The Lowry Family refers to parents Arthur Osborne Lowry and wife Evelyn Boden Lowry and their four sons, from oldest to youngest: Stuart Osborne (b. 9 May 1895), Wilfrid Malbon (b. July 1900), Arthur Russell (b. September 1905), and Clarence Malcolm (b. 28 July 1909). Arthur O. was born in 1870, one of many children of a Liverpool contractor and architect. Arthur himself became a successful cotton broker in Liverpool, as well as a director at various points of sugar and oil corporations. As a cotton broker, he was a head partner at Bustons and often travelled with Evelyn as the company’s international representative. Evelyn Boden, born in 1873, was the daughter of a Liverpool ship owner and mariner. Arthur and Evelyn were married on June 5, 1894, and the couple moved to various houses in neighbourhoods across the river from Liverpool until settling at what became the family home, Inglewood, in Caldy sometime shortly after youngest son Malcolm’s birth in 1909. Arthur died in 1945, survived by Evelyn, who died five years later in 1950.

Arthur was highly successful in his business, and all four of the Lowry sons went to the Leys Public School and later Cambridge. Eldest son Stuart achieved the rank of Captain in WWI. He married Marguerite (Margot) Peirce in January 1919, against his family’s wishes (Margot was a Catholic and the Lowrys Protestant; Margot was excommunicated for marrying Stuart because of the difference in religion). Stuart and Margot spent six years in Texas, where Stuart learned the cotton trade at the source of its supply chain, then returned to England where Stuart became a partner at Bustons under his father. Stuart and Margot settled in Upton, in a house called Corvelly, which the younger brothers visited frequently.

Wilfrid was a skilled sportsman in school and played on the school, local, county, and, once, the England rugby teams (he was on the England team for the game against France on January 21, 1920). Based on accounts from his brothers, Wilfred frequently acted as a stand-in father figure for Russell and Malcolm during their school years, visiting them at school and taking them on holidays during school breaks. Wilfrid became engaged, against his mother’s wishes, some time in 1924 and married in May 1925. He also became a partner in Bustons in 1926, with brother Stuart, and was a Lieutenant in the Royal Artillery in WWII.

Russell did well academically at school and went to Lile, France, in 1924/1925 to study commercial French. While in Lile he met Meg Gillies, a Scots girl with whom he fell in love; his parents were extremely opposed to his relationship with Meg. Russell became an apprentice and junior partner in Bustons, though not elevated to partner until 1 September 1938.

Arthur was obliged frequently to intervene in the affairs of youngest son Malcolm, with whom he had a strained relationship. Malcolm became a successful writer, but he was often in need of financial assistance, and his alcoholism and misadventures led to several periods where his finances were directly controlled by Arthur or by Arthur via intermediaries (lawyers and sometimes friends of Malcolm’s like Conrad Aiken). Malcolm’s relationships with his brothers were also fraught. He was closest Stuart throughout his life; though he was fairly close with Wilfrid and Russell in their younger years, they drifted apart as Wilfrid and Russell began pursuing their careers in the family business in earnest. Malcolm died in England on June 27, 1957.