JAMES OUTRAM FRASER, born in 1886, was the third son of Annie Palmer who at twenty-three became the bride of a young Scotsman, already making his way as a veterinary surgeon. The bridegroom, James Fraser, was a Highlander by birth, whose grandparents had emigrated to Canada when the then Duke of Sutherland evicted not a few of the crofters on his estate to make space for a deer forest. These farmer folk had character as well as godliness, and in spite of prolonged hardships founded a flourishing community near Hamilton, Ontario. Here it was, almost within sound of Niagara Falls, that young Fraser grew to manhood, developing gifts which carried him through a successful university career, first in Montreal and afterwards in Edinburgh.
‘Send me your best student,’ wrote a veterinary surgeon in Yorkshire to the Principal of the Edinburgh college.
It was James Fraser who was sent.
This unexpected development decided the young Canadian to remain in England rather than return to Canada. By dint of hard work he did well, bought a practice of his own and before long was in a position to marry. It was then his good fortune to meet Annie Palmer, who was attracted by his fine personality and Christian principles. And the attraction was mutual, though the sweet, quiet girl had neither Scottish nor Canadian ancestry.
Descended on her mother’s side from Thomas Rossell, leading member of a settlement of Moravians still found at Ockbrook in Derbyshire, she had inherited much of his upright and generous character. His son, Edward Rossell, had literary taste and was popular on the hunting field, but he was unsuccessful as a farmer. His property having to be sold up he fell back upon writing, chiefly on antiquarian subjects for reviews and journals. This meant hardship for his children, one of whom became Annie Palmer’s mother.
Early left an orphan, this bright, attractive Fanny Rossell was adopted by an uncle in Nottinghamshire into a congenial group of cousins and their kin. Twelve or more young people growing up together on neighboring farms had plenty of good times as well as thoroughly practical training. Among the boys, William Palmer, two years her senior, was Fanny’s special friend. Eager to make his way in the world, he joined relatives in Canada, but work on the land proved too much for his strength. The home-pull was strong; and when he returned to the scenes of his childhood it was to find an unexpected opening with the Midland Railway―and the love of early years unchanged. The outcome was the singularly happy marriage of the young station master with Fanny Rossell.
Of these beloved parents Mrs. Fraser found it difficult to speak in later years without seeming to say too much. The building and brick-making business which brought them to London prospered greatly, and Mr. Palmer became a considerable employer of labor. There, too, in London, he was brought into the full rest of faith as a Christian which he had long sought. The experience mellowed and sweetened an already beautiful character, and conquered the natural reserve which had hampered his intercourse with others. From that time his life was a constant overflow of loving Christlike ministries.
‘No man ever had a better master,’ said one of his workers in the brickfield. ‘He was an angel from heaven to everyone who had anything to do with him.’
His employees stayed with him year after year, and many were the personal kindnesses done so quietly that only the sorrow of his passing revealed them.
With all this he had a kind of quiet humour [his daughter recalls] and enjoyed fun immensely, so long as it was harmless. I never heard him say an unkind word of anyone. His sensitive, refined nature showed itself in his very appearance.... There was a quiet dignity in his bearing that came of high moral character and a nature in which nothing mean or selfish ever found place. He carried with him an air of purity and nobleness, so much so that anything unworthy was rebuked by his very presence. Yet his humility was just as manifest. Tender-hearted though he was, his moral and physical courage were very marked. He never shirked anything he felt to be his duty. To my young heart, his loving nature interpreted our Heavenly Father’s love.
Of all his forbears, this grandfather was the one James O. Fraser most resembled. With his own father’s fine physique and strength of character, he had the disposition of William Palmer and a large share of his musical and artistic gifts. Jim was five years of age when his parents moved to St. Albans, to occupy the spacious house they had planned and built. The father was by that time absorbingly busy. He saw little of his children, for to his responsibilities as Vice-President of the College of Veterinary Surgeons (England) he had added political activities that brought him into prominence. He was an able public speaker, and was twice offered to be taken up as a candidate for Parliament: but his private practice was too clamant. Evening prayers he conducted daily with the household; but it was the mother who made home for the young people, four boys and two girls, and kept them the united group they were all through school and college days. And few mothers can have had a more rewarding task.
For the Fraser children were warmhearted as well as gifted above the average. The breakfast room in the big house was their special domain, and there Mrs. Fraser lived with them in all their interests. She was cultured in her tastes and was their first teacher in music and drawing. She read to them and talked with them often about the things that matter most. She studied carefully beforehand for the lessons on the life of Christ which went home to their hearts, and through her own love for foreign missions interested them in the advance of the kingdom of God. She did not tell them that she had long prayed that one at least of her children might become a missionary. Did she think of James especially in this connection― strong and loving among that promising group? In his pioneer days in China he wrote of his missionary call being due to his mother’s prayers. But in the old home at St. Albans he was a somewhat dreamy though venturesome boy.
While he was still a child, the foundation stone of a new Wesleyan Chapel was being laid, just opposite their home. Jim could not see the proceedings for the crowd; so he disappeared and was discovered not long after standing boldly out on the narrow parapet that ran round the roof of the house, quite unconscious of the dismay his dangerous position occasioned.
