Arthur Morris of the Arthur Morris Group and a founder of the Bermuda Society of Chartered Accountants, has died at the age of 80 after an illness.

According to an interview with business writer Roger Crombie, at the beginning of his career in the early 1960s Mr Morris was one of Bermuda’s few accountants. He formed a partnership with Charles Kempe as the firm of Morris & Kempe, Chartered Accountants, in 1964. Mr Crombie wrote: “As the Island’s intake of businesses grew, accountancy quickly moved to the forefront. The growth of the international sector demanded an equal expansion of local support services.”

Mr Morris was a founder of the The Bermuda Society of Chartered Accountants (BSCA) which was formed in 1967 as captive insurance got underway, the harbinger of what was to become Bermuda’s huge re/insurance business.

The accountant was also a long serving director at Bermuda Press (Holdings) Ltd, the parent company of this newspaper.

A bagpiper, he was involved in the founding of another Bermuda institution — the Bermuda Pipe Band.

Mr Morris was an early proponent of computer technology, and Morris & Kempe purchased one of the first machines, which they bought from NCR Corporation and used to computerise the records of the Island’s electricity and telephone companies. The partners also set up a computer bureau in Jersey, Channel Islands.

Mr Morris retired from Morris and Kempe in 1977, and the firm became Charles Kempe & Co.

Mr Morris then activated Morco Management Ltd, now Continental Management Ltd — a company he had formed in 1976. Mr Crombie wrote: “Corporate management had attracted him because he found this work to be more interesting and professionally rewarding than auditing, and he briefly considered remaining exclusively with the management business.

“But there was also the continuing allure of business overseas, and his undying wish to see the world. At one point, Arthur considered moving lock, stock and barrel to the Cayman Islands to start an accounting and corporate management practice there.”

Instead, he joined forces with British accountant Dudley Cottingham, who had joined the international department of Morris & Kempe in 1977.

Arthur Morris & Company was then a practice of just four employees, focusing on private client work, as well as some audit work on behalf of the smaller, second-tier firms.

Ultimately Mr Morris’s interests grew to include local businesses Continental Management Ltd, which provided corporate services, and the auditing and accountancy firm Arthur Morris & Company.

He later joined forces with accountant Craig Christensen when Mr Christensen suggested that they should merge their two practices. Based in Hamilton, Arthur Morris Christensen & Co provides accounting, auditing and consultancy services to local businesses: trading and investment firms (both privately and publicly held), partnerships and individual traders.

The group’s Cayman office was Morris Brankin & Co, and Turks and Caicos Island operations were Morris Cottingham & Co.

In addition, Mr Morris established the first local insurance company on Providenciales known as Turks & Caicos First Insurance Company Ltd. Ultimately, Arthur Morris & Company’s affiliated practices in Turks and Caicos comprised Morris Cottingham & Co, an audit and accounting firm; Morris Cottingham Associates Ltd, a corporate management firm; and S T A R Corporate Managers Ltd.

“With the advent of the 1980s, the Arthur Morris Group came into its own as an extremely broad-based practice,” wrote Mr Crombie.

“Bermuda’s success as a jurisdiction confirmed the invested hopes of many previous years.”

Mr Morris leaves his wife June, two children, Michele Lawrence and Christopher Morris, two step children, Michael Chilvers and Annette Beveridge, and ten grandchildren.

Ms Lawrence said her father had particularly loved computers, acknowledging his early embrace of the technology in the days when “a computer filled a whole room”, she said, and also noted his contribution to founding Bermuda’s pipe band.

A grandchild who is also a bagpiper will play at his funeral, she said.

“We miss him, and are sad — but he fought a good fight.”

Mr Morris’s funeral is planned for 3pm on Wednesday, May 14 at St Anne’s Church in Southampton.