Selwyn Abara-Cray, 84, Guarded A Door He Was Never Allowed Through.
For fifty-one years he sat outside the closed door with a sword, the fifth Tyler in an unbroken line since 1874. Like all five he was staff, never a member. His salary was £1,100 a year and his dinner.
MARTLEBURY, England — Selwyn Abara-Cray sat outside the closed door for fifty-one years and never went through it, and nobody stopped him.
He was staff.
The Tyler of a lodge is the officer who sits outside the door during a meeting with a drawn sword and admits nobody. In the Martlebury order the post has been filled without a break since 1874 by five men, and not one of the five was ever initiated. They were hired, paid, and pensioned. He was the fifth, and he died in May, aged eighty-four.
The job
His salary in his last full year was £1,100 and his dinner on lodge nights, of which there are nine.
The rest of the year he did the boiler, the bins, the gutters, the flowers, and the widows' Christmas hampers — twenty-nine of them in 2024, packed on his kitchen table. He held the keys to the hall, the cellar, the meter cupboard and the yard.
And he kept the attendance book: one ruled line per man per night, in ink, for roughly four hundred and seventy meetings.
This newspaper has quoted that book four times this year. We did it without once asking whose handwriting we were reading, and we learned his name in June because we telephoned to ask a question and were told he had died.
The sword
His predecessor bought it on 3 November 1932 from Hobbs & Wraight, theatrical costumiers of Birmingham, for twelve shillings and sixpence. The order book survives. Entry 411 reads: Sword, stage, brass hilt, unsharpened.
It has never been sharpened since. A quotation was obtained in 2004 — £48 — and the minute records that the matter was not proceeded with.
He kept it in a canvas cricket bag under the stairs and carried it up in the bag.
The book
The two pages missing from 2014 and 2015, which this desk has complained about in print, were lost by a binder in Kidderminster when the volume was rebacked. His widow says it upset him for the better part of a year and that he wrote to the binder twice.
Everything else is there: 1874 to 2025, every name, every night. It is the most complete membership record of any body of its kind we have seen, and it was kept by a man the body would not count as a member.
What he knew
He took the coats. He signed people in. He drove four men home for years, and he knew which of them ate alone.
Asked once by our correspondent whether the order had secrets, he said that it had a great many and that none of them were his to be interested in, and that there was one thing in that building he would not repeat.
1988
He was asked to join. Once, in his own kitchen, in November 1988, by a member in a wet coat. His widow and the Provincial Grand Secretary agree on the occasion and on the answer.
He declined on the ground that he would then have had to pay. The subscription that year was £42. He was paid £610.
He would have been handing back a fourteenth of his wage for the right to sit on the other side of a door he already had the key to.
Two changes
Mrs Abara-Cray asked us to alter two things in this obituary before it ran, and we made both.
He never said the Temple. He said the room. And he was not a servant, whatever the 1874 volume calls the first of the five. He was employed, from 1974 he had a written contract, and he was proud of the contract because his father never had one.
He is survived by his wife Enid, two daughters, and six grandchildren.
The post has been advertised twice this year at £9.60 an hour, without the dinner. There have been no applicants. The sword is in its cricket bag in the boiler room, and the attendance book for 2026 is ruled and empty, in nobody's hand at all.
The structure of the order he worked for is set out in our explainer on its four legal entities. He appears in it once, as an employee of the second box.
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Sources & Method
We came to this life through its handwriting. This desk quoted the Martlebury attendance books four times this year without ever asking whose hand we were reading; when we finally asked, in June, we were told he had died in May. We then read fifty-one years of wage books, traced the four Tylers before him through the volumes, and went twice to see his widow with everything we had.
Who we spoke to
- Enid Abara-Cray, His widow; married 1966. Interviewed at her house in Martlebury over two afternoons, and given the full draft to read, mark and answer August 2026 Asked for two changes before publication. Both were made, and both are described in the piece.
- Wage books, Lantern Hall (Marches) Limited, 1974–2025, Fifty-one annual entries for one employee. Produced by the company secretary on request, unredacted apart from bank details, and photographed July 2026 Six rises in fifty-one years. The last was in 2019.
- The Martlebury attendance books, 1874–2025, Thirty-one bound volumes, one ruled line per man per night. Read in the hall over five days across two visits, photographed with written permission March and June 2026 This desk has quoted these books four times this year. Every quotation was in his hand or his predecessor's.
- Hubert Sankey-Vine, Provincial Grand Secretary. Interviewed at the hall and asked, in writing, to confirm the 1988 offer and its terms August 2026 Remembers the offer being made once, in the kitchen, and refused in a single sentence.