Music was his passion, and his persistence came out in more than one way in this connection. He knew of his mother’s love for the great masters and determined to spend his little all in obtaining a bust of Beethoven to give her pleasure. This he ordered from a music shop in the town, little expecting to have to wait months for its arrival. Five months is a long time to a boy of twelve, especially when it concerns a great surprise. But Jim appeared at the shop, week after week, and could not be discouraged. At last the beautiful thing arrived―a small white bust of the noble head of the musician. Then patience was rewarded in the loving appreciation of his gift—which still adorned that dear mother’s desk, forty years later. The tie between them was always one of unusual closeness, though Jim took his full share in the endless interests of the family.
Out of school hours, they must have worked hard to produce their little monthly magazine, price one farthing, with its pictures, music, puzzles and serial stories, and a lively Table of Contents on the illuminated cover. To this Jim contributed drawings and musical compositions. His bent of mind appeared also in ‘The Marvel Two-penny Atlas,’ another of their efforts, with ten pages of maps, brightly colored and surprisingly accurate. A list also remains in his handwriting of all the counties of England, made from memory, before he was six years old.
When photography became the rage, Mrs. Fraser had no fewer than five camera enthusiasts about her. Jim and his favorite cousin established The Imperial Photographic Company Limited, sending the following letter to all shareholders:
Dear Sir or Madam, We, the above company, hereby acknowledge the receipt of 4d. on January 5, 1900, from which you will receive a dividend of 5 percent.
Signed―Hon. Sec., J. O. Fraser.
Hon. Treas., A. W. Bourne.
The Company had By-Laws which included one to the effect that ‘persons having ordered photographs are obliged to pay for them.’ This bore hard upon one of the household more distinguished for good nature than for beauty, who had allowed herself to be photographed. Dismayed at the result, she would have declined the picture, but By-Law Number Two was brought into force:
If the Company takes a photo which is perfectly finished but does not give satisfaction, because of the fault of the person photographed, he or she will have to purchase the photo.
Another, no doubt equally necessary regulation was: ‘No person must meddle or in any way damage the Company’s materials.’ But catastrophe was not to be avoided―for the Company’s affairs were wound up long before the dividend fell due.
What grand times the young people had with their music on winter evenings and outdoor sports in summer! The program of one Christmas concert given at home shows that all but the youngest took part in violin and piano solos, duets and trios, recitations and songs. Cycling was also a family recreation, for they would often make excursions together, or ride over to Barnet. where after his retirement from business their grandfather kept open house. Great were the attractions of the lovely garden and Mrs. Palmer’s perfect housekeeping, but the welcome that always awaited them and the atmosphere of loving sympathy meant even more to those young hearts.
As Jim grew older, he developed powers of endurance that were to stand him in good stead in many an emergency. ‘He once walked to London and back, forty-four miles in one day, and on another occasion rode a hundred and ninety-nine miles on his bicycle, without dismounting.’ In his studies he was equally persevering. The Master at St. Albans Grammar School had to make a special class for him in mathematics, and after three years at a school in Sheffield, he passed the London University Matriculation twelfth in all England.
His love of music showed itself from childhood in the pains he took to master its difficulties. He learned under good teachers and so made his own the works he studied that, even as a boy, he could play the best classical music, hour after hour, with no notes before him. His enjoyment of Symphony Concerts in London during the Season was correspondingly keen. It is not difficult to imagine the eagerness with which he and his musical sister, Millicent, would ride up together on their bicycles for those enchanted hours in the great city.
Vacations from college brought other enjoyments that left a mark on life.
One year [recalls Millicent] Jim and I and Aleck Bourne had a cycling tour. We took train to Shrewsbury, then cycled all through North Wales and down to Torquay on the coast of Devon―a rapturous time! I was eighteen then, and the boys two years younger.
Jim was such good company―so interesting to talk with! He had an alert mind, and was sympathetic toward other people’s ideas and had a keen sense of humor. He was original too, and in no bondage to conventions.
For a Sheffield concert, he once secured a seat in the orchestra. When it was over and everybody was going out, the grand piano―a fine instrument―proved too great a temptation! The orchestra was empty and he stepped down and began to play. At once the disappearing audience took seats again―for of course his touch was exceptional. But when he found everybody stopping, he stopped too.
School gave place to University, and through it all the inward life was deepening. Not that the Frasers ever said much about spiritual things. They were brought up to read the Bible and go to church regularly. James became organist at a small Methodist Chapel, where he also attended a Class Meeting and taught in the Sunday School. But there was an influence deeper than these through all those formative years, an influence that told on life. The reality of prayer and the strength it gave could not be questioned by the thoughtful boy in that St. Albans home. There were trials in the life of the mother he so deeply loved that he could not fully understand, but he did see and know the source of her strength. Sacred to that son was the sense of an Unseen Presence, when his mother came from the place of secret prayer, renewed again and again in the peace ‘that passeth understanding.’