that the change of environment would improve Maggies health, but it did not. Her condition steadily worsened and she died in 1864.
Following Maggies death Murray �continued his pursuit of knowledge. It was his way of escaping the pain of losing his family. He began to research various dialects and languages, concentrating on those unique to the British Isles . Murray was so interested in languages that by the time he was in his late twenties, he had mastered approximately two-dozen languages and was in the process of learning more. Yet, his activities were temporarily interrupted when he was introduced to Ada Ruthven.
By the time Murray �was in his 30s, he began to take more of an interest in philology and during the late 1860s, he joined the Philological Society of London. He began teaching at the Mill Hill School
1861, Furnivall managed the dictionary project, yet it was not a position for which he was well suited. Winchester Murray
However, the delegates of the Oxford University Press were hesitant to accept him. They were concerned that Murray �didnt have the skills to manage the project. Moreover, Murray and the Oxford Delegates squabbled over editorial guidelines and the details of his contract. Although it took several years, Murray was finally granted the position of editor in 1879.
For years, Murray and his staff worked diligently on the dictionary, sorting and categorizing as many as 1,000 quotation slips a day. It took approximately nine years to complete the first volume ending with the letter B, which was published in 1888. In recognition for his work, he earned an honorary doctorate from Durham �University
In October 1897, Oxford University Delegates held a grand dinner party to honor Murray �for 18 years of hard work. His contribution was by any standard a remarkable achievement. Many of those involved in producing the dictionary were present at the dinner, except for one key person.
Over the years, Murray �corresponded with one of the projects most prolific contributors, Dr. William Chester Minor. On occasion, Murray would ask Minor for help concerning various words, for which he had difficulty finding appropriate quotes. Time and time again, Minor delivered, often providing more information than expected.
In preparation for the work ahead, Murray built a corrugated-iron shed in the grounds of Mill Hill School, called the Scriptorium, to house his small team of assistants as well as the flood of slips (bearing quotations illustrating the use of words to be defined in the dictionary) which started to flow in as a result of his appeal. As work continued on the early part of the dictionary, Murray gave up his job as a teacher and became a full-time lexicographer.
Richard Chenevix Trench (1807-1886) played the key role in the project's first months, but his Church of England appointment as Dean of Westminster meant that he could not give the dictionary project the time it required; he withdrew, and Herbert Coleridge became the first editor.[16]:8–9
Furnivall then became editor; he was enthusiastic and knowledgeable, yet temperamentally ill-suited for the work.[13]:110 Many volunteer readers eventually lost interest in the project as Furnivall failed to keep them motivated. Furthermore, many of the slips had been misplaced.On 12 May 1860, Coleridge's dictionary plan was published, and research started. His house was the first editorial office. He arrayed 100,000 quotation slips in a 54-pigeon-hole grid.[16]:9 In April 1861, the group published the first sample pages; later that month, Coleridge died of tuberculosis, aged 30.
Furnivall believed that since many printed texts from earlier centuries were not readily available, it would be impossible for volunteers to efficiently locate the quotations that the dictionary needed. As a result, Furnivall founded the Early English Text Society in 1864 and the Chaucer Society in 1868 to publish old manuscripts.[15]:xii Furnivall's preparatory efforts, which lasted 21 years, provided numerous texts for the use and enjoyment of the general public as well as crucial sources for lexicographers, but did not actually involve compiling a dictionary. Furnivall recruited over 800 volunteers to read these texts and record quotations. While enthusiastic, the volunteers were not well trained and often made inconsistent and arbitrary selections. Ultimately, Furnivall would hand over nearly two tons of quotation slips and other materials to his successor.[17]
In the 1870s, Furnivall unsuccessfully attempted to recruit both Henry Sweet and Henry Nicol to succeed him. He then approached James Murray, who accepted the post of editor. In the late 1870s, Furnivall and Murray met with several publishers about publishing the dictionary. In 1878, Oxford University Press agreed with Murray to proceed with the massive project; the agreement was formalized the following year.[13]:111–2 The dictionary project finally had a publisher 20 years after the idea was conceived. It would be another 50 years before the entire dictionary was complete.
Late in his editorship Murray learned that one prolific reader, W. C. Minor, Minor, a Yale University-trained surgeon and military officer in the American Civil War, was confined to Broadmoor Asylum for the Criminally Insane after killing a man in London. Minor invented his own quotation-tracking system, allowing him to submit slips on specific words in response to editors' requests. The story of Murray and Minor later served as the central focus of The Surgeon of Crowthorne (US title: The Professor and the Madman]), a popular book about the creation of the OED.
