Muriel Robertson, 1883-1973

Muriel Robertson was born on 8 April 1883, in Glasgow. Although she grew up in that city and spent the greater part of her professional life in London, she had a deeply rooted affection for Limavady in Northern Ireland and it was there that she died. The history of her family suggests the sources from which she derived her versatility, her vitality and her keen intellect. She was the seventh child and the fourth girl in a family of twelve, who all grew up. Her father, Robert Andrew Robertson, was born in London in 1842, the son of Andrew Robertson of Kelso who, after studying for the ministry in Scotland, became a schoolmaster in London. Her paternal grandmother, Isabella Riddell, of a Border family in the south of Scotland, died before Muriel was born, but she believed that her father must have inherited his quick, lively temperament from her, for he was entirely different from his inhibited and dour father. Muriel’s mother, Elizabeth Ritter, was born in Australia in 1851 where her parents had settled immediately after their marriage. They prospered rapidly and the family returned to England after five years and settled in London. The history of Muriel’s mother’s family is well documented by a set of family letters and papers stretching over one hundred and fifty years. Nevertheless there is a certain legendary element in the history of Muriel’s maternal grandfather. Elizabeth Ritter, Muriel’s mother, was the first child of Edward Frederick Christian Ritter and Jane Alexander of Limavady. Ritter can be described as a somewhat romantic figure and, according to the family tradition, was the son of a Prussian officer in the German army that entered France at the time of the fall of Napoleon and of a French lady of Toulouse.