James Murray (1721-1794)
Murray fought under the command of General James Wolfe in the attack on French Quebec in 1759. Following Wolfe's death in battle on the plains of Abraham, he became Governor of Quebec and, ultimately, when the French troops surrendered, Governor of British Canada. Murray was intimately connected with Hastings, in part due to his marriage in 1748 to Cordelia Sayer, the daughter of Hastings Mayor and lawyer, John Collier. Becoming a freeman and Jurat of the Borough in 1757, he owned much property in Hastings that included the Swan Inn and Bohemia Farm. In the 1780s Murry built Beauport Park near Battle, and named it after the Quarter of Quebec in which he had been stationed. He died at Beauport in 1794.
He is buried in the apse of the now ruined Old St Helen's Church, Hastings.
