Robert Murray

Background

Robert Murray was born in 1731 in Scotland and emigrated to America with his father, John, in 1732.

Career

At Swatara Creek, now in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, a region noted for its thriving agriculture, the younger Murray in early life operated a small flour mill, in which he shared an interest with other members of his family. Later he undertook trading voyages to the West Indies, and from 1750 to 1753 he lived in North Carolina.

In 1753 he engaged in general trade in New York with a younger brother, John, as a partner. The import and export trade of the brothers with England and her colonies, carried on in their own ships, gradually advanced the Murrays to the foremost rank of American merchants.

From 1767 to 1775 Robert was on business in England. When the interests of commerce were required to yield to a patriotic consideration, and New York merchants agreed, in opposition to the tea duty, to exclude British goods from the domestic market, Murray acquiesced in the policy of nonimportation.

In February 1775, however, the ship Beulah arrived from London and, failing to get past the boat of the Committee of Sixty, went to Sandy Hook, where a part of its cargo was taken off by a boat from Elizabethtown. Robert and John Murray confessed to the Committee that they were principals in the affair and promised to reship the goods in seven days' time.

In May 1775 they petitioned Congress for restoration of former commercial privileges. That Murray's sympathies were with the British may be inferred from the fact that in 1779 Gen. Alexander McDougall, describing in a letter to Governor Clinton a plot to get supplies to the King's troops, said this of the Quaker merchant: "Robert Murray is on Long Island, with a store of goods, which makes one link of the chain". There is little doubt that Murray's ocean trade was brisk, and profits approached the normal magnitude, when British warships were able to keep the lanes of commerce open. It is significant that Murray's house "on the Heights of Inklenberg" (Murray Hill) was exempted from seizure by the British during their occupation.

Murray was an original member of the New York Chamber of Commerce, formed April 5, 1768, and served on a committee of the chamber to consider the condition of the coinage and the embarrassments springing from variations in colonial standards. In 1768 he invested money in the whale fishery. Robert Murray died on July 22, 1786, in New York City, United States.

Achievements

• Robert Murray was a prominent merchant, who made trading visits to the West Indies. These trading efforts undoubtedly capitalized on Murray’s position as a miller: flour and wheat were Pennsylvania’s major exports to the West Indies.

Religion

Robert Murray was originally a Presbyterian. He became a Quaker when he married.

Connections

In 1744, Robert Murray married Mary Lindley, by whom he had twelve children.

Father:

John Murray, II

Mother:

Mary Murray

Sister:

Elizabeth Reed (Murray)

Sister:

Arabelle Dixon (Murray)

Sister:

Mary Murray

Wife:

Mary Murray (Lindley)

Daughter:

Susan Murray

Daughter:

Mary Willett (Murray)

Daughter:

Beulah Hoffman (Murray)

Son:

Lindley Murray

writer, grammarian

Son:

John Murray, IV

Brother:

John Murray, III

merchant

Brother:

Samuel Murray

Brother:

Richard Murray

Brother:

James Murray

Brother:

William Murray