WALTER MORRISON (1836 -1921)

Walter Morrison was born in London 21st May 1836, the son of, James Morrison a Liberal MP for Ipswich and self-made man, who had scaled the social heights. James had been born in 1789 in Wiltshire and made his fortune in haberdashery, before moving into banking. His business style entailed achieving small profits on a quick turnaround, such as cornering the market in black crepe just before the death of Queen Caroline in 1821. He owned several large country houses and lived at Basildon Park, Buckinghamshire. He was a keen supporter of the Arts who was instrumental in the setting up of the National Gallery. He bought the Malham Tarn estates when they were sold in 1852 by Lord Ribblesdale, having been held by the Lister family of Gisburn Park since at least 1760, when they had built the first phase of the present house about 1780 to replace an earlier hunting lodge.

Walter was the fifth of seven sons, his eldest brother, Charles inherited half his father’s £4 million+ fortune and the Basildon Park estate when James Morrison died in 1857. Charles was an astute businessman, supporter of the Arts and had extensive financial interests in the Argentine, primarily the Mercantile Bank of the River Plate and later the River Plate Trust, Loan & Agency Company.

Part of Walter’s inheritance was the Malham Tarn Estate and it became his favourite home. He remained a bachelor but had many interests, and was also a successful businessman with interests in the Argentine railways -"the king of frozen Argentine meat transport". He had been a shareholder in the Central Argentine Railway from at least 1873, and chairman of the company from 1887 to 1909. He was also chairman of the Central Argentine Land Company, reorganised in 1888 as the Argentine Land & Investment Company, and sometimes traveled to Argentina. A town and station on the former Central Argentine Railway originally named Zuviría, in the Province of Cordoba, was re-named Morrison in memory of Walter in 1907. He was a very generous benefactor both to the local community and in support of his interests in archaeology and education. Like his brothers Charles and Albert,Walter was also a keen supporter of the arts and Malham Tarn House hosted guests such as Charles Darwin, John Stuart Mill, John Ruskin and Judge Hughes, author of Tom Brown’s Schooldays. When Charles Kingsley visited he was so taken with the Malhamdale scenery and trout fishing on the Tarn, which he described as "the best on the whole earth", and it appears in his book "The Water Babies" along with his host, cast as the red-faced squire, John Hartover.

Walter went to Oxford and gained an MA and became an MP, first for Plymouth in 1861-74 and then an Liberal Unionist MP for Skipton 1886-92 and 1895-1900. Whilst in office he was active supporter of Women's Suffrage and the Co-operative movements, and in 1872, Walter Morrison introduced the first Proportional Representation Bill, which of course was successfully opposed and defeated.
In October 1900 the Craven Herald carried a special supplement on the General Election which included:

Unionist candidate Walter Morrison was battling it out with Fredrick Whitley-Thompson, representing the Radicals. The pair had spent much of the week touring villages of Craven and speaking to the electorate. Mr Whitley-Thompson had received a luke-warm reception in many places, including Airton, where he was heckled for so-called "scandalous and misleading statements" in his election leaflets.

Walter Morrison was a staunch supporter of both the Church and education in Malhamdale, restoring the Church End House in 1866 for use as the vicarage, allowing it's occupation by the current incumbent for a nominal rent. He provided the premises and set up the Malham Moor Subscription School in 1872 and was a governor of Kirkby Malham School. In 1874 he built the Kirkby-in-Malhamdale United School and master's house, sited midway between Malham and Kirkby Malham villages to replace their inadequate educational facilities, at a personal cost of £2,925. He remained on the governing committee of the United School until his death in 1921. A regular member of the Kirkby Malham congregation, he was at various times churchwarden and sidesman and when the church was restored in 1879-80 at a cost of £3,049 Walter Morrison contributed almost £1,700 to the fund. Again when a new organ was required in 1884 he contributed all but £1 of the £696 required to carry out the work.

He was an Honorary Colonel of the 2nd Volunteer Battalion of the West Riding Regiment from 1871, a West Riding JP and made Sheriff of the West Riding of Yorkshire in 1883. In 1905 he became the Chairman of the Craven Bank.

