STRACHAN, JOHN, 1778-1867.
Letter, 1850 Jun. 20.

MANUSCRIPT NUMBER 301

ACCESS: Unrestricted

REPRODUCTION: All requests subject to limitations noted in departmental policies on reproduction.

COPYRIGHT: Information on copyright (literary rights) available from repository.

CITATION:  John Strachan letter, MSS 301, Archives and Manuscripts Dept., Pitts Theology Library, Emory University. 

John Strachan, first bishop of Toronto, was born on 12 April 1778 to John Strachan and Elizabeth Findlayson of Aberdeen. He was educated at King's College, Aberdeen, and at St. Andrews. Strachan went to Canada in late 1799, after being invited to take charge of a new college planned at York (now Toronto). The college was never established, and Strachan found work as a private tutor. In 1803 he was ordained a minister of the Church of England. In subsequent years, he held positions as rector of York (1812), archdeacon of York (1825), and bishop of Toronto (1839).

As bishop, Strachan traveled widely through his province, establishing churches and schools. In 1827 he founded the University of King's College in Toronto. The university was affiliated with the Church of England until 1850, when the provincial government took control of its endowment and made it a secular institution. In response, Strachan launched a major fundraising campaign, and went on to establish Trinity College under royal charter.

Strachan married in 1807. His wife, Ann, was the daughter of Thompson Wood and the widow of Andrew McGill of Montreal. The couple had nine children. Strachan died in Toronto on 1 November 1867.

(Source of biography: Michael Gauvreau, 'Strachan, John (1778-1867)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/26619, accessed 7 June 2005])

In this letter, dated 12 June 1850, Strachan asks an unknown Church of England cleric for funds to support an Anglican university in Toronto. Strachan writes, ".the means of providing a University education in the principles of the Church of England for the Members and Ministry of that Church have been violently destroyed in my Diocese by the withdrawal of the Charter of King's College and the seizure of its endowment."