Richard Gray, Mary Gray (née Monro), and Mrs. Monro
Richard Gray was a Scotsman who pursued a career much like that of
John James Ruskin.
In
1812, when
John James was growing frustrated with his position in the wine firm,
Gordon, Murphy & Company, he remarked to his mother that “
Gray is doing a great deal at
Lisbon & is a Merchant of consequence
now . . . I look upon his fortune as made” (
John James to Catherine Ruskin, 5 October 1812, in
Burd, ed., Ruskin Family Letters, 1:58).
In
Praeterita,
Ruskin also characterizes
Richard as resembling his father
in the “scholarly love of good literature”, and even exceeding him in “romantic sentiment”.
Gray probably helped
John James navigate foreign life in
Spain and
Portugal,
when
John James traveled there sometime between
1815 and 1817
to learn about sherry production (
Ruskin, Works, 35:100;
Viljoen, Ruskinʼs Scottish Heritage, 238–39 n. 14;
Burd, ed., Ruskin Family Letters, 59–60 n. 8).
It was during
Grayʼs time in
Lisbon, according to
Ruskin in
Praeterita,
that he met and married
Mary Monro, an “extremely good and beautiful Scotch girl”
(
Ruskin, Works, 35:100).
Later, the Grays and the Ruskins became neighbors when, in
1823,
John James had become securely positioned with his own firm, Ruskin, Telford, & Domecq,
and he moved his family to the house atop
Herne Hill in the
London suburb of
Camberwell.
Mary and
Richard Gray were either then already established in
Camberwell or would soon purchase their property, 2 Grove Hill Terrace.
(
Dearden suggests that the Grays arrived in
Camberwell after the Ruskins had settled in
Herne Hill;
however, a
letter by Margaret Ruskin to John James, 30 January 1822, indicates that the Grays were then already living in
Camberwell,
Margaret taking
John there for an extended stay, away from the Ruskinsʼ
London house in
Hunter Street
[
John Ruskinʼs Camberwell, 23;
Burd, ed., Ruskin Family Letters, 107].)
Also members of the Graysʼ
Camberwell household,
Ruskin adds in
Praeterita, were
Maryʼs mother, “old Mrs. Monro” and her “white French poodle, Petite”
(
Ruskin, Works, 35:101).
Mrs. Monro, too, was a prior acquaintance. In
1821, for example,
Margaret wrote to
John James describing a visit by “Mrs. Gray & Mrs. Monro”
to the Ruskinsʼ
Hunter Street house, during which
Mary sat with
John
“on the drawing room floor very deeply engrossed” in teaching
John to play the flute
(
Burd, ed., Ruskin Family Letters, 100–101).
Since the Gray household proved childless, the Grays and
Mrs. Monro continued to take great interest in
Johnʼs development,
when living near the Ruskins in
Camberwell (see
Burd, ed., Ruskin Family Letters, 59–60 n. 8).
Mrs. Monro is presumably the addressee of
Ruskinʼs ca.
1829 Letter to Mrs. Monro,
copied in
MS II. However, while
Mary Grayʼs mother seems the likeliest addressee of
Ruskinʼs letter,
it is possible that another
Mrs. Monro was intended—namely, the wife of
Robert Monro, who was a brother of
Maryʼs.
The maiden name of this
Mrs. Monro was Dowie. All three families—the Grays, the Monros, and the Dowies—were
lifelong friends of the Ruskins
(see
Burd, ed., Ruskin Family Letters, 1:100. 101 n. 5, 121, 123 n. 4).