| Chapter #4
WILLIAM DREVER
William Drever was born on March 21, 1865, at a house called Homer or Hammer in North Pharay, when he was very small his father died and when he was four his mother died also, leaving seven children. His aunt, Eliza Harcus Burger, took William and brought him up at her house in the north end of the island known as Cott. She took his brother, little Gillies, across to her brother Gillies in Stronsay, and other uncles took the boys who were not old enough to work for themselves.
William was undoubtedly a happy little boy, deeply fond of Aunt Eliza and of his cousins, Billy, Tomima and Catherine. They went to the stone school down tho road, carrying each morning a peat or two under their arm to keep the school's fires in the open fireplaces going. They helped with tho jobs around the farm, and William often went out in holiday time to mind his uncle's flock of sheep, to see that it did not stray into neighbours' fields. Aunt Eliza would pack his lunch and put in the basket either a Bible or a volume of Robert Burns' poems, many of which he could still recite fifty years later. With him too would go one of the little Orkney Collies, and for many years in Canada he continued to keep Collies out of the love that had begun for them when he had those long, long summer days with a collie for company.
No doubt the boys longed for the time when they would be allowed to join the men on their fishing expeditions. Indeed William did go along on one of these and later nearly died from illness brought on by exposure to unexpectedly severe weather. Aunt Eliza nursed him back to health and he remembered vividly the quantities of pure cod liver oil he consumed then. William Burger said in 1953 that as boys they used to sleep together and that his cousin's asthmatic coughing spells were so severe that he doubted if he would live to manhood.
When William was little he sailed his model fishing smack, the "Naomi", in the "mackle" well at Cott and no doubt threw stones (or tried to) into the crow's nest high up in the Surrie Geo. Later he learned to climb the cliffs on the Atlantic side of the island in search of birds' eggs. You may still see the Fulmar Petrels and countless other birds nesting there but now there are no small boys to steal their eggs. Perhaps the boys watched for baby seals to play with for a time on Their beach. You may be very sure the little Williams at Cott kept a sharp eye out for any timbers or other treasure which might come ashore after a severe storm.
Soon the time came for him to go away and at first he tried the baking business in Edinburgh, but his boyhood bronchial weakness caught up with him and he found that he could not stand the extremes of heat and cold that a baker's apprentice met as he ran from the ovens down the street with trays of fresh bread. So he went back to Kirkwall and served his "time" as a cabinet-maker, staying during this period with his cousin, David Harsus, who later came to Oakwood in Ontario.
In July, 1888, he went to Lerwick in the Shetland Islands with his friend William R. Logie (who died in Palmerston, Ontario, at the age of 92 in 1957) and worked there for a year. Then the two boys emigrated together to Hamilton, Ontario. Here is his own story of the crossing in 1889, possibly in May of that years:
"We left Kirkwall per the St. Magnus for Leith about ll p.m. Wind North and snow falling in a great quantity. Ship crowded with passengers and the most part of them belonging to Shetland. Arrived at Aberdeen 12 midnight, we had to walk up through Aberdeen. It was moonlight and we had a fine view of the town. It is a fine-1ike place, for the most part built of granite. We leave Aberdeen about 5 a.m. and arrive at Leith about 12 noon where I am met by Mrs. Drever. We take the train for the Waverley Station and after getting my luggage booked we leave for home. After spending a week in Edinburgh with Mrs. Drever, during which time I visited my friends in Leith and Edinburgh and along with R. Tulloch visit the waxworks (?) and with W. Logie visit the Museum and the Castle we leave for Glasgow on Thursday by the 11.30 train, It being a fine day we have a splendid view as we came along in the train.
