Notes for James Michael MORRISSEY

Notes for James Michael MORRISSEY Doug & Nancy Russell's Homepage

Notes for James Michael MORRISSEY

Burial location: Wesley I 881.[O'Brien.FTW]
His birth was registered under the name "Michael James Morrissy". Died of T.B. He had dar k red hair. After the death of both his parents, James went initially to live in the househo ld of his mother's sister, Georgina Carroll until about 1874. He was treated very cruelly b y her husband. He finally ran away and went to live with his other aunt, Rosina Poppins wh o already was looking after his younger sister. This aunt and uncle died when James was ninet een, and he and his sister assumed the care of their four children. James eventually left th e Catholic church, and became a committed Methodist.
THE SPIRITUAL PILGRIMAGE OF JAMES MORRISSEY (1858-1910)
by HIS ELDEST DAUGHTER
FOREWORD
This short memoir has been written in response to the requests of several relatives who wishe d to know more of the spiritual background of one whose radiant goodness has left an impressi on that is deep and lasting.
As I think of him, the words of Brother Lawrence come back to my mind: "The time of busines s does not differ with me from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen , while several persons are at the same time calling for things, I possess God in a great tra nquillity as if I were on my knees at the Blessed Sacrament." That was also Father's experie nce - he found God always near and relevant.
He had a Christlike compassion and almost a genius for loving people, and the lives he touche d were made happier and better by that contact. His was the true goodness that had grace an d charm and was quite unselfconscious. It is little wonder that even now, more than forty ye ars after his death, letters still come from old friends telling of his active influence upo n their lives.
George Bury Poppins, a cousin who was closely connected with Father nearly all his life, wrot e for us what he remember of his early life. This moving story of Father's childhood, yout h and early manhood has been included in this narrative.
Various questions have been asked about Father's spiritual pilgrimage. Why did he leave th e Catholic Church? What led him to join the Methodist communion? Did he ever regret havin g taken this step? Was he ever attracted to the Society of Friends whose outlook so closel y resembled his own? These questions and others have been in my mind as I have sought to tel l something of his pilgrimage.
EARLY YEARS
(As told in a letter to the Morrissey children by George Bury Poppins)
I would not overstate or understate in the smallest detail what I know of him whose memory i s so dear to me, yet, in writing of one whom it is my delight to honour, I may unconsciousl y overstate some circumstance. This however I shall try to avoid, and whenever I feel a doub t about any matter, I shall be silent. If some happenings in your father's early life shoul d give you pain, I do not wish to spare you, but would rather be a partner in your love and a ffection for the most perfect character it has been my privilege to know. To dwell on his li fe helps one to be incapable of littleness, and draws one closer to the Christ he served so f aithfully in all his relationships.
When your grandfather Michael Morrissey died, your father was about five years old and your A unt Jane about three. Your grandfather was a very devout Catholic, and I have never forgotte n Uncle Carroll's criticism of him. When your father left the Church, Uncle Carroll came t o remonstrate with him, and found him ready and able to give reasons for the step he had take n. In a fit of anger Uncle Carroll said, "You are just like your father! He always went t o extremes in matters of religion, and if he ever made up his mind that a certain course wa s right, nothing could move him!"
Your grandmother died four years after her husband, when your father was only nine years old . Lately I went to see Mrs. Smithett who knew your grandmother and I encouraged her to tal k of your father and his mother. I wish that you could have heard the old lady talk of the l ove and care he showed his mother; he seemed to anticipate her every wish. "He was such a ma nly little fellow," said Mrs. Smithett, "eager to grow up and work for her. Mrs. Morrissey w as a superior woman but very sorrowful. In spite of failing health she did her best to maint ain her little family. During her illness most of the work of waiting on her fell to littl e Jim, and with loving devotion he did his best. He told me once about his trouble with th e washing. He boiled up the flannel and cotton clothes together and they went to jelly! Hi s mother's death was the first great sorrow of his life. She killed herself working for he r children, and little Jim's heart seemed broken."