He maintained a house in London as well as Malham Moor, and was a member of the Reform and United University Clubs. At the time of the 1881 census he was staying at his London home, 77 Cromwell Road, Kensington, SW London and he is described as a landed proprietor and farmer of 25 acres employing 2 men. James Redmayne (17) was his footman and George Jessey (39) his butler.

In 1897 the foundation stone was aid for the new chapel at Giggleswick School, paid for by Walter who was Vice Chairman of the Governors.

Reproduced courtesy of The Francis Frith Collection.

An article in the Craven Herald in February 1902 explained how the Skipton Conservative Association president was recuperating at Hastings due to an illness caused by the fatigue and exposure to severe weather during his many trips between London and his home at Malham Moor.

"His many admirers will be pleased to hear he is determined to have more consideration for his health," the columnist continued. "No man has realised more fully the responsibilities of his position as a Member of Parliament, a landed proprietor and a business magnate than Mr Morrison. He has ever been at the beck and call of his late constituents and no journey was too long or troublesome for him if he could further the interests of the district he represented in Parliament so worthily for something like a dozen years."

When his brother Charles died in 1909 he left Walter another £1.9 million to add to his own, not inconsiderable fortune.

One of his last acts of generosity was to pay for the publishing and free distribution of the book Craven's Part in the Great War , a roll of honour which was presented to all the soldiers or their families who had enlisted in the Skipton Parliamentary Division.

He died in 1921 leaving an estate worth over £2 million and was buried in the churchyard of St Michael the Archangel, Kirkby Malham which had done so much to support, on the 23rd Dec 1921.

Geoffrey Dawson, the editor of The Times who was himself born in Skipton, wrote a very comprehensive obituary about Walter Morrison, which was published in the February 1922 edition of the National Review which we have transcribed here.

He is commemorated by the oak paneling around the sanctuary, and the Latin inscription on the paneling reads:

The walls of this sanctuary, restored by him when in a ruinous condition, have been paneled in affectionate memory of Walter Morrison, of Malham Tarn, Master of Arts and Doctor of Civil Law of Oxford, a man of the greatest generosity of heart and hand. He represented in Parliament for 24 years the borough of Plymouth, and the Skipton Division of Yorkshire. He was educated at Eton and Baliol, where he took honours. He afterwards showed himself a keen supporter of learning. He presented a splendid chapel to Giggleswick School. In the University of Oxford beside other benefactions he added munificently to the endowment of the Bodleian Library.
After having been resident in this parish for 64 years, he deceased on December 18th, 1921, in the 85th year of his age, deeply lamented by many friends, dependant's and neighbours.

Walter Morrison by H. W. Salmon and Sons(1900)

Excerpt from the catalogue to the T. E. Lawrence Centenary Exhibition held at the National Portrait Gallery, London, 1988-9

Walter Morrison (1836-1921) was a successful businessman, noted philanthropist, and MP. After gaining First Class Honours at Oxford he traveled in the Middle East and America. He inherited a very considerable fortune which he increased substantially through his own business activities, yet his personal tastes were extremely simple. He spent much of his time on a moorland estate at Malham Tarn in Yorkshire, where he took an active part in local affairs. It was during a visit to Malham by Charles Kingsley that the idea of The Water Babies was conceived, in which the Squire was based on Morrison.
The full extent of Morrison's philanthropy cannot be assessed because his gifts were generally anonymous. It is known that he contributed large sums to northern universities, and that he built and furnished the remarkable chapel at Giggleswick School. His immense gifts to the University of Oxford included £30,000 for a readership in Egyptology and other projects, and £50,000 to the Bodleian Library (in real terms on the largest gift the Library has ever received). A few of his benefactions were eccentric: he disliked the Victorian chapel at Balliol College, Oxford (where he had been an undergraduate), and once offered money to rebuild it in the style of the original. The offer was declined.
One of his passions was archaeology. He financed the Society of Biblical Archaeology and was the founding benefactor of the Palestine Exploration Fund. It was he who contributed the anonymous donations which financed the British Museum’s Carchemish excavations, £5,000 in 1911 and a further £10,000 in 1914.

Further reading:

"Walter Morrison: A Millionaire at Malham Tarn" by WR Mitchell, published 1990 by Casleberg, Settle (ISBN 1-87-1064-09-0)