Greville Ewing

Greville Ewing (1767-1841) was originally a minister in the Church of Scotland. Ewing took an active role in the formation of the Edinburgh Missionary Society in 1796, serving as its first secretary and editor of the Missionary Magazine from 1796 to 1798. He became a Congregationalist minister in Glasgow in 1799, remaining in that capacity until 1836. Ewing, along with the Haldane brothers and Ralph Wardlaw, was instrumental in bringing Congregationalism and home missions into Scotland. He would later break with the Haldanes when they became Baptists, remaining loyal to his congregationalism. Ewing played a leading role in the formation of the Congregational Union of Scotland in 1812. In 1811, he was also serving as a tutor at the Glasgow Theological Academy, a Congregationalist school he helped found in 1809. Despite his affiliations, Ewing was a solid supporter of the BMS, collecting subscriptions and donations on the part of the Serampore Mission to replace the contents lost in the fire of March 1812. Among his publications are A Defence of Itinerant and Field Preaching: A Sermon Preached before the Society of gratis Sunday Schools, December 24, 1797, at Lady Glenorchy’s Chapel, Edinburgh (1799) and The Duty of Christians to Civil Government (1799). See Brian Talbot, The Search for a Common Identity: The Origins of the Baptist Union of Scotland 1800–1870. Studies in Baptist History and Thought, vol. 9. (Carlisle UK: Paternoster Press, 2003), 90-98.