The donation included a portrait of Arthur Charles Duncan and an illuminated address presented to Samuel Duncan in 1905, along with certificates of education and correspondence, including a letter from Winston Churchill dated 1903 and a postcard received from William Gladstone in 1887.
Samuel Duncan, from Crobane, Newry, was born in 1852. He served his apprenticeship with Messrs R. McBlain & Co. before setting up the business of Duncan, Alderdice & Co. with George Alderdice in 1879. Mr Duncan was a successful businessman, President of Newry Chamber of Commerce from 1901 to 1902 and one of the original members of the Newry Port and Harbour Trust.
After over a quarter of a century of business in Newry, Samuel Duncan and his family departed from Newry to Dublin, where he had purchased an extensive business in Dawson Street, renamed S. Duncan & Co. Limited, dealing in the wholesale wine and spirit trade and imports of tea and cigars.
An artistically illuminated address was presented to Samuel Duncan in the Boardroom of the Town Hall on the 7th June 1905. In attendance were a large number of Newry’s most influential citizens. Procured by Mr Jospeh Wright, of the Newry Reporter Printing Works, the address featured the arms of Newry and views of the Duncan’s former residence, ‘Braeside’, Newry port and Narrow Water Keep. The address expressed the regret at the loss of “one of our most capable and foremost citizens”, while wishing prosperity and happiness to the Duncan family. The address was accompanied by a silver salver inscribed “Presented to S. Duncan, Esq., by his Newry Friends”. Mrs Duncan also received a gift of a fully equipped silver-mounted lady’s dressing-case.
The address was signed on behalf of the subscribers by amongst others, Henry Loughran, Chairman of Newry Urban District Council, Thomas Irwin, Chairman of Newry Port and Harbour Trust, John J. McAreavey, Chairman of Newry Technical School Committee and Arthur McCann, President of Newry Chamber of Commerce.
Samuel Duncan responded that he would always feel proud of his association with Newry, in terms of his business and the projects he had been involved in for the advancement of the town. Shortly after moving to Dublin, he gave up his business and moved to London, becoming the representative of Messrs. Kirker, Greer & Co., a well-known firm of distillers. He died in London in January 1915, following an operation to amputate an injured leg.
Samuel’s youngest son, Alfred Charles Duncan, was born in Newry in 1886. He left Newry with his family for Dublin in 1905 and emigrated to Winnipeg, Canada, for a time with his brother, Herbert, who died in October 1907 after an operation for appendicitis.
At the outbreak of the First World War he enlisted in the Artists Rifles, the 28th (County of London) Battalion of the London Regiment. Demobilised in 1918, he qualified as a Chartered Accountant in 1922 and joined Odhams Press Ltd. in 1923. At the time Odhams was one of the UK’s major newspaper, magazine and book publishers and printers. He became Chairman of the company in 1949, and in 1952 was appointed by the Duke of Norfolk to the 1952/53 National Coronation Committee. Odhams had the printing and publishing contract for all the 1953 official Elizabeth II coronation material.
He retired in 1961 and was offered a hereditary peerage, which, after consulting with his two sons, he declined. He died in May 1979 in Devon at the age of 92.