When your grandmother died, Jim's sister Jane, then a little girl of seven, went to live wit h my parents. (My mother was your grandmother's sister.) But little Jim was taken into th e home of Georgina, another of his mother's sisters. Her husband, Robert Carroll, was a litt le-minded bully who did not welcome the poor orphan boy and flogged him on every possible occ asion. The poor child was sent to sell papers morning and evening, and was the slave of thi s tyrant and bully for the rest of the day. He had very little schooling. I think he told m e he had never been more than two years altogether at school. Your father told me of those u nhappy days, how he felt the cold in the early winter evenings, how he suffered with chilblai ns, being ill-clothed and half-starved, not recognised as one of the family. He told me ho w small his allowance of food was, how all the degrading duties of the house fell to him. A s soon as possible he was sent to work. He did not wish to be a burden to Uncle Carroll; ev en in those days he was very independent and hated to take any favours. I could tell much mo re of Carroll's cruelty, but your father would be displeased if I did.
Strange as it may seem, but during those unhappy years in the Carrolls' house, God was leadin g your father to Himself. A long chapter could be written of how he sought to serve God by p rayers, penances and fastings. His earnestness was noticed by the priest who said, "My boy , there is no need for you to confess so often. Come once a month, not weekly."
His nephew's keen desire to find salvation seemed to annoy Uncle Carroll. "You pray too muc h - you must stop!" he ordered. At confession your father asked the priest if it were possib le to pray too much. "Does your guardian think that you pray too much?" enquired the priest.
"Yes," your father answered.
"My boy," said the priest, "we ought to obey God rather than man", which advice he followed.
His self-imposed penances included walking on a newly metalled road with bare feet. On fas t days one meal only is taken by Catholics in holy life, and devout Catholics often keep a li st of such days. Your father knew an old lady who had such a list and at lunch time he woul d often run to see if it were a fast day. If so he would give his lunch to a blind man who b egged near the Church of St. Francis, and he himself would fast till evening.
But for all his earnest devotion to his church duties, Jim was a very manly little fellow. A t this time, his one diversion was a fight, and often when sent on an errand - he had no tim e for play - he would be delighted with any boy who would let him batter his face, granting h im the same privilege.
In those days Jim's only friend was the blind man who used to beg outside the Church of St. F rancis, and he seemed to make this poor man the centre of his charity. Having nothing to giv e, he became eyes to the blind man, and often shared his meagre meals with him.
Because of Carroll's cruel treatment, Jim ran away twice and took refuge in our home. On th e second occasion, when he told Dad of Carroll's merciless floggings, my father was so distre ssed that he would not let Jim return to his guardian. Of course Uncle Carroll came to deman d his return, for Jim, now fifteen years old, had become useful to him. My father met Carrol l at the door, and how well I remember the glorious cursing and swearing launched at Carroll , who just got outside the door before my father's boot, worse luck!
(George's father, John Poppins, was a warm-hearted Irishman, the son of an Anglican clergyman . As a young man he was incensed with his father because of his co-operation with the landlo rd and the bailiff in oppressing the poor Irish tenants in his parish. After denouncing hi s father as an exploiter of the poor, John left home for good and migrated first to America a nd then to Australia.)
I was nine when Jim came to live with us and I still remember how my mother used to watch hi m at meal-times. I saw her once turn away and overheard her say, "The poor, poor boy has bee n starved!" I think that Dad got his satisfaction from an extra curse at Carroll.
Jim had become a great reader, and my father, who had good literary taste, encouraged him an d advised him in his choice of books. There was a lending library nearby where he could ge t books by his favourite authors - Dickens, Thackeray, Hugo, and others. I remember my fathe r discussing the books with Jim, also giving him some language instruction, for my father wa s a man of some education, as was Jim's own father. Jim used to tell me stories from the book s that he was reading at this time. I remember particularly the story of Jean Valjean and th e Bishop's silver candlesticks.
If ever anyone entertained an angel unawares, it was my people when they took Jim into thei r home. What a blessing he proved to us later, this little narrative will show.
