My sweetheart and penfriend of 40 years died in an horrific car crash, hit by a Dump Truck, with his twin brother Mozell. Wardell was driving and died at the scene. Mozell died in hospital soon after…
My heart is broken. Good Bye my love x
Roberta Cleopatra Flack 10th February 1937-24th February 2025
Gartloch Asylum Glasgow.
Dear Miss Moir
It transpires that your Great Grandmother had a very long history of mental illness. As the records are either not in a fit condition for copying or are in very heavy volumes, I have transcribed the salient passages.
She was admitted to Gartloch Asylum on 4 Dec 1903. Her next of kin was recorded as being her husband. Two doctors who examined her provided the following reports for the Sheriff of Glasgow (who authorised her admission):
1. “Incoherence of speech: thinks that her children are poisoned by her neighbours. Voices continually speak to her.”
2. “She is dull, irritable & excitable & she is incoherent in her talk & has delusions of suspicion & persecution. Her husband states that she neglects her household duties & has been very strange in conduct for several years.”
Her husband provided the following:
“Illness began 12 years ago – restlessness at night: would go away very early in the morning to see her father, leaving an infant. Since lost oldest boy (14) in July last – he was accidentally drowned – has been much worse: thinks her neighbours had boy murdered for £100. 9 children, no miscarriages.”
On 25 Feb 1904 she was transferred to Govan Parish Asylum at Hawkhead (later re-named Leverndale) because under the Poor Law system Govan was the parish responsible for her. The doctor who first examined her there wrote, “She is often unduly depressed and confessed that she is under the influence of delusions”. She remained at Hawkhead, at least until 1917. There is a gap in the records between 1917 and 1921.
On 30 Jul 1921 she was re-admitted to Hawkhead. She is described on admission as a 55 years old widow, previously residing at Dalmary Cottage, Gartmore. She is diagnosed as suffering from “Dementia secondary” and is said to have been insane for 18 years.
On 8 Oct 1929 she was transferred to the mental wards at the Southern General Hospital (also run by Govan Parish Council). These wards were generally used to house chronic cases of incurable insanity, especially amongst elderly people. Her next of kin is recorded as being her sister, Mrs Miller of 225 Holmlea Road, Cathcart. She remained at the Southern General Hospital until her death, 1952.
I hope that this will help you. Please bear in mind that it is very unlikely that we will be able to provide answers to whatever supplementary questions may occur to you. For instance, the records do not state whether she was buried or cremated, nor by whom. Nor do they indicate who visited her.
Yours sincerely
Alistair Tough
Mr Alistair Tough,
Greater Glasgow Health Board Archivist.
As I searched for the three mass graves of the victims of RMS Lusitania at the Old Cemetery, Queenstown, now Cobh, my hair stood on end and my body tingled.
I quickly realised I had just walked over the first mass grave site…a moment I shall never forget.
The sweetest of song to escape from the Sistine Chapel…
The Choir of Claire College, Cambridge.
I had the joy of listening to a performance last year
at Douai Abbey, Woolhampton, Berkshire.
Sweet sweet tears…
The choir of King’s College, Cambridge sing this lovely Easter hymn.
I remember this well from my childhood in Scotland.
“Mrs Cecil Frances Alexander wrote this hymn as she sat up one night with her seriously sick daughter. Many times, traveling to town to shop, she had passed a small grassy mound, just outside the old city wall of Derry, Ireland. It always made her think of Calvary, and it came to mind as she wrote this hymn.”
There Is a Green Hill Far Away.
Music by William Horsley.
There is a green hill far away,
without a city wall,
where our dear Lord was crucified
who died to save us all.
We may not know, we cannot tell,
what pains he had to bear,
but we believe it was for us
he hung and suffered there.
He died that we might be forgiven,
he died to make us good,
that we might go at last to heaven,
saved by his precious blood.
There was no other good enough
to pay the price of sin,
he only could unlock the gate
of heaven and let us in.
O dearly, dearly has he loved!
And we must love him too,
and trust in his redeeming blood,
and try his works to do.
Unlike most wildlife documentaries this two part BBC delight focuses intimately on one man’s life committed to rescue and nurture of Joeys, baby Kangaroos orphaned in their mother’s pouch, forgotten live victims of roadkill, and his devotion to feeding them, socializing them and eventually setting them free or introducing them to his life’s work reserve and his rescue ‘Mob’…solitary work 24/7, always alert to the danger of dog packs or wild fire in his tin shack and fenced off land near Alice Springs…More of a man than Crocodile Dundee BECAUSE he declares himself MOTHER to these wee tiny needy creatures, who would perish without his care, understanding & love.
The view inside a Kangaroo pouch, bean like baby clamped on teat, and the improvised pillowcase pouches essential for the gangly, needy growing Joeys and the snuggledown time at night…contrasting with the fierce fights he has to escape from, as a once rescue baby, now top Roo in his Mob, shows his muscles and killer strength…tremendous!
I salvaged this Crabtree & Evelyn oily body spray from my dear departed Mother’s things, and am enchanted…Today I ordered a room spray from CRABTREE & EVELYN’s web site, free postage for Saint Valentine’s Day…the day I was Christened in Glasgow Cathedral 1960.
My dear sister bought me their Evelyn Rose hand & body cream and it is intoxicating…
GLASGOW CATHEDRAL xxx
From a poem by Christina Rossetti…x
abelmoir 
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