Dancing Suite, part 2: The Consequences of Flight, 4/?

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The Consequences of Flight (5015 words) by Tournevis
Chapters: 4/?
Fandom: Murdoch Mysteries
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: William Murdoch/James Pendrick
Characters: William Murdoch, James Pendrick, Julia Ogden, Inspector Brackenreid, Georges Crabtree, James Gillies
Additional Tags: A host of OCs - Freeform, A host of historical figures, Diary/Journal, Fake Academic Essay
Series: Part 2 of The Dancing Suite
Summary:

The following is taken from a recently defended Master’s cognate in History entitled « The Consequences of Flight : The Rediscovered Diary of a Canadian Homosexual in the Late-Victorian Era. »

The Murdoch Diary, part 1:

Sault-au-Récollet and SS Columbia,

11 and 12 March 1900

11^th^ March. Sunday.

I took Mass today. The ship's chaplain is Anglican, but there is a Cistercian on board, and the Chaplain agreed to let him serve those of us Catholics passengers. An especially generous offer, rather rare occurrence to be of note.

James was bed-ridden until Christmas. I was back on my feet fairly quickly, but it was not the case for him. The entire ordeal, the wound at his shoulder festering and sapping his strength, the shock of our flight, even the basic nature of our accommodations all combined to slow his recovery. I still catch him flinching when someone addresses him as Mr. Beckett. He made a joke Monday that he should have chosen an anagram of his full name instead. I asked him what he meant by it but he changed the subject. By Christmas, he was anxious. He was mostly healed but Cabin fever has set in. I remember it well from my time as a logger. Short days and the cold will eat away at most people. For us, the timing was unfortunate. The winter was far from over with the grim and frost of February still to come. We were both in a bad mood.

Nevertheless, I had been accepted in the village as one of their own, le butler canadien they said, and I was able to move about the village with smiles and hellos rather than ceaseless questions. Despite myself, I made friends. Old Mr. P owner of the General store^1^ and, inexplicably, the Ice Merchant G^2^. The curé^3^ was a frequent visitor too, I think mostly to convince me to make Confession and take Communion. I went to Mass on Sundays, of course, but I will not lie in Confession, so I refrained. I continued to disappoint him for the entirety of our stay. He gifted me a copy of his history of the Parish^4^, from its earliest days as an Indian mission in the times of New France to the present. It was published two years ago with a fine red cloth cover. I found him too inclined to accept interventions of Providence over more scientific explanations, but that is no surprise. I regret leaving it behind.

To keep occupied during the short dark days of winter, we paid Mr. P to ensure we got all the Montreal and Toronto papers. The former we received daily and the latter weekly, brought back from the city to us by a young man who works there but returns home every Sunday. In late January, James was well enough that we would sometimes avail ourselves of the tramway line on warmer days. We attended a few public lectures at McGill^5^, notably one by Doctor Osler^6^. But we could not partake in many paid entertainments, since neither of us were employed and we only had what money I had taken with me from To. (We were only able to access James's Mtl accounts two weeks ago.) We did take in a play at the Theater français^7^ [sic.] and two converts at the Academy of Music^8^. In February Father F also took me to a boxing match, at the Monument National^9^. James refused to come. Despite the more than abundant entertainment in English in the city, we chose to cultivate our French.

Overall, our stay at Sault au Récolet [sic.] was dark, slow and melancholy, with short moments of energy and wonder. Mr. P's store kept us well stocked in paper and ink, and F loaned us a set of drafting tools from the Noviciate. We needed to "lay low" as G^10^ would say and our need to save money did not allow James or I to tinker at all. Any new ideas James had during our stay has to remain paper dreams for the foreseeable future.

12^th^ March. Monday.

Clear skies today. James spent the entire day on the Promenade deck bundled in heavy blankets taking in the pale sun like a tuberculosis patient. It's frightfully cold on deck, but James would not be deterred. I took lunch alone.

