William Aird Thomson

The Very Rev Dr William Aird Thomson DD (1773-1863) was a Scottish minister and antiquarian who served as Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1835.[1]

Life

He studied divinity at Glasgow University.

He was originally minister of Dalziel then moved to the far larger Middle Church in Perth in 1807.[2]

In 1833 Glasgow University awarded him an honorary doctorate (DD).[3] In 1835 he succeeded Very Rev Patrick McFarlan as Moderator of the General Assembly.

In the Disruption of 1843 he left the established Church of Scotland and joined the Free Church of Scotland, establishing a new Free church in Perth.

He died at home, 6 Athole Crescent in Perth[4] on 17 March 1863.

Family

He was married to Margaret Frazer.

In 1841 his daughter Mary Anne Thomson married Walter Glass of Smiddiegreen. He committed suicide by shooting himself in the head two months after the wedding. She then married Prof Patrick Campbell Macdougall of Edinburgh University.[5]

Other children included Gilbert James Thomson (b.1813).[6]

Publications

  • Memoirs of the Late Rev James Scott (1820)
  • John Campbell of Carbrook (1827)
  • Letters on Church Politics (1832-6)[7]

References

  1. ↑ https://www.geni.com/projects/Moderators-of-the-General-Assembly-of-the-Church-of-Scotland/15939
  2. ↑ Traditions of Perth, George Penney (1820)
  3. ↑ http://www.universitystory.gla.ac.uk/biography/?id=WH17119&type=P
  4. ↑ Perth Post Office Directory 1862-3
  5. ↑ http://redbookofscotland.co.uk/glass-of-smiddiegreen
  6. ↑ https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VQH5-P6P
  7. ↑ http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/c/F53552



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