Murrie was born at 125 Perth Road, a humble flat over shops in Dundee on 19 December 1903 the son of Catherine Stuart Burgh and Thomas Murrie, a commercial traveller from Broughty Ferry.
[1] He studied Classics first at the University of Edinburgh then at Balliol College, Oxford.
He joined the Scottish Office as a civil servant in 1926 and was soon appointed Private Secretary to Sir Godfrey Collins.
In 1935 he transferred to the Department of Health as Permanent Secretary (assisted by Norman Graham), where he prepared the plans for the evacuation of Scottish children in the run up to the Second World War.
[3] In 1952 he returned to Scotland as Secretary of the Scottish Education Department with colleagues including William Arbuckle and James Brunton.