It occurs to be we missed the Lord Stanley's Championship finals. Father F was looking forward to it and hoped the Montreal Shamrocks would win against all other teams^1^^1^. There is no way to know today. Perhaps in Paris we can find access to Canadian newspapers. We left Mtl on the first present under heavy snow and I wonder how long the storm lasted^1^^2^. I find myself wondering about all the news we missed. The new we will miss. Once in France, newspapers will be our only link to home. Maybe these are the questions marring James' mood.

He spoke to me after dinner. Attempted to explain his behaviour, his mood. He is confused. He tells me he is not as well as he expected to be once we were finally on our way to Europe. He expected to feel free of all our travails once we boarded the ship. He thought the thrill of adventure would return and we could remake ourselves replacing the pain of what we have lost. He spent all day in the bracing cold searching inward in search of that spark in his heart. He tells me he did not quite find it.

His affections for me have returned. We had not touched in this way in quite some time. I refuse to admit I have counted the days. But now that he sleeps and I write these words by the light of the near-full moon. I wonder if he did not try to distract himself in the pleasures of the flesh.

1. Théophile Paquet (1830-1903), owner of the Magasin général in the village and at times member of the Municipal council. The store building, first opened in 1865, still stands today on Gouin boulevard.

2. Most likely Eugène Gagnon (?-1959). Why would his friendship be inexplicable is not clear. In all probability, Gagnon would have been somewhat younger than Murdoch, but not of a vastly different age or social class.

3. Charles-Philippe Beaubien (1843-1914), parish priest at Visitation-du-Sault-au-Récollet church from 1890.

4. Charles-P Beaubien, Le Sault-au-Récollet. Ses rapports avec les premiers temps de la colonie. Mission -- Paroisse (Montréal: Beauchemin, 1898).

5. McGill University.

6. Doctor William Olser (1843-1919), Canadian physician of world renown, founding professor of Johns Hopkins Medical school. Notably he innovated by focussing on bedside clinical training for medical students and was often considered the best diagnostician of his time.

7. Le Théâtre français, founded in 1885, stood near the corner of Saint-Laurent and Sainte-Catherine streets. Originally planned as a skating rink, the theatre specialized in French-language plays, with a particular interest in French classical theatre.

8. The Academy of Music (1875-1910) was a popular venue on Victoria street, which catered to both the Francophone and Anglophone bourgeois and middle classes.

9. Le Monument national (1893 to today) was a modern venue capable of seating 1620 spectators when it was opened under the auspices of the St. Jean Baptist Society of Montréal. It focussed primarily on entertainment for French Canadians, whether classical or popular, whether theatre or variety, as well as boxing.

10. Possibly George Crabtree.

11. The Montreal Shamrocks did win the Challenge Cup, as the Stanley Cup was known then, on March 7^th^, 1900, against the Halifax Crescent in Montréal.

12. A record-setting 46 cm fell on Montréal on March 1^st^, 1900.

Dancing Suite, part 2: The Consequences of Flight, 3/?

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The Consequences of Flight (3755 words) by Tournevis
Chapters: 3/?
Fandom: Murdoch Mysteries
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: William Murdoch/James Pendrick
Characters: William Murdoch, James Pendrick, Julia Ogden, Inspector Brackenreid, Georges Crabtree, James Gillies
Additional Tags: A host of OCs - Freeform, A host of historical figures, Diary/Journal, Fake Academic Essay
Series: Part 2 of The Dancing Suite
Summary:

The following is taken from a recently defended Master’s cognate in History entitled « The Consequences of Flight : The Rediscovered Diary of a Canadian Homosexual in the Late-Victorian Era. »

The Murdoch Diary, part 1:

Sault-au-Récollet and SS Columbia,

9 and 10 March 1900

9^th^ March. Friday.

