by graeme1 » Mon Oct 24, 2011 5:42 pm
With regard to Robert Burley and sons, I think this building may have belonged to the father of the famous Scottish war correspondent of the Victorian era, Bennet Burleigh, his father was a master carpenter.
Bennet Graham Burley (He changed his name to Burleigh after the American Civil War) was born in 1839 in Greenock, near Glasgow, Scotland, to Robert Burley and Christian Seath, he was to be one of x brothers and x sisters. His parents were local people, and his father was a retired soldier and joiner who later widened his horizons and became the owner of a wood products company in Glasgow, as well as a general importer and exporter, a job which would have involved foreign travel. Robert Burley was also a trustee of Glasgow’s Mechanics Institution, and largely responsible for opening, in 1840, after a decades hard work, the Greenock Mechanics Library. At the opening, Mr. Robert Burley, who regularly attended the lectures of the Institution of Arts and Science some years prior to the founding of the Library, spoke of his pleasant connection with the Institution, and rejoiced that the labour and love of long gone-bye days had not been without fruit.
According to Bennet Burleighs own account, after he left school in Glasgow, he joined his fathers company as an apprentice joiner, and then spent some time, like many other young men in Greenock at the time as a seaman.
Bennet went to join up with the American civil war in the 1860's, and had many adventures, sentenced to death on several occasions, escaped prison, hence the name change. He had a daughter, in fact a few kids born in the usa in the 1870s i think, i know the first was in lord darnleys cottage around glasgow cathedral. I also know he had a brother.
When Burleigh eventually returned from America, a family story goes, that he asked his father if he was still “bothered with wood”, and upon the affirmative, he presented him with some American hickory, which brought about a revolution in the handle and walking stick industry.
Also in census details burleieghs age is never correct and his first wife died in june 1885 perhaps this is why the kid was with brother? Bennet himself was in Soudan in 1885 reporting on the liberation of Soudan from the Mahdi, then returned and . He stood in Lanarkshire and Glasgow constituencies—in 1885 as Liberal-Labour candidate,
Bennet was in Scotland at this time "On 28th September 1885, a poster advertises that, Bennet Burleigh War Correspondent of the "Daily Telegraph" was to give a presentation in Dundee's Kinnaird Hall on the war in Soudan, "
I am not sure, but i think perhaps the coincidences are too strong for this not to be the same family.