02 Gideon Guthrie

DATES OF RECTORSHIP 1705 – 1710

BEFORE
1674: Some form of education in Edinburgh
1684: MA from Marischal College, Aberdeen
1688: Licensed. Probably ordained Deacon and Priest in the same year
1688-Onwards: Tutor to Charles Mainland of Pitfichie, and Chaplain to the Earl Marischal
12/1697 – 5/1698 in Glenmuick

AFTER:
1710: Received letter from Brechin townsfolk re an appointment.
18/10/1711 Sentenced in Brechin and fined
‘Deposed’ from Brechin in 1716
1716 – retired to Edinburgh
Source: Aberdeen Journal VI p 72, 11/4/1913 Entered family of Dowager Lady Marischal (Keith?) (died 1701), as chaplain and tutor at Fetteresso Castle in 1700, so moved to Inverurie; 1702 to Oxford as tutor
26/12 1703: offered Fetteresso (on death of John Mylne), presented by Earl Marischal, – many disputes,
21/3/1705 0rder to give up keys, but congregation barricaded the doors
1709 – Aberdeen Court gave possession to Presbytery;
Removed to Nether Kirkland, Dunnottar, celebrated there with Mr Ross, but there was already a meeting house in Stonehaven
Moved to Brechin to avoid harassment

BIRTH
Date – Place 24th May 1663 – Castleton Parish of Fordoun
Father Harie Guthrie of Halkertown
Mother Margaret Sibbald daughter of David Sibbald of Kair
Source Scottish Review (Edinburgh 1882), 36 1900 July page 192

MARRIAGE
Gideon Guthrie is one of the better documented lives of our early clergy, but not without considerable discrepancies.

For one, he was definitely married, but the date or who to is contentious. Some say he was married in St. Vigeans in 1683 to an Elspet Black. Others say in 1706 to an Anne Melvin. Others still say to a daughter of Alexander Young, Bishop of Ross, also in 1706.

Whoever he was married to, it seems 1706 is the most likely date, as he had four children born between 1708 and 1713, one of which survived to adulthood.

DEATH
Some sources suggest that he died soon after being removed from Brechin (possibly killed in violence). Others say he retired to Edinburgh and died nearly 20 years later in 1732. The latter seems more likely, as there are references to him having spent some time in Oxford, and he does not seem to have had time to do so before his retirement.

CHILDREN
William    17/8/1708 d. 9/3/1770
Harry        5/1/1709 d. 5/6/1704
Margaret  13/9/1711 d. 7/8/1715
Isobel        3/5/1713 d. 14/9/1714

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

At Fetteresso in the Mearns, where Gideon Guthrie ministered, he possessed the manse and glebe by a tack from the Earl Marischal, from 1707 until he left the parish in 1710.8
In fact the loss had already been made good by the arrival in 1710 of Gideon Guthrie who, with the patronage of the Earls of Panmure and Southesk, introduced the English liturgy on 18 October 1711 in a meeting-house built by the congregation.

Politically, he appears to have been a Juror, but was opposed to the Act of Union in 1707.   He was frequently in trouble with the authorities, due to his support of Episcopacy. His whole ministry was beset by this, and his time at Stonehaven was no exception.  In 1707 – did NOT conform to the Civil Authority of the Revolution

Bishop Luscombe comments:
An active episcopal minister in Angus and Mearns from the 1690s was Gideon Guthrie, who, like James Gordon younger, left a first-hand account of his experiences. He received calls to Grange in Banff shire and Aboyne in Aberdeenshire, both of which were frustrated by the Committee for the North in 1694. The patronage shown to him in these instances by Sir John Forbes of Craigievar269 was also extended to Alexander Thomson, who possessed Fintray ‘upon a call frae the Heretors and Parochiners therof’, of whom Forbes was the most considerable. Thomson was deprived by a committee of parliament in 1695. 270 Guthrie enjoyed the patronage of the Earl Marischal at Fetteresso, which he possessed on his presentation, despite counter-measures by the ecclesiastical and civil authorities to dislodge him, from 1703 until 1710; he then moved to a meeting-house in Brechin which became one of the most successful in Angus and Mearns in the period before the 1715 Rebellion.271

Sources:
NRS GD188/36/9 Guthrie Family papers – Testificate 1674 – see above
NRS CH 1/2/31. Gideon Guthrie entered the Marischal family as chaplain in 1700, subsequently tutoring the Earl’s sons, and possessing Fetteresso church under his protection from 1703 until 1710 (GG, 44-6, 70) = Gideon Guthrie: A Monograph, ed.C.E. Outhrie Wright (Edinburgh, 1900).
NAS CH1/2/28/5 General Assembly 1709 Information against GG – intruder at Fetteresso
Gideon Guthrie and William Dunbar appealed from the Justiciary Court in May 1709 (JGD, 179, n. 13).JGD = James Gordon’s Diary 1692-1710, ed.
G.D. Henderson and H.H. Porter – (Third Spalding Club, 1949)
Angus GB618/MS 53 1710 Letter as above
NAS CH1/2/28/4 General Assembly 1710 Answers to Kirk re ‘pretended preacher’
NRS CS271/22649 Court of Session 1712; Rev GG v. Rev. John Webster
NRS CH1/2/35 General Assembly 1715 accused of lots of things
NRS GD45/1/96 Maule Family papers – 9/5/1715 memorial on charges against GG
NRS GD220/5/494 Montrose muniments – 21/4/1715 – request by GG for protection
NAS CH2/575/1 1716 deposed at Brechin
NLS GB233/MS.2975 Letter from Lord Blantyre 1723 still said to be minister of Fetteresso
NRS GD45/31/16 Maule Family papers – 1727 Reciept form GG for £8/8/0
He was a non-juror, = In British history, non-jurors refused to swear allegiance to William and Mary
Cf Fasti Ecclesiae Scoticanane Vol3 part ii