About that time a devout Catholic woman who lived nearby was dying. Your Aunt Jane, then a g irl in her early teens, used to do little services for the sick woman, who took a great likin g to the child and made over to her a little money and a few of her possessions. Among thes e was a copy of the Douay Bible. Your father began to read this Bible, and the more he rea d the more deeply interested he became. But as he read it was borne in upon him that the Chu rch had got far away from the simplicity of the teaching of Jesus. He seems to have fought t his battle alone, step by step. How long the struggle went on I do not know, but I am sure t hat at the time of my mother's death, Jim was still a Catholic at heart.
Shortly after Jim came to live with us my father's health began to fail, and Jim gave freel y whatever help he could, though he was still only in his teens. When Jim was eighteen my fa ther died and nobly did Jim step into the breach to help my mother. He was working in King S treet, West Melbourne, and after a hard day's work, walking both ways from and back to Collin gwood, he would go after the evening meal to Hoddle Street to do overtime. It was about thi s time that he began to do some work for Mr. Heinzle, who became a true friend to him.
Twenty months after my father's death my mother died also. When she was dying, Aunt Carrol l asked, "What are your wishes in regard to the children?"
"I am not worrying about the children," said my mother, "Jim is here." And she died in peace .
All Jim's friends, with one exception, advised him to place us in an orphanage, which seeme d the wisest course. Mr. Heinzle alone advised him to keep us, and Jim agreed that this wa s the right thing to do. But look at what it meant to a lad of only nineteen! I believe i t was gratitude to my parents for their care of his sister and their love to himself that ins pired him to undertake this heavy burden of responsibility. Your aunt was only about sevente en, I was thirteen, Jack was only three, and Bob and Bill came in between.
I am as sure as I am of my own existence that your father worked himself to the verge of th e grave for us all. He worked day and night. After working all day at Mr. Heinzle's, at nig ht six chairs would be brought home, polished, and carried back in the morning. At the prese nt time [about 1930] no grown man would undertake in a day what Jim did at night. And this w ent on day after day. Your aunt could tell of the struggle of those days. No wonder his hea lth gave way. I am convinced that your father would never have survived the struggle to mak e a living for us all but for a divine miracle. He worked day and night till the dread compl aint laid hold of him, and still he kept on working. I know what happened for by this tim e I was working with him. I slept in his room and knew of the night-sweats and other distres sing symptoms. He had no money to pay for medical treatment - we were dependent on his earni ngs. What could he do? In his desperate plight he prayed for healing, believing that healt h was God's will for him. And he was healed there and then. Thirty years later, when he wa s a man of fifty, doctors found the scars of that early trouble.
I will now return to his spiritual pilgrimage. Your father became more and more interested i n studying the Bible given to your aunt, and what he read there made him begin to doubt the d octrines of the Church. To have such doubts about the authority of the Church was to be damn ed, yet here was evidence that the Church of his fathers had strayed from the truth. Where c ould he find light? Certainly not in Protestantism, which was disunited and split into sects . His mind was in a grievous state of confusion and distress, and he would never have foun d light but for a direct revelation. By waiting on God in prayer and by doing his duty to hi s church as far as he was able, he was gradually coming to the point where God could speak t o his soul. One morning at Mass, he realised the presence of God in a very remarkable wa y - he felt his heart glow and the peace that passes all understanding filled his soul. He c ould not understand it, for he had never known anyone to have this experience before. He ha d certainly heard of the ecstasy of this saint or that, and to use his own words, the devil c ame and told him that he must be a saint, but he put the presumptuous thought away from him . This wonderful sense of the presence of God still remained with him.
You must bear in mind that I was nearly six years his junior, so I do not know much about hi s leaving the Church. But I do remember Uncle Carroll visiting us to remonstrate with him, a nd I remember his last parting shot: "There was always a bad drop in you!" - a reference ou r great-grandmother O'Brien who was a Quakeress! I do know however, that in the great spirit ual struggle which led to your father leaving the Church, he received no human help - he ha d to find his way alone. On one occasion he was induced to visit Mr. Stranger, a mature Chri stian and a man of deep spiritual insight, but your father told me that this visit only adde d to his confusion of mind. God Himself had started the work, and it seemed that He must fin ish it.
