User:Catherine Mcmartin

Patrick William Keir locally known as William McMead lived in Rockwood Estates, Kottarakara, the then Madras Presidency now Kerala in the early 1900s. He married a Tamil woman namely Velliamma a daughter of a supervisor in the same estates. Cross cultural marriages were a commonplace in those days especially when the men belonged to christian community. Unfortunately Patrick William Keir died in a timber fall accident when he was riding a horse in the year 1926 around 2 years after his marriage with Velliamma. Meanwhile he had a child with Velliamma whom he named Catherine in the year 1925. After the death of her father, Catherine grew up to be a Tamil woman though her appearance was very much English. Slowly she lost contact with her English roots and her relatives in the UK. Today her children live in India though she also passed away in 2008.