Dictionary of Glengarry Biography

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====== Morphy, Arthur George Morphy ====== 
 (died 8 Nov. 1952, aged 87), physician. Born in London, Ont. The future physician served in the North-West Rebellion of 1885, with the Queen’s own rifles of Toronto. He graduated in medicine from McGill in 1891, having also a B. A. degree from the University of Toronto. He practised medicine at Lachine, Que., till 1914, and thereafter, over many years, in Montreal.

<tab>Whether or not Dr Morphy ever lived in GC, he was the leading figure among the founders of the Lovatt Hall Sanatorium, which was begun in the old house of John McLennan the MP, near Lancaster. Nominally an institution for treatment of the milder forms of mental illness, it seems to have been, in practice, an institution for alcoholics. It was opened officially in Jan. 1930, but may have been in operation from about 1928. At the time of the official opening in 1930, Dr Morphy was the president of the institution, and he was described as being from Lachine and Montreal, and from the Royal Victoria Hospital, Montreal. The institution attracted local hostility, and the report has been handed down that it was managed in a disorderly way, and that drink continued to be a problem within its walls. In July 1931 a coroner’s jury, of which the foreman was Archibald Browne the painter, relieved the Lovatt Hall authorities of all responsibility for the suicide of a patient, whose body had been washed ashore at South Lancaster. (//Cornwall Freeholder// 4 and 8 July 1931) However, another patient was reported at this time to have committed suicide by drowning the previous October, and there are traditions about a patient killed by traffic on the road. Whatever the exact facts about these deaths, and whether there were three deaths or only two, it is likely that these events were a cause of the closing of the Hall not long after.

<tab>Dr Morphy also organized the Montreal School for Epileptics. In 1945 he retired from his Montreal medical practice. He died in Montreal at the Royal Victoria Hospital, where till his death he had the rank of honourary attending neorologist. (three children) He married (1) Mary Emily Magor (d. 1925), and (2) Ida Simpson.


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<fs small>//Glengarry News// 14 Nov. 1952 * information from the late Howard Pattingale, late 1970s, present author’s notes * Ross, //Lancaster//, 317 * Lovatt Hall opens, //Cornwall Freeholder// 7 Dec. 1929, 8 Jan. 1930 
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