- Hobbs & Wraight, theatrical costumiers, Birmingham — order book, 1932, Entry 411, 3 November 1932. The successor business holds the order books and photographed the page for us June 2026 'Sword, stage, brass hilt, unsharpened — 12s 6d.'
What we could not confirm
- Whether the line of five is genuinely unbroken. The attendance books name a Tyler in every year from 1874 except 1917 and 1918, where the space is ruled and empty and the hall was requisitioned. Somebody let the members in during those two years and we do not know who.
- What he was paid before 1974. The wage books begin with the incorporation of the hall company. Before that the Tyler was paid in cash by the Master personally, out of a tin, and no book was kept — which means the first four men in our diagram have no recorded wage after 1901.
- Whether he was asked to join more than once. His widow remembers a single occasion in the kitchen in 1988; the Provincial Grand Secretary remembers the same one. Two people recalling the same event is not evidence that it was the only one, and everyone else in that kitchen is dead.
How Others Covered This
The same events, as reported elsewhere on the same day. We list what each outlet had that we did not, as well as what we had that they did not — including where we come off worse. Why we print this.
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The Meridian TelegraphTHE MAN WITH THE SWORD: FIFTY-ONE YEARS INSIDE THE ORDER
Ran his life as a vigil, and implied throughout that he had been trusted with what happened on the other side of the door.
Had that we did not
The attendance book, which is real and remarkable, and a good photograph of him at the door in 1979.
Left out
That he was never once in the room, was paid £1,100 a year, and did the bins.
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ApertureThe Threshold Keeper
An essay on doors, thresholds, and the men who stand at them. Genuinely beautiful; never mentions a wage.
Had that we did not
The observation that he was the only person present who saw everyone arrive and everyone leave.
Left out
His contract, his pension, and the rise he asked for in 1991 and did not get.
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They Buriedthis newspaperSelwyn Abara-Cray, 84, Guarded A Door He Was Never Allowed Through.
Read the wage books and the attendance books first, then went to see his widow, twice.
Had that we did not
All five Tylers, the terms of his employment, and the one thing he called a secret.
Left out
We have quoted this man's handwriting in four stories this year without printing his name once, and we learned it only because he died. — V. Ashcombe-Doyle, standards editor
Right of Reply
They Buried contacted Enid Abara-Cray, his widow in person on 6 August 2026, again on 17 August with the full draft, the wage books and the diagram, and no deadline. Replied in writing on 20 August 2026, asking that it run entire and that we not tidy it. Printed unedited.
Your headline is wrong and I want to start there, because you will put it at the top of the page and everything I say underneath it will look like a widow being loyal.
He was allowed through. He was asked, in my kitchen, by a man in a wet coat in November 1988, and he said no. You have taken my husband's own answer away from him and given it to them, and turned him into somebody who was kept out. He was not kept out. He was not interested, and he had a reason, and the reason was money, and I do not think either of you would find that hard to understand.
Now. The second thing. You have written a piece which says, underneath all the politeness, that the great secret of the order was a man doing the catering with a sword. I know what that sentence is for. I have read your paper for four years and I know that you like the small true thing better than the big false one, and mostly I agree with you. But you should be careful. My husband did that work for fifty-one years. When you say it was only the bins and the boiler and the hampers, you are making a joke out of a job that a man got up for on nine Tuesdays a year and every other week of his life besides, and the joke lands on him, not on them.
He was paid badly. He knew it. He asked for a rise in 1991 and Mr Naish told him the position had always been an honour, and Selwyn came home and said, an honour that pays sixty pounds a month is a job. That is the sentence you should have used and you have used it, and I am grateful.
What you have not got, and cannot get, is what he was actually like at that door. He was not a guard. Nobody was ever going to come. There has not been a single person try that door in a hundred and fifty years, and he knew that, and he sat there anyway with a blunt sword across his knees because a room full of men who had been told all their lives to keep their troubles to themselves needed to believe the door was held. Somebody had to hold it. It happened to be him and he happened to be good at it.
The thing about the lonely ones is true and I will say it myself rather than have you say it. He drove four of them home for years. He knew which of them ate alone. He never told me a name, not once, not even when they died, and when I said to him it was hardly a state secret he said no, but it is theirs.
Two things I asked you to change and you changed, and you have put them in the piece, which I did not expect. He never said the Temple. He said the room. And he was not a servant, whatever the 1874 book calls the first one. He was employed, he had a contract from 1974, and he was proud of the contract because his father never had one.
One last thing. You have printed what he was paid. I asked you not to and you explained why you were going to anyway, and I have thought about it and you were right and I was wrong. The figure is the story. It just should not be the joke.
Published unedited under our right-of-reply guarantee.
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