We arrive at the Queen Street Station in Glasgow at 2 p.m. We are met by Mr. James Harcus who guided us to the Allan Line Office and thence to the wharf where the steamboat is lying. (William never at any time calls the boat anything but "the steamboat.” Strange“ D.D.) After seeing our luggage (W.D.'s consisted in part of a wooden sea chest. It now forms part of the bookshelf in D. D.'s bedroom) put all right I return home with Mr. J. Harcus and have a view of the principal streets. We are up at 5 a.m. next morning and have breakfast and then start for the ship and go on board at 7 a.m., sail at 7.30. we drop anchor at Greenoch at 9 a.m. Then after getting breakfast which is at Irish stew, coffee, breed and butter, here the ship goes under the Board of Trade supervisors, and rocket apparatus is fired and the life boats are manned. We have dinner which is soup and beef and bread. Then we wait the turn of the tide and have tea which is tea, bread and
butter. Then anchor is weighed and we steam down the Clyde in all its splendor, we see the “Great Eastern" lying in the bay, we are supplied with plenty of music, the bagpipes, the fiddler and accordion. Dancing is commenced at 7 (?) and kept up until stopped by the Stewarts at 8 o'c1ock as the time for Female passengers to go below. Then we are all sent down by darkness and we may bid adieu to Scot1and's bonny hills for we will be out of sight in the morning.
"Saturday - fine morning. The wind is from the west, we are in sight of Ireland. Go down and have breakfast. Then a Pilot is taken on board and we steam up Lock Fyle and drop anchor about 15 miles from Londonderry at a place called M.. a good-like little village wall surrounded with trees. We get dinner about 12. Then we lie waiting the tug from Londonderry with the passengers. During that time the females are busy with the skipping ropes. Then the tug named Samson comes along side with about one hundred and thirty passengers and they are taken on board and there is two stowaways found and they are sent ashore with the tug. The anchor is weighed about 3 p.m. We then steam down the Loch and full speed is put on the ship. There is some dancing going on all day. During the evening we have a view of the west coast of Ireland and darkness comes on and we now take our farewell of Arena Isle for it will be many miles out of sight in morning. The day is fine and wind is from the west.
Sunday - Up at 7 a.m. Fine morning. Wind from the N.W, There is breakfast served at 8 a.m. Just the same kind of food as yesterday. A11 passengers ordered on deck and soon the heavy swell makes effect on the passengers for we see lots of them beginning with seasickness. Dinner is served at twelve: soup, beef, and bread and pudding. Ship is making 20 knots. About 4 o'clock wind is rising and heavy sea beginning. Two stowaways come up from among the coal as black as sweeps. Teatime only about 20 sit down to tea. The rest are either in their bunks or else sitting above the deck vomiting. In a short time we are racked to sleep.
“Monday. Weather feather. Wind north slipping about west. Carrying spanker sail. Still some seasickness. Pottage and molasses for breakfast today. There is a little of dancing going on today. The bushing of the smoke condensers is done and the steam is taken off the ship and she is going before the wind for about a halt hour. Nothing of importance today.
"Thursday. The weather is stormy and the sea very heavy. While Bill Logie and me was looking at a steamboat passing she shipped a sea that wet most everyone on everyone deck. I spent the rest of the day in the bunk reading. Ship only going easy ahead.
"Friday, I have got no sleep last night for the ship rolling as I did not get up for breakfast today but I have a breakfast of good Orkney cheese and oat cakes. There is no pleasure an deck today for the sea is breaking over the ship and running from stem to stern. The gale still continues and the ship is still going easy ahead. Wind from the North West. One birth on board today. Another wife for some man if she lives. 8 o'lock wind some less and passengers begin to show themselves an desk again for a smoke before they go to bed.
"Tuesday weather fair. Wind west. Fresh breezes. Speed 10½ knots. Seasickness appears to be a good bit better today. The tickets is collected. At 10 a.m. there is a raffle of a pipe and a tobacco pouch and about thirty tickets sold. The tickets is drawn at eight and 36 is the winning number, an Irish girl and she is giving it to what appears to be her sweetheart. Dancing is carried on with great spirit today. We have had the pleasure of seeing an Irish national war dance by six natives also an Irish Jig by two natives. There seem to be everyone enjoying themselves. The day has passed away very quick and we have to go below.
