Uncle Jim's Murray

A Robertson cousin: the son of Robertson's uncle James ("Uncle Jim") Robertson, and, like the diarist himself, given "Murray" as a middle name. His full name was James Murray Robertson, born 3 June 1892. First named in a February 26, 1916 letter to Doris as "Uncle Jim's Murray, from Toronto," a Lieutenant in the Royal Field Artillery "down in Egypt somewhere." A Canadian Expeditionary Force service record (regimental no. 83608; Library and Archives Canada file B8360-S010) points to an earlier enlistment in Canada as a ranker, before that Imperial commission. Still in Egypt that June ("chasing around Egypt with his Battery"), and tracked again in a January 10, 1917 letter, which reports he "got sick — went to hospital, was sent to England." The diary's own January 8, 1917 entry ("Letter from mother says they saw Murray on his way home") lands two days before that letter and almost certainly describes the same homecoming. Surfaces once more, over a year later, in a March 16, 1918 letter: "Murray must be having quite a time of it with Allenby's troops in Palestine," consistent with the R.F.A.'s continued service in that theatre. Not to be confused with the diary's own recurring "Murray" (see Murray), an enlisted mess orderly; Doris and the rest of the family addressed this cousin as "cousin Murray," and he signs every one of his letters to her that way.