The Columbia is a remarkable vessel. This morning James convinced a steward to allow us access to the mechanical decks. From the promenade deck, all is white with elegant beige funnels^1^, but aft and amidships, the elegance makes way for brute metal and coal dust. The boiler room, the steward would not let us enter, but through the dust and soot we glimpsed all its engineering strength. I am uncertain as to the reason for his hesitation, since he was convinced we were both some form of engineers. At least, James is. James posited later that we did not see the boilers possibly because of the filth, but also because we would have seen the state of the dozen or so men toiling below, feeding coal into the furnace. We were allowed to view the enormous twin screws that power the propellers. The noise was deafening. We are now once again in the library. James is reading what looks to be a history of __. His mood is improved.

He still struggles to answer to his new name, I notice. When we were still in The Province of Quebec, he found it especially difficult. After To^2^, by the time the train reached Longueuil Station^3^, it became clear James could travel no further. I did not yet know then, but infection had set into his injured shoulder where our enemy had ran through what I think was a steel bore. With the dehydration, in his already weakened state, we would not be able to flee any further without risking his life. Hiding was the appropriate course of action until he healed completely. It had been foolish to think we would have made our escape to Europe quickly. So once at Lngl^4^, I made a telephone call.

James is sleeping now and I am writing by the moonlight through the porthole of our cabin. Once in Lngl, I realized we should have stopped in Mtl^5^ directly. We needed help and we needed to hide for as long as James needed. No hotel in Montreal would provide that. I was desperate, I telephoned to an old school friend of mine from Jesuit College. F., now Father F, lived at the Jesuit Noviciate^6^ in the village of Sault au Recollet^7^ on the north of the Island of Mtl. I lied to him after a fashion, told him it was a police matter, that I needed a place to lay low with someone under my protection. He said he would take care of it, that all we needed was to make our way to the village, that the roads past the city limits were still passable despite the snow^8^. It was well banked on the roads and the coach we hired got there in the evening. He met us at the Noviciate gates. James' fever only rose as we made our way out of the city, across miles of farmland until the first houses on Principal road appeared. The Noviciate

[page missing]

10^th^ March. Saturday.

Father F met us at the Noviciate gates, climbed into the coach with us and told the driver to go back up the road to the white house with the gray door^9^. This was the house we woulds be staying in for the length of James' convalescence, however long it took. The house belonged to a recent widow who would be spending the winter with family on the South Shore with her young children. The Noviciate was expecting to be given the house outright, or they planned the purchase, I'm not certain which and never bothered to ask. F assured me we would not be disturbed. The village had a doctor, and he paid us a visit that evening.

The story we told villagers went thus: we were both recent widowers, hurt in a recent accident on our way to Quebec City. But our state of health demanded we convalesce in peace. F agreed to spread the story. He asked I not enquire how he convinced his superiors to give us shelter, and I did not.

The weather turned today and the Atlantic Ocean shows its might. My father would call it choppy seas I believe. The Columbia is a marvellous ship. It navigates the waves with stability and ease. No doubt my father's schooner, had it been full size, we would be tossed about. As it is, only the weakest of stomachs among the 1^st^ class Passengers seem a little green. I would not want to be below deck with the 3^rd^ class today, I fully admit.

James was quiet today. Not exactly melancholy. He seems contemplative. Most likely my reflective mood is rubbing off. He asked what I am writing today at lunch. I told him.

Within half a week of our arrival at Sault Au Recollet, not only did the entire village know of our existance [sic.], but our names and a version of our story built on rumour and deduction. They knew us as James Beckett from Toronto (un Anglais, they called him^10^) and his French Canadian butler William Gagnon^11^. They agreed that I had spent most of my life in Ontario, explaining my more English inflections and errors when speaking French with them. We had been widowed in a train wreck "out west" in one version, and had chosen to spend our mourning and convalescence in tranquility. It seems we were not very unusual visitors to the Sault; since the arrival of the tramway in 1893^12^, quite a few Messieurs Bourgeois had bought summer homes here, turning it into a bit of a resort in the warm month. The mayor^13^, whom I met at church weekly, is inordinately proud of the village's wood sidewalks, though his pride is not completely misplaced. The villagers were welcoming to a fault, respectful of our grief and so far as I know never suspected they had been lied to. Not the Jesuits either, nor the Priests of St. Gabriel^14^ who run the village school or the Sulpicians of the Parish church^15^, not the good Holy Heart nuns^16^ who sent us sucre a la crême fudge [sic.] weekly withing ten days of our arrival.

