Contact Us

Use the form on the right to contact us.

You can edit the text in this area, and change where the contact form on the right submits to, by entering edit mode using the modes on the bottom right. 

Form Block
This form needs a storage option. Double-click here to edit this form, and tell us where to save form submissions in the Storage tab. Learn more
         

123 Street Avenue, City Town, 99999

(123) 555-6789

email@address.com

 

You can set your address, phone number, email and site description in the settings tab.
Link to read me page with more information.

Database

Preface

James Dodson

PREFACE 5

The Rev. Matthew Hutchison, in his volume on The History of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in Scotland (Paisley, 1893), dealt with the wider field of the Church’s policy and ecclesiastical life, and had little to record regarding its ministers and congregations. The following pages are concerned with these aspects of the Church’s work, and do for the earliest Dissenting Church in Scotland what has already been accomplished for the other great Presbyterian bodies in the land.

The reader may be struck with the smallness of membership in many of the congregations, but it will be readily conceded by those acquainted with their activities that the influence they exerted in the community was altogether out of proportion to their numbers. It is a curious fact, however, that the existence of Reformed Presbyterian congregations has largely been ignored by local historians and statisticians.

The Reformed Presbyterian Church nominally came to an end in 1876, when its congregations took their place in the Free Church. The accounts given naturally end with that date. Anything further recorded has been added to give completeness to the narrative. Since 1876 many of the congregations have united with the local Free Church or United Free Church congregations.

The sources consulted have been many. The Reformed Presbyterian Synod, quoad civilia, allowed me full use of their records, both printed and manuscript. Unfortunately the extant minutes of the Presbyteries and Synod cover the period from 1759 only, but from that date they are singularly complete. At the Disruption of 1863 the then clerk of the Edinburgh Presbytery retained the minutes of that Presbytery from 1832 to 1859; it is due to the courtesy of the present Reformed Presbyterian Synod that I have been able to consult them. The magazines of the Church have been a mine of information on many points.

Necessarily only the barest outline of congregational and personal histories has been possible. In every case indication has been given where fuller information can be obtained, if it exists in print. An attempt

6 THE REFORMED PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

has been made to show the literary interests of the ministry. Most of the publications referred to can be consulted either in the New College Library, Edinburgh, or in the Mitchell Library, Glasgow, which latter secured the bulk of the books of the historian, the Rev. J. H. Thomson.

To indicate the growth of the Church, it was thought advisable to arrange congregations in the order of their recognition, though that was not always possible, and ministers according to the date of their ordination. The method involved a certain duplication of statement, but it is hoped this may be overlooked in the interests of completeness.

I am greatly indebted to Rev. Prof. Morton, D.D., and Mr John S. Paterson, B.L., for reading the proofs and suggesting corrections.

26 Circus Drive

Glasgow, September 1925