Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 24 March 1916 Letters 1916-1923 William S. McKee

This work was originally published by Maynooth University in Ireland in 2017. In 2026 this data, stored in a relational database was extracted and converted into this TEI/XML document.

 Austrian Centre for Digital Humanities Vienna, AT 2026

This is an open access work licensed under Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC 4.0).

This is a letter from William S McKee (b. 1836) to Colonel Frederick Hugh Crawford (1861-1952) McKee has recently left the employment at A. Crawford & Sons and clearly Crawford has continued to send him his full salary. McKee writes to thank him for the money but protests at Crawford's generosity.Born in in Belfast, County Antrim, to a Methodist family, Frederick Hugh Crawford was an engineer, soldier and a gun runner. He smuggled German guns into Larne, Bangor and Donaghadee in 1914 for the Ulster Volunteer Force. William McKee was the long time manager of A. Crawford & Sons starch manufacturers, a firm founded by Crawford's grandfather.

 Public Record Office of Northern Ireland Crawford Papers, D/1700/5/17/1/129 https://letters1916.ie/item/429 English William S. McKee 1916-03-24 Mossvale, Bangor, County Down, Ireland Frederick Hugh Crawford Wilson Street, Belfast, County Antrim, Ireland Male Industry and Public Administration

The data in these XML files was generated based on a data dump from the Magellan database (https://github.com/Maynooth-Center-for-Digital-Humanities/Magellan). Each database record has been converted to a JSON file (https://github.com/letters1916static/letters-data/tree/main/json). The element section of the JSON file contains the TEI-encoded contents of the letters. The TEI XML has been cleaned and made well-formed using a Python script (https://github.com/letters1916static/letters-data/tree/main/src).

 MOSSVALE, BANGOR, CO. DOWN March 24/16 Dear Col. Crawford I yesterday received from Ernestmy usual weekly drawing,& must thank you for your goodnessin telling him to pay this amountto me whether at the office or not. I know this is only in keepingwith all the kindness you haveshewn me, both before & sinceyour father died, but as I amfully aware that any business you have, can be carried onperfectly well without me I feel it would not be fair to take this money in view of your present financial difficulties. Ernest is really doing all the work & will naturally & fairly expect more salary than he now has & as I will be perfectly satisfied & content with half my usual wages, you can at once give him an advance without in the least increasing the office expenses in any way. I need hardly say that it is most painful for me to be obliged to give up my position in the old firm, after such a long and pleasant service. With all the several members of the firm I have always had the happiest relations and I feel I owe them more than it would ever be possible for me to repay, if I were to live for a century longer. I cannot however get over the fact that I am now in my 80 th year & that I no longer feel that I am fit to take on great responsibilities in connection with business. I am not given to complaining about my health but I must say that I never felt any winter so severely as this one, and I am almost certain that only for your kindness in giving me shorter hours & a whole Saturday holiday, I would not have been able to hold out so long. I need hardly say that anything it is in my power to do for you or the firm in any way, I shall always be ready to do. I am counting on feeling better when the weather improves & when I will be able to take more outside exercise than is now possible. With kind regards Ever yours truly W. S. McKee Bangor 25 Mar 16 Private Colonel F. H. Crawford, A Crawford & Son, Wilson St., Belfast. William S. McKee Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 24 March 1916Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 31 March 1916 Frederick Hugh Crawford Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 24 March 1916Letter from Frederick Hugh Crawford to Lady Ruby Carson, 8 March 1916Letter from Frederick Hugh Crawford to Edward Carson, 8 March 1916Letter from John Robert Wilson to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 16 April 1916.Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 31 March 1916Letter from Frederick Hugh Crawford to Lady Ruby Carson, 28 February 1916 Wilson Street, Belfast, County Antrim, Ireland Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 24 March 1916 Mossvale, Bangor, County Down, Ireland Letter from William S. McKee to Frederick Hugh Crawford, 24 March 1916