1. In 1900, the chimney funnels on Hamburg-America ships were beige with a black band.

2. Toronto.

3. Longueuil is situated on the South Shore of the St. Lawrence River, directly across downtown Montréal, QC.

4. Longueuil.

5. Montréal.

6. We could not identify Father F. No priest with this initial served at the Noviciat Saint-Joseph at Sault-au-Récolet in 1900. The institution was founded in 1852 and remained in operation as the Jesuits' main school for recruits until 1969. The building still stands on Gouin boulevard in the arrondissement Ahuntsic-Cartierville in Montréal and houses the Collège Mont-Saint-Louis.

7. The village of Sault-au-Récollet was founded in 1696 and was named for the French Récollet priest Nicolas Viel who drowned in the rapids in the Prairie River in 1625. It was an Indian mission until the early 1700s. A number of buildings from the 18^th^ and early 19^th^ centuries still stand and the old village is now a protected historic area.

8. In 1900, most of the territory on the Island of Montreal was still farmland. Outside of Montréal proper and its immediate suburbs, the island was dotted by a number of rural villages, some of which were turning into summer resort areas, notably Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue (then referred to as St. Ann) and Sault-au-Récolet.

9. We could not identify the exact house. We know from later mentions that the house stood between the Jesuit Noviciate and Visitation-du-Sault-au-Récollet parish church, possibly on what is now Lambert street.

10. This monicker was a common way from French Canadians to refer to Anglophones in Canada. especially but not exclusively those from British extraction. This monicker was widely used well into the mid-twentieth century. James Pendrick would be the epitome of an "Anglais": White, English-speaking, and of Protestant extraction.

11. Though Murdoch's fluency of French is a well-known, this sentence indicates that he spoke the language almost as well as a native. Steve Gunn, in his biography of Murdoch, found that the Detective consistently gave the reason for his French-language fluency as having studied with Jesuits in New Brunswick. The main issue here is that there were no Jesuit houses of education in that province during Murdoch's lifetime. Gunn posits that Murdoch may have been taught by one or more Jesuit priests who had left the Society of Jesus in order to become secular priests in an unidentified New Brunswick parish. There are a few examples of such priests in New Brunswick in the second half of the nineteenth century, though Gunn could not identify Murdoch's mentor or mentors. See Gunn, Our Own Sherlock (Toronto: UTP, 1999), chap. 2.

12. Murdoch is incorrect by two years: Montreal Park & Island inaugurated tramway line 24 in 1895.

13. Émile Delorme, who was mayor in 1897-1902.

14. The Frères de Saint-Gabriel were invited by Archbishop Bruchési to settle in Québec in 1888 and moved to Sault-au-Récolet in 1891. They built a noviciate near the Jesuits and opened a primary school immediately.

15. In 1900, as with most parish churches on the Island of Montréal, Sulpician priests were responsible for and own the Visitation-du-Sault-au-Récollet parish church, first built in 1749 and expanded several times in the 19^th^ century.

16. The Dames du Sacré-Coeur convent was established in 1855. They ran several institutions in the village, notably a school for girls.

Dancing Suite, part 2: The Consequences of Flight, 2/?

