Alexander Duncan (bishop)

Alexander Duncan (c.1655–1733) was a non-jurant Scottish Episcopal clergyman, college bishop (from 1724), and Bishop of Glasgow from 1731.

Early Ministry

Duncan is thought to have been the son of William Duncan, the Minister of New Kilpatrick, in Dunbartonshire, and his wife, Janet Macarthur. He attended the University of Glasgow, graduating in 1675. In 1680 he became the minister of Kilbirnie in Ayrshire. At this period the structure of the Church of Scotland was Episcopalian. Along with many clergy with Episcopalian sympathies Duncan was rabbled from his parish in 1688, struck and abused, his furniture smashed, and he and his family thrust out of doors. The following year the Episcopalian structure of the Church was abolished by Act of the Scottish Parliament, disestablishing the Scottish Episcopalians.

After Disestablishment

Duncan eventually made his way to

Although the Old Pretender’s campaign was unsuccessful and he returned to mainland Europe, contact with Episcopalians continued (indeed, John Walkinshaw acted as his ambassador in Vienna^[1]), and church appointments were presented to James Edward Stuart for approval. In 1724 he approved Alexander Duncan as a college bishop (i.e. a bishop without a diocese). Duncan was consecrated in Edinburgh by Bishop John Fullarton, Bishop Arthur Miller, and Bishop William Irvine, on the Feast of St James, 1724. In 1726 Duncan consecrated James Rose and John Ochterlonie as bishops.

Duncan considered support of the government of George I to be sinful. At this period, Episcopal clergy in Scotland could be licensed officially if they took an oath and agreed to pray for the monarchs who had replaced James VII and II. Duncan refused to do this, and continued to believe that the Stuart dynasty would again be restored, and the Church’s Episcopal structure re-established.

In 1728 a new Episcopal meeting house was opened in Broad Close opposite the old university buildings in Glasgow's High Street, with a Mr. Wingate as its minister. Neither Duncan nor Wingate had taken the necessary oaths, so the magistrates closed it again shortly afterwards. Wingate was sent packing, whilst Duncan, although threatened with imprisonment, was left alone. He was now very old, but he preached to a small congregation assembled in his own home, including several of the families mentioned in the list from 1713. In 1729, he baptized the infant son of a later Lady Dundonald.

In 1731, the Scottish bishops agreed that Duncan should be responsible for the Diocese of Glasgow, the last Episcopalian Archbishop of Glasgow,

Sources

• David M Bertie, Scottish Episcopal Clergy, 1689-2000 (2000)
• James Gordon, Glasghu Facies - The History of Glasgow (1873)
• Robert Wodrow, Analecta (1843); Correspondence (1842); Early Letters (1937)

References