"Wednesday. I am up at half past six, have a wash, and than get breakfast. Weather fair wind weat. There is some seasickness today but still I am free but I feel very little appetite for food. I spend the day in reading. We see a brig passing today.
"Saturday. Up at six. Weather a little better this morning but not very smooth sea yet. I see another stowaway at work today. We saw four ships passing today. Towards night the wind increaseth from the North. Course W. and N. Ship making 10½ knots.
"Sunday. Weather unsettled. Up at six and get a wash. We pass four steam ships today. They signal, one of them being one of the Cunard steamers. There is two services today. I only manage to get to one of them. The Captain gives a lot of small books and tracts to be dispersed among the passengers. There is a collection in aid of the lifeboat fund taken at the service today which is liberally supported. The day in spent sitting about the deck reading.”
They landed at Philadelphia and went to visit Will Drever's sister Mary. Then on by train to Hamilton, Ontario, where they stayed about a year. They were delighted with ice-boat sailing on Hamilton bay and the first winter they did not find the Canadian climate cold. Eventually William Logie found permanent employment in Listowel and William Drever went to Guelph to work as a cabinetmaker at the Guelph Piano and Organ Company. (He did the cabinet work on D. D.'s piano.)
In Guelph William fell in lave with Elizabeth Fairley, one of three sisters who lived at 120 Ontario Street. Her father was Benjamin Fairley of Scotland and her mother was Elizabeth Kribs of Elora. They had two children, Arlatta and Roy. Elizabeth was ill for some years and died when Arletta was in her early teens. Later William married Mary Flaming and their daughter was Dorothy. Letta meantime had gone to Galt and later to Calgary where she met and married Harry Camit of Chicago.
By 1910, twenty years after his arrival in Canada, William was entering a phase of public service which was to continue until his death. At that time he was elected to represent St. Patrick's ward on the Beard of Education of the City of Guelph. In addition we find his name on the list of officers of Knox Presbyterian Church as one of two congregational representatives on the Music Committee. Latter he was a member of the church's committee of management until "Church Union“. William believed that Canada was not a country that could afford to indulge in sectarianism and therefore supported Church Union of the Methodist, Presbyterian, and Congregational Churches of Canada quietly moving to Chalmers United Church when Knox voted to remain Presbyterian.
In the year 1910 he also took the first degree in the Masonic Order, Speed Lodge, 180 on Feb. 20. He was to take the second degree on Feb, 25, 1911, the third on Apr. 18, 1911, and he became a member of the Scottish Rite on Oct, 20, 1920.
William had a term as president of the Trades and Labour Council of Guelph, and was a member of the Piano, Organ and Musical Instrument workers International Union of America (A. F. of L.) until his death. In his inaugural address as president he said that he looked forward to an increasing degree of co-operation between management and labour. He held the No. 1 share and of course a number of others, in the Peoples' Co-operative store venture in Guelph. By December of 1913 he was a member of the Board of Parks Management of the City of Guelph, and had a great deal to do with the establishment of Lyon Park on the Speed Rives in St. Patrick's Ward and its later development. He was active in the Guelph Horticultural Society.
One of the very happiest periods of his life occurred in 1912 when he made his one
visit home to Orkney. He sailed on June 1st on the S. S. Cassandra from Montreal to Glasgow, returning on the S. S. Athenia which sailed from Glasgow on the 20th of July. Aunt Eliza was still alive, indeed she was to outlive her nephew, and she delighted him by singing for him again, and by giving him the satin neck kerchief worn by John Harcus at his wedding in 1825 to Jean Drummond. At this time William Burgar was still living on Pharay, so he was able to return to the house he had known so well, to find his model sailing ship and give it to little Robert who would also sail it in the muckle well.