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The Consequences of Flight (2145 words) by Tournevis
Chapters: 2/?
Fandom: Murdoch Mysteries
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: William Murdoch/James Pendrick
Characters: William Murdoch, James Pendrick, Julia Ogden, Inspector Brackenreid, Georges Crabtree, James Gillies
Additional Tags: A host of OCs - Freeform, A host of historical figures, Diary/Journal, Fake Academic Essay
Series: Part 2 of The Dancing Suite
Summary:

The following is taken from a recently defended Master’s cognate in History entitled « The Consequences of Flight : The Rediscovered Diary of a Canadian Homosexual in the Late-Victorian Era. »

The Murdoch Diary, part 1:

Sault-au-Récollet and SS Columbia,

To 8 March 1900

[no date]

I am worried about James.

 

[no date]

I write this sentence nearly two months ago, some time after Christmas. I don’t remember the exact date. My memory is failing me and I still worry.

 

8th March, Thursday

I have decided I should keep a journal, a diary. Now that we are no longer in danger of immediate arrest. I find I need to speak of the last dew months. I has been almost 6 months since we left Toronto. We boarded the SS Columbia this morning, heading for Cherbourg, from which we are heading to Paris 1. We are in a 2nd class cabin that James had arranged to be reserved for us when Operation Exodus was launched. The too ship is comfortable and swift, and rather modest for a Hamburg-America steamship, or so James tells me. No doubt He’s been on bigger, better vessels. Which comes as no surprise, and I have caught him looking wistfully at 1st class Passengers and to glimpse into their reserved Salons. I think, though, he is attempting to see if he knows any of them. We do not want to be recognized. Myself, I am simply happy to have avoided joining the 3rd class passengers below. I am told there are about 300 of them on our way to Europe, but there will be close to 800 when the ship makes its way back.

There will be no return trip for us. Certainly not in the foreseeable future. There is a library on board. It is small well-stocked and open to all 1st and 2nd class. James is already sat in one of the deep leather chairs reading the morning editions. We will not have access to them for at least a week, until France. James is pointedly not asking me what I am writing in this ledger. I am writing because I need to tell the our story to someone and because it cannot happen in person. Not even to a priest. Paper will have to do.

Six months ago, We left Toronto on the Monday morning in a coach that would take us to Kingston as per the original plan James

[pages missing]

I will not name anyone in this diary. There is no shame in what James and I are to eachother and what we have done, but I cannot in good conscience risk that this diary could or anything could be read used to reach back to those of our friends who helped us.

This journal is therefore must be of William Gagnon and his compagnon friend James Beckett. This is who we are now.

Young J helped the staff2 and Dr R3 pack for us, as I made lists of what to bring between naps. The good Dr O4 cried when I hugged her last. James regained consciousness in the early morning and took the news of our impending flight well enough, all considering. Our enemy5 had made sure his intentions clear to James before torturing him. Our enemy kept James well drugged after a day or so. He did not remember being blinded and rendered dumb with plaster casts. He was not in any shape. He was not in any shape to travel, we all knew, but we did not have any choice. The doctors would not chance giving him a tonic or stimulants not even coffee because most are diuretic and he was still dehydrated. The daylong trip to Kingston only made things worse, for both of us, even if I were in a better state of health.

We bid farewell to our house, the library, the music room, our friends. We left our life on that cold Winter morning.

We were two [sic.] numb to cry and It was too early to mourn, so we spoke softly in the coach huddled under the coach covers, which were heavy and dry. I recounted what had happened in the last three days and what he’d missed of our rescue. How Dr O had been a beacon of sanity during the ordeal. How G had proven himself a capable Detective. How I‘d be lost without him8 at my side. How I love him and cannot regret our life despite the strife. And how we owed the Inspector9. everything. Why we had to leave.

James explained how our enemy has lured him to the laneway of St. David’s. It had been too easy, James felt more than foolish. How no one had recalled witnessing the event is astounding to me. Somehow, our enemy or an aid had used what I think is a fishing line to puck James’ driving hat right off his head. near He saw it fly up above his head drove to follow it. when it disappeared from sight, James stopped his motor without thinking and turned the corner to get his hat back. One turn into the laneway and he was smothered with chloroform. He woke next in what we now know was the top floor of the Ru a downtown building. All this for a hat.

