Born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1782, Thomas Murray arrived in Boston in 1810 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1814.

Murray initially worked in Boston as a laborer. He became the sexton of St. Augustine’s church when it was established in South Boston in 1819, and his duties included managing St. Augustine’s cemetery. He was the first listed Catholic undertaker in Boston; over the years, his entry as an undertaker in the Boston Almanac shows his business address changing from Franklin Street to Theatre Alley and finally Dearborn Avenue in South Boston. Murray was also a bookseller and owned a bookstore on Cornhill, not far from Washington Street in downtown Boston.

Murray married Margaret Murphy on October 18, 1821, in a ceremony officiated by family friend John Cheverus, Bishop of Boston. Thomas and Margaret had six children: Mary Anne (July 28, 1822), John Cheverus (June 13, 1824), Margaret (March 19, 1826), Catherine (June 6, 1828), Thomas Selverus (June 20, 1831), and Sarah Elizabeth (February 20, 1833). As well as providing for their own children, the Murrays also took in an orphaned relative from Ireland, John Quarry, in 1822. Several of the Murray children traveled and corresponded back to the family in Boston: Quarry went to Honduras in 1829; John Murray studied at Montreal College in Canada in the late 1830s; and Thomas S. Murray traveled to California in 1849. (Although his return date is unkown, letters indicate he was still in Sacramento as late as 1852.)

The Murray family purchased land originally owned by the Catholic Church on Fourth Street in South Boston in 1834 and began residing there in 1836. The house remained in the family until its destruction around 1964. The Murrays also leased a stone quarry and owned farmland in Milton, both before and after Thomas Murray’s death.

Thomas Murray died on January 8, 1840. He and his wife are buried in the Saint Augustine Cemetery in South Boston.

Sources:

“Thomas Murray” [Biographical Sketch], Archdiocesan Archives, Archdiocese of Boston.

Dickinson, S.N., Boston Almanac. Boston, MA: Thomas Groom and Co., 1821-1840.