I really believe that this period when he entered into light was the most joyous time of you r father's life. I often think still how the cellar we worked in was filled with his hymns o f joy as he worked - his voice is still in my ears. His face was often like the face of an a ngel as he sang. I would not lose the memory of those days in Heinzle's cellar for anything . His favourite hymns were "Jesus, the very thought of Thee", "When Peace like a River", "Je sus Keep me near the Cross", "Beneath the Cross of Jesus I fain would take my Stand", and "M y Jesus I love Thee".
I remember the time when your father's liberality first became known to me. I don't think th at he had any rich friends, but I know that he had a great many poor ones, and I could name m any whose lives were brightened and whose needs were supplied by him. His desire was alway s to give what cost him something and to hide his giving. I often think how his poor friend s looked for him at Christmas. One year he made me the dispenser of his charity, and it wa s an eye-opener to me to find how many hearts were gladdened by his gifts. How he found thes e poor and needy ones was a wonder to me.
As I think of him I realise that he still lives and moulds our lives. I think of his forgivi ng spirit as shown in his goodness to Aunt Carroll. She was probably not cruel to him but sh e did not seem to have tried to make his unhappy lot any easier. Your father's countless kin dnesses to her and to her worthless sons showed what manner of man he was. As for me, I alwa ys held her and hers in contempt, and I am afraid that I showed it!
A little incident that came to my notice a few days ago will show your father's thoughtful co nsideration for others. Mr. Duncan, who was at Kornblum's Warehouse when your father starte d business at Fairfield, told me how he had shielded a young man from getting into serious tr ouble. Frank had cut off one and a half yards too much of a valuable silk, not the first tim e he had made such a mistake. Your father brought back the silk, but found Mr. Kornblum hims elf at the counter. "Frank," said your father, "I'll leave this parcel here and call back fo r it ." He came back later and the mistake was rectified. Frank spoke of this little episod e only last week, twenty-five years afterwards, and commented, "You know, Mr. Morrissey was t he finest man in the furniture trade."
Looking back, I remember that when we sent suites to Wise's and other auction rooms in thos e early days, they were sold at once. This became so marked that the salesmen were accused o f "pushing" our furniture. One day an old fellow who could not get any of his work sold said , "It's easy to see whose side's the Lord's on!" Judging by appearances, I am old-fashione d enough to think so too. I always felt that God could trust your father with success.
You have asked me to tell you what I can of your father's early years and I have done my ver y best. Your aunt, however, who was nearer his age and was more in his confidence, would b e able to tell you more. If what I have told your has given you pain, forgive me. The writi ng of these memories has been a painful task, yet a joyful one, because of my deep regard an d affection for your father.
(Reading Cousin George's account of Father's childhood and youth, one is impressed by the unu sual spiritual maturity of one so young. It calls to mind what the historian Trevelyan say s about the living faith of the Quaker children in his "England under the Stuarts". Trevelya n points out that 'the times encouraged the growth of religion. The period of childhood wa s normally absent by adolescence. There is nothing priggish about the gravity of these Quake r children. There is an early morning freshness, a simple directness in their faith and cond uct, perhaps due in part to the grim discipline of persecution." There would seem to be a pa rallel between the childhood of Father and of these children, for he also went through the di scipline of great suffering. O.E.M.)
LIFE AT OXFORD STREET (section only).
When Father at the age of nineteen made himself responsible for the support of four orphane d young cousins, his sister Jane did her part bravely and cheerfully by undertaking the manag ement of their little home, a big task for a girl of seventeen. Many years later she wrot e of those days in Oxford Street: "No one will ever know how very poor we were nor how very h appy. God was very near and we learnt so much of His love and power that we could never doub t Him no matter what happened to us. I love to think of those days still. God only knows ho w much I loved your Father and how happy we were together."
There was an unusually strong bond of love and sympathy between them, which was certainly str engthened by the sorrows of their early childhood. As George has already told us, their fath er died when Jim was five and Jane only three years of age, and their mother died four year s later, worn out with grief and the desperate struggle to support her two children. Life sh ould not have been such a struggle for the young widow. Her husband had made some provisio n for his little family, but his inexperienced young wife lost her capital by following the a dvice of an unscrupulous adviser. (I feel sure that it was the knowledge of his mother's fin ancial loss that caused Father to make his own will in such a way that his wife and daughter s would not have the handling of the capital.)