When we arrived at Kingston, we almost took a room at the PG10. James was not in a good way, but we decided to take the next train to Mtl. James wouldn’t have been able to walk up the hotel’s steps, so we simply waited in the lounge with hot drinks for three hours. He had high tea. When we boarded the train across the street, from there it was a smooth enough trip to Mtl. Or so was the plan.

 

1. The Hamburg America Line steamships on the New York/Hamburg via Southampton and Cherbourg route sailed out of Hoboken, NJ.

2. “Young J.” Could not be identified and no records remain of who Pendrick kept as staff after 1898.

3. Doctor Paul Roberts (1869-1903), who rose to prominence as one of the more progressive staff members at Toronto’s Provincial Asylum until he resigned due to ill health in 1901.

4. Doctor Julia (Ogden) Roberts (1863-1938), Toronto’s only female coroner, on and off, from 1895 to 1918.

5. James Gillies, as discussed in the introduction.

6. Presumably George Crabtree (1875-1927), constable then detective of Toronto’s Station House no 4. Records show he worked primarily as an assistant to Murdoch before 1900.

7. Pendrick, most likely.

8. Thomas Brakenreid (1856-1928). Born in York, UK, he emigrated to Toronto as a young man and made his way up the echelons of Toronto’s police force, becoming Inspector in 1891, and Chief Inspector in 1908.

10. The Prince George Hotel in Kingston, ON, which still stands across Ontario St. from the now defunct train station. It has been in operation almost continuously since 1809, though today only caters to long-term rentals.

Dancing Suite, part 2: The Consequences of Flight, 1/?

in ,

Welcome to the next installment of my Murdoch Mysteries m/m fic. Click through or read below.

The Consequences of Flight (2145 words) by Tournevis
Chapters: 2/?
Fandom: Murdoch Mysteries
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: William Murdoch/James Pendrick
Characters: William Murdoch, James Pendrick, Julia Ogden, Inspector Brackenreid, Georges Crabtree, James Gillies
Additional Tags: A host of OCs - Freeform, A host of historical figures, Diary/Journal, Fake Academic Essay
Series: Part 2 of The Dancing Suite
Summary:

The following is taken from a recently defended Master’s cognate in History entitled « The Consequences of Flight : The Rediscovered Diary of a Canadian Homosexual in the Late-Victorian Era. »

Description : The following is taken from a recently defended Master’s cognate in History entitled « The Consequences of Flight : The Rediscovered Diary of a Canadian Homosexual in the Late-Victorian Era. »

Excerpts from the Introduction

[…] The history of homosexuality at the waining years of the Victorian era, whether in North America or Europe, is limited by an extreme dearth of primary sources outside of judicial and police records. While we know quite well how homosexuality was policed and legislated, the lived experience of homosexuals remains obscured. There are a few notable exceptions, usually among artists and writers, but even in their cases, much is to be deduced and many historians will refuse to see anything other friendship in historical correspondence which would be considered proof of a gay relationship in the contemporary record. As such, the turn of the Twentieth century continues to be a history of silences and closeted individuals thrown forcibly into the light by judicial means.

In Canada, the new Criminal Code adopted in 1868 on the heels of Confederation made same sex relations into act of gross indecency which, if it do longer required the death penalty, continued to land homosexuals in prison and hard labour. As such, there are few “confirmed bachelors” in the non-judicial public record in this period, outside perhaps of Montréal. Indeed, in Toronto the Good around 1900, homosexuals of any gender only even appear when prosecution or public opprobrium is raised. This is why the discovery of a hitherto unknown diary or a hitherto unidentified Toronto homosexual, one well-known person at that, is so rare and exciting. [...]