He visited Gillies Drever, his brother, now a tailor on Junction Read in Kirkwall. Lily wrote many years later "I do remember your Dad used to deliver little “orations” standing on the kitchen floor that even impressed me though I was only 9 years old. I remember well wondering where he got all his information from about Britain and the British way of life when he had bean so long away. But I thought he could fairly air his opinion anyway and I greatly admired him for an uncle though I felt awed to silence and awful fits of fright when he addressed myself and wished the floor would open and cover me up. That of course was largely due to our upbringing, never being allowed to meet strangers. Looking over our Dad's old papers we came across notes on subjects he had spoken an when he was much younger in the Y. M. C. A. It was interesting to read the articles and we thought them good. So there must have been a trait for public speaking in them both too I think ...? (Actually William never at any time ‘aired his opinions" in public without having the selfsame awful fits of fright that Lily had. (D. D.)
Many of his cousins were still living in Scotland, so it was a very busy five or six weeks he spent in the old country. The steamship journey he enjoyed as keenly as ever. He appreciated to the full the improvement in the menus in the 23 years since he had crossed the Atlantic before, and came home with his fine Roman nose well sunburned from his walks about the deck. And with gifts too? Yes, indeed. For Grandma Fleming a grey Orkney shawl (fine knitted woolen lace), for Dorothy a tiny set of do1l's dishes, and for his wife Mary the lovely yellow rose Limoges tea set, the brass candlesticks, a white Orkney shawl, and a copper jardiniere.
Then came the tragedy of Roy's death in December of 1913, after an unsuccessful operation for appendicitis. Mary Drever said in the l950's that she believed that Roy would have been treated as a “blue baby“ and survived had he lived at the present time. Letta was all broken up over it and soon afterwards Harry and Letta came to Guelph and stayed until after the birth of Marjorie, when they went to Chicago to live.
William continued to live in "Rosedale Cottage“ and nothing that Mary could do would persuade him to move "uptown". He was passionately fond of gardening and when you visit Orkney and see the difficulty with which gardens there are produced, it is easy to guess that the tulips and peonies and roses at Rosedale Cottage may have been Wil1iam's compensation for leaving the sea. He always said that he felt safe in a boat than in anything on wheels, although he had his doubts about the design of some of the Chicago ferry boats.
The visits of Letta and Harry and their family to Guelph and the two trips which William, Mary and daughter Dorothy made to Chicago were unquestionably the highlights of William's later years. He was immensely proud of his grandchildren and they were an endless source of delight to him.
On June 20, 1926, as he was coming home from work by bicycle the accident occurred which resulted in his death a scant hour or so later in the Guelph General Hospital. There were many to mourn his death, but perhaps apart from his family, near and far, he was missed most by his friends in St. Patrick's Ward for whom he had worked so hard in all his years of public service and who had watched him for so many years off to work on his "wheel" or to church on Sunday on foot swinging his well polished cane.
Later that year, Charles Dawson, the oldest member of the Guelph Board of Education, read the following resolution, which was passed by the Board:
"Whereas after a continuous membership on the Board since the your 1910, it has pleased Almighty God to take unto Himself our esteemed colleague, William Drover,
“And whereas during his long term of trusteeship as one of the representatives from St. Patrick's Ward the deceased rendered faithful services as a member of the Board, chairman of the School Management Committee and presiding officer (Chairman of the Board itself).
"And whereas the late William Drever's record throughout his association with the board is that of duty well done, coupled with that high sense of his obligations as a trustee, has served to make him of the greatest service to education and caused him to be held in the highest esteem by his colleagues.
"Therefore be it resolved that this Board place on record its sincere regret at the untimely death of the late William Drover, its sense of loss in his departure, and its deep sympathy with the bereaved widow and family in their sorrow."
John Hercus was to write from Glasgow: "I shall always remember dear cousin William as one of tho most kind-hearted and lovable of men, always bright and cheery, "one of the best." Or in the moving words of Mary Burgar from Fersness in Eday where Aunt Eliza was still living sitting in her hooded Orkney chair by the hearth. "When we told her we had got the letter and that there was not good news she said, “Is Willie away?“ meaning dead. He was always to her as one of her own, and to us as a brother, for our Willie never had one.“
Willie was indeed away, leaving a good inheritance, the memory or his life as he lived it day by day, a merciful man whose righteousness will not be forgotten.
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