Though Jane was only seven years old when her mother died, she never forgot how at nights he r mother, from utter weariness after her long day's work, would fall asleep while undressing . At last their dying mother could go on no longer, and had to bread the news to her two fri ghtened children that she was leaving them for a while to go into hospital, and that their au nts, her two sisters, would look after them. Little Jane was to go to Aunt Rosina's and Ji m to Aunt Carroll's. Jim cried, "Oh, I couldn't go to Uncle Robert's!" The broken-hearted m other, who knew what type of man Robert Carroll was, did her best to comfort her little son . She knew, alas, that she was dangerously ill, and thought that in the long run it would b e in Jim's interests to accept the Carroll's offer, for Robert Carroll owned a good saddler y business.
Aunt Rosina and her kind-hearted husband, John Poppins, took little Jane to their hearts an d home. She was a very lovable little girl and was a general favourite. For the next six ye ars Jane saw very little of her brother Jim, but she knew of Robert Carroll's brutal treatmen t of him and her heart was very sore. Even in later years she found it very hard to meet Aun t Carroll, who she thought should have done more to protect her orphaned nephew from her husb and's cruelty.
But when Jane was thirteen years old, to her joy her brother also became one of the Poppins h ousehold, and so brother and sister were reunited. It was four years later that they took ov er full responsibility for their newly-orphaned cousins. The task of making ends meet was t o difficult that, for a time, in addition to housekeeping for their family of six, Jane, wh o had been taught tailoring, gallantly took in outside work. But her brother, who saw that t he physical strain was too great, insisted on her giving it up.
Even at that age Jane was a wonderful home-maker. With her sunny nature, her lively Irish wi t and her love of people, she did much to make that little home a very happy one. I have hea rd my mother's brothers tell how as small children they delighted to go visiting at the Morri sseys' home. Jane gave them such a gracious welcome and there was such an atmosphere of fu n and happiness. And there was music, for several of their friends were good singers and the re was a small harmonium to accompany their voices. Our little home blessed everyone who ent ered its doors, though behind the scenes was always the struggle to balance the budget.
Jane never lost her gaiety and her zest for life. When we were children, visits to Auntie, a s we called her, were red-letter days. She gave us such a warm welcome and thought out suc h delightful ways of keeping us amused and entertained. And her tales were told with such an imation and humour! Almost the last time I saw her, when she was bound hand and foot with ar thritis, she said to us with the same merry twinkle in her brown eyes and the same lovely lit tle chuckle, "I may be eighty but I don't feel old, and if I only had the use of my legs, I m ight be tempted to surprise the neighbours!"
It was in the first year after Aunt Rosina's death that Father passed through the period of g reat spiritual stress when his religious faith was shaken to its foundations. His sister ha d always been so proud of his devotion to the church that it was terrible shock to her when h e began to entertain such wicked doubts about the only true Faith. When at last he neglecte d his church duties altogether, she was shocked and pained beyond telling. It greatly increa sed her brother's mental conflict to know what grief he was causing her. But before many mon ths had passed, she too, impressed by her brother's newly found peace and joy, entered into t he same experience.
In Father's diary, written at this time, there is only one reference to his doubts regardin g the doctrines of the Church. It reads: "The first doubts that arose in my mind with regar d to the Catholic Church was her teaching about Protestants, who according to some parts of h er teaching were damned. This I could not believe. But then it was church doctrine and it w as a deadly sin to doubt the teaching of the Church. I don't remember speaking of this matte r outside our home. As well as I can remember, my next doubts were about Confession. One ni ght about seven or eight months ago my doubts about Confession took hold of me more forcibl y than before. I believed with all my heart that contrition for sin was necessary, but contr ition without the kind of confession demanded by the Church."
Base Hill, N.S.W.
August, 1953.
Olivet Elma Morrissey.
He died at 68 Oxford Street, Collingwood.

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