[...] Internal references show that the diary’s author was most likely none other than William Murdoch (b. 1863, Shelbourne, NS), who served in the Toronto Constabulary, notably as a Detective of Station House no 4 from 1893 until is disappearance in October 1899. [...]

His disappearance, along with that of former millionaire and inventor James Pendrick (b. 1895, Toronto, ON) had led at the time to endless speculation as to their well-being. [...] Police archives reveal little more. They show it was well-known that the two men lived together in the Pendrick Mansion in Rosedale, but with no suspicion of impropriety.

What was well known at the time, however, was that in the few days before they disappeared, the men were kidnapped and tortured by James Gillies (b. 1878, London, UK; d. 1899, Toronto, ON), whom Murdoch had arrested for murder in 1897. Toronto newspapers, for the most part, believed them murdered. [...] Until the discovery of the diary presented here, popular culture had completely embraced the theory that serial murderer James Gillies had assassinated Murdoch and Pendrick, as the movies Jagged Edges (1996) and its remake The Murdoch Trap (2012) posited.

The Murdoch diary reveals a very different story. Murdoch and Pendrick survived Gillies, but they were found to have been much more than housemates. The two men were in fact a committed couple, but they had allies in the Toronto Constabulary who aided in their flight from the city.

That Murdoch and Pendrick were a homosexual couple, one that had completely escaped the historical record is astounding, especially considering how well-known both men were in Toronto at the time. Between 1893 and 1900, Toronto newspapers are replete with articles and reports about them. Murdoch is arguably Toronto’s most well-known police officer at the time, due to his arrest record and his many narrow escapes. Pendrick was perhaps more infamous than famous. He was an impressively successful industrialist, becoming one of Toronto’s first millionaires by 1894, but suffered a humiliating blow, when it was revealed that his wife (Sally Hubbard, 1866-1898) was in fact a criminal mastermind and multiple murderer herself! She swindled her husband out of most of his fortune. It was in fact during the investigations over the Hubbard thefts and murders that Murdoch and Pendrick met. It is not known when their intimate relationship began.

[...] The Murdoch diary is a unique window into the minds of the two men. Spanning about a year, it is dated from March 8th, 1899 to October 17th 1900, with two early entries dating to some time after they fled Toronto in October 1899. It recounts how they left Toronto, through Montréal and Cherbourg to finally Paris. Murdoch’s narrative is at times choppy, especially in the first half, which was written aboard the Hamburg-America line steamship SS Columbia while describing their winter sojourn outside Montréal. It speaks to the physical and emotional tole they suffered. The reader cannot help but feel for these two brave gay men, facing a world of prejudice preventing them from healing properly from the trauma inflicted upon them. It also shows how they overcame their travails. It is quite moving at times: the former policeman expresses great sorrow. It seems perhaps the men even suffer from clinical depression. “I find I need to speak of the last few month,” writes Murdoch at the beginning of the journal. One excuses the disorganization of the diary’s first section, as it was written in the span of a week, largely in flashback, during a singular period of transition: the crossing of the Atlantic before they would begin their new life in France: “There will not be a return trip for us.” [...]

The second section of the Murdoch diary, written in Paris proper, is just as moving, though it speaks more of adventure and discovery, as both men find a place for themselves and a new identity. Murdoch quotes Pendrick: “We might make ourselves useful afterall [sic.].” Contrary to the former section, the Paris narrative is written day to day, rendering it more legible and more coherent. [...] The diary itself is a single 100-page ledger manufactured by the Consolidated Stationary Company (Winnipeg, MB) and is written with at least three different nibs. Murdoch’s handwriting is crisp and legible, consistent throughout despite the different writing implements used, and compares perfectly with the police reports he penned before his disappearance. [...]

This cognate essay takes the form of an annotated transcription of the Murdoch diary. Individuals, places, events and inventions which have been identified with certainty are fully referenced. Where doubt remains, footnotes indicate this candidate’s best hypothesis.