When the troops sent by General Gage from New York arrived in Boston and were refused shelter in various places under control of the disunionists, Mr. Murray came forward and the sugar house was opened to them for barracks. Thenceforth "Murray's Barracks" or "Smith's Barracks," as they were indiscriminately called, were a source of irritation to the disloyal section of the town. Moreover, his willingness to lodge British soldiers, and a free hospitality shown to British officers (among others who frequented his house was General Mackay, a relative, probably, of his wife) marked Mr. Murray as a King's man. His appointment in 1768 as a Justice of the Peace drew him still further into public notice. Popular displeasure in fact, so far distinguished him as to make him, in the autumn of the next year, the victim of a mob. The condition of affairs was rapidly growing worse. The troops were called from Murray's barracks to protect the guard on King's Street from the fury of the mob and this brought about the so-called "State Street Massacre." Then followed the Lexington affair and Bunker Hill and the siege of Boston by Washington's army. During this time Mr. Murray remained in Boston. His daughter, Mrs. Forbes, had returned from Florida and with her sister Elizabeth, lived on the farm at Brush Hill. His sister, Elizabeth Smith, had married Ralph Inman of Cambridge and while her husband remained in Boston, she stayed in the Cambridge mansion to prevent its being confiscated. Communications between Milton and Boston were carried on by vessels sailing up the Neponset.
Mr. and Mrs. Murray visited Brush Hill in this manner and Mrs. Inman even journeyed back and forth between Cambridge, Boston and Milton in this way. Finally the evil day came when the evacuation of Boston became a necessity. The consternation was indescribable. Men who had lived all their lives in Boston and were a part and parcel of it found themselves suddenly compelled to take leave of friends, old associations and property and to flee with the army to Nova Scotia. The departure of General Howe was hampered and delayed by the necessity of caring for the removal of the Loyalists. All the transports which were at hand, assisted by such other vessels as could be procured, were inadequate for the purpose. The refugees, on their part, were in a state of distraction between the impossibility of taking with them more than a small part of their possessions. Mr. Murray, like the rest, had no recourse but to sail with the troops for Halifax. The parting he must have believed to be only temporary, but it was final.
A lady writing from Brush Hill under date of May 17th, 1776, and signing herself E. F., gives a graphic description of the condition in which the Murray family were left. She writes, "This amiable family are going to be involved in new troubles. Did I fear for myself alone, I should be happy compared with what I now suffer, for I have nothing to fear from the malevolence of man, but when I see the few but valuable friends I have remaining upon the point of becoming destitute like myself my heart sinks within me, and I can not avoid exclaiming "Great God!" Surely for all these things people shall be brought to judgment. I am hunted from one retreat to another, and since I left your Ark, like Noah's dove I can find no resting place. The Committee at Cambridge have left Mrs. Inman's farm, in spite of all assiduity to prevent it and the same tribe of demons have been here to take this into possession during the life of Mr. Murray. When this affair will end, God knows. Nature is all blooming and benevolent around us. I wish to Heaven that she could inspire the breasts of this deluded people with the same affectionate glow towards each other. May eternal curses fall on the heads of those who have been instrumental to this country's ruin."
Again under the date of June 16th she writes, "Rejoice with me, my dear Aunt, this infernal crew cannot succeed in taking the farm from this amiable family. The Almighty Father of infinite perfection will not permit them to prosper in all their wickedness."[186]
James Murray now began the weary life of banishment, the pathos of which was so many times repeated in the history of the Loyalist exiles. He first went to Halifax; there he established himself with his wife and his sister, Mrs. Gordon, but he could not be content to stay so far from his sister and his children, who remained in Boston to prevent their property from being confiscated, and soon, as he puts it, he came "creeping towards" them, hoping at least to be able more easily to communicate with them and to serve them by sending occasional supplies. He visited Newport, New York and Philadelphia. He found himself, however, no nearer the accomplishment of his wishes in New York than in Halifax and to Halifax, in 1778, after some two years spent in profitless wanderings, he returned. There he remained the rest of his life. In his last letter to his daughter dated Halifax, February 17th, 1781, he said "A man near seventy, if in his senses, can want but little here below, nor want that little long. Therefore the withdrawing of my salary for some time past gives me but little concern." In this letter he seems to have had a premonition of his death, for he died a few months later. The salary that he refers to was that which he received from England for several years after leaving Boston—about 150 Pounds a year as inspector of imports and exports, many sufferers received from 50 to 300 Pounds a year in addition to their salary for their present subsistence. Mrs. Inman, his sister, survived her brother but a few years and those were sad ones. Her friends were scattered, her means reduced and her health undermined. She died May 25, 1785.
Elizabeth Murray, his daughter, married Edward Hutchinson Robbins, who in 1780, when but twenty-two years of age, became a member of the disloyal government and who occupied the position of Speaker of the House of Representatives, Lieutenant Governor and Judge of Probate. Brush Hill afterwards passed into the possession of her son, James Murray Robbins, who lived here until his death in 1885. It then passed into the possession of his nephew, James Murray Howe, its present occupant.
As previously stated, the only thing that prevented the confiscation of this estate was that Elizabeth and Dorothy Murray, to whom their aunt had given it had remained on the property during the war and would not leave it, although every effort was made to drive them off it by their disloyal neighbors. Their father was proscribed and banished under the Act of 1778, he was forbidden to return to Massachusetts and for a time did not even dare to write to his family. A daughter of Mary Robbins married a son of Paul Revere. Two of their sons fell upon the battlefield in the war for the Union, fighting on the loyal side in support of their government, giving to their country on the one hand lives derived from the disunionists and on the other from their loyal ancestor.
Rev. John Forbes wrote to his wife in 1783, just previous to his death, as follows: "Upon hearing of the peace, having all my property in Florida, I thought of going immediately to England. I might be of use to myself either by giving a short representation of the importance of retaining the province under the Crown of Great Britain or in finding early what hopes I might entertain of being in a situation of remaining in England with my united family, when the boys might be educated under my eye." After Mr. Forbes' death his wife, Dorothy Forbes, hoping to recover something from his estate as well as from her father's, made a trip to Wilmington and St. Augustine. The land which Mr. Forbes owned in Florida, which had been given over to the Spaniards, she received compensation for from the British Government. In Wilmington, however, she did not succeed, for when her father went to Boston he turned over his Cape Fear estate, which he valued at that time at £3000, to his nephew, Thomas Clark, who had recently come over from England. After the war commenced, the whole of Mr. Murray's property was confiscated. It was then claimed by Thomas Clark, who presented an account for more than the assessed value of the property for his salary for caring for it. As he had joined the disunionists it was ultimately made over to him by act of the Legislature. Mrs. Forbes tried to recover some of her patrimony, but without success. She did not even see her cousin, who wrote from his plantation that floods prevented his leaving his estate to visit Wilmington but that if she would come to him he would be happy to see her and did not doubt of being able to convince her that he had acted for the best in what he did.