For some time, Murray �knew that Minor was in some way associated with the Broadmoor asylum, because his letters were addressed, W. C. Minor, Broadmoor. Crowthorne, Berkshire . However, according to Winchester s article, The First Meeting between James Murray and William Chester Minor: Some New Evidence, � it was assumed that Minor was a medical officer or possibly the director of the institute. Thus, one could imagine Murray s surprise when in 1889 he learned from visiting Harvard College Murray also learned the reason why he was detained in the mental institution and was greatly affected by the story. Murray held Minor and his work in great esteem, despite Minors past transgressions, so in 1891 he decided to pay him a visit at the asylum.
That January, Murray �boarded a train to Crowthorne where he met the director of the asylum. The men traveled to Broadmoor where Murray met Minor. They became acquainted over a pleasant lunch. Murray spent the better part of the day with Minor, mostly in his cell and found him to be a delightful person.
Over the years, Murray �often visited Minor at Broadmoor. The two men found they had a great deal in common and were intellectual equals. Interestingly, they even looked similar -- both men wore a long white beard and moustache, had a gentle disposition and shimmering kind eyes. The two developed a friendship that would last many years.
Eventually, however, Murray �began to notice Minors mental decline. It became increasingly apparent that his friend was losing grip of reality. Minors delusional state intensified over time, as did his paranoia and anxiety. Minor recounted with horror his nightly delusions, where men would come from beneath the floor and from the rafters, taking him sometimes in an airplane to far off destinations and using him sexually before returning him back to his cell.
Near the turn of the century there were organizational changes made at Broadmoor, which led to the hiring of a new and stricter director. Dr. Bryan was disliked by most of the inmates because of his callous and brusque character. Minor also disliked him because he was less personable than the previous director, whom he liked immensely.
Not long after the new director took control of the facility, Minor slipped�into a deep depression. He ate irregularly and showed little interest in having visitors, something he used to enjoy. Minor was so unhappy that he refused even to work on the one thing that brought him the most pleasure -- the dictionary.
In December 1902, Minors depression turned into violent aggression. His hostility was not directed at anyone at the institution, but at himself. In a fit of desperation and anger, he mutilated himself in the most gruesome way. Minor took a penknife and amputated his penis.
No one knew why he resorted to such extreme measures. Some speculated that self-hate or guilt for having lustful thoughts motivated him to harm himself. However, only Minor knew why and he kept his reasons to himself.
After a month in the infirmary, Minor made a partial recovery and retained some functional use of his organ. Yet, other aspects of his physicality began to worsen. He grew exceedingly weak from various flu-like illnesses that plagued him. He also�� started to lose his vision. It was during this time that Dr. Bryan considered moving him to another facility closer to his family, where he could live out the rest of his days.
With the help of Murray , Minor was secured passage back to America �in 1910. Minors brother Alfred sailed to London to escort him to the United States where he was to be interned at St. Elizabeths Asylum in Washington , D.C.
Minor realized when he departed on the boat to America �that he would probably never see his closest friend Murray again. Although it saddened the two men greatly, they both knew that Minor was better off in America near his family. After Minors departure, Murray returned back to his editing position at Oxford where he began work on the letter T. It was the last letter he would ever work on.
By 1902 Minor's mental health had deteriorated and he cut off his penis in an act of self-mutilation, which he thought would stop his lascivious thoughts. In 1910 following strong representations from Dr Murray, the US Consulate and others, the then Home Secretary, Winston Churchill, signed the necessary papers to allow Minor to return to the mental hospital in the USA.
On July 26, 1915 , Murray �died of heart failure as a result of pleurisy. Following his death,Murray was recognized as one of the centurys best wordsmiths. A friend and colleague named Burchfield described him as the founder of the art of historical lexicography. He had worked a total of 35 years on the dictionary, often putting in 14-hour days. Unfortunately, he didnt live long enough to see its completion. According to the OED, the work to which he had devoted his life represented an achievement unprecedented in the history of publishing anywhere in the world.���
Minor may have been one of the last of Murray s friends to learn of his death. He was thousands of miles from London , both physically and mentally. His delusions worsened, as did his health. In 1918, Minor was diagnosed dementia praecox, which is now called paranoid schizophrenia.
One year after he had been formally diagnosed, Minor was transferred from the hospital to an asylum for the elderly in Hartford , Connecticut March 26, 1920 , Minor, 85, succumbed to the illness and was buried in relative obscurity in New Haven sEvergreen �Cemetery
Minor, like Murray �never saw the completion of the dictionary. It was another eight years before the first full edition was published. Upon its completion, the dictionary consisted of ten volumes, which contained more than 400,000 words and phrases. It is considered to be one of the most remarkable literary masterpieces of the century and the ultimate authority on the English language.
He died of complications arising from pneumonia on the 26th March 1920 in an old peoples home in New Haven, Connecticut, having been discharged from hospital shortly and is buried at Evergreen Cemetery New Haven. The last psychiatric diagnosis on Minor was that he suffering from dementia praecox or schizophrenia.
No comments:
Post a Comment