Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/321

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Montgomery
315
Montgomery


the management (1838-41) 'of the Belfast academical institution; his speech of 13 April 1841 was followed by the defeat of Cooke's endeavour to exclude Arian professors of theology from chairs in the faculty. In the struggle for the tenure of meeting-house properties and endowments by Unitarians, resulting in the Dissenters' Chapels Act of 1844 [see Field, Edwin Wilkins], Montgomery took a very important and laborious part. His exertions brought on an illness in London (1844), when Peel, whose support of the measure Montgomery had secured, showed him much personal attention.

In 1835 was founded the association of Irish non-subscribing presbyterians, a union, though not an amalgamation, of the remonstrant synod with the Antrim presbytery and the Munster synod. Montgomery, who had since 1832 given regular courses of lectures to non-subscribing divinity students, was on 10 July 1838 appointed the association's professor of ecclesiastical history and pastoral theology. The office was without salary, till in 1847 the government endowed the chair with 150l. per annum out of reyium donum. Many of the students became ministers to the English Unitarians. A controversy on the efficiency of the system of ministerial training arose in 1847. Montgomery founded in his synod in 1857 a revised code of discipline, which restricted the wide range already given to presbyteries in the matter of ministerial examination; but the new questions were withdrawn in 1863 in consequence of a legal decision in the Ballyclare case.

Montgomery, who had suffered from calculus, died at the Glebe, Dunmurry, on 18 Dec. 1865, and was buried in the ground attached to his meeting-house on 20 Dec. His funeral was attended by all ranks and classes, including his old opponent Cooke, with whom in later years he had been on terms of friendship, and the Bishop of Down, Connor, and Dromore. The funeral sermon was preached (24 Dec.) by Charles James McAlester (1810-1891) of Holywood, co. Down. Montgomery married, on 6 April 1812, Elizabeth (d. 16 Jan. 1872, aged 78). fourth daughter of Hugh Swan of Summerhill, co. Antrim, by whom he had ten children, of whom four died under age. In person Montgomery was of commanding stature and handsome presence, with a voice of great sweetness, and fascinating manners. His portrait, painted in 1835 by John Prescott Knight [q. v.], has been several times engraved. Classon Porter describes him as 'a born diplomatist;' his political influence with successive governments was undoubted. His politics in later life became more conservative. It has been alleged that his religious sentiments likewise underwent a change, but his theology neither advanced nor receded. He was much in controversy with later developments of Unitarian thought, which he viewed as equivalent to deism. On his deathbed he recommended to his successor, Thomas Hugh Marshall Scott, his 'Creed of an Arian' (1830), as containing his lifelong opinions. Having a remarkable memory, he rarely wrote either sermons or speeches. His first publication seems to have been an anonymous catechism (1811, 12mo); his best printed sermon is an anniversary discourse, 'We persuade men,' 1843, 8vo. His oratory was more polished than that of Cooke; in pathos and in sarcasm he was Cooke's equal, but he had not Cooke's mastery of the passions of a crowd. Some of his best speeches are reprinted in his 'Life,' others are to be sought in separate pamphlets and in the 'Northern Whig.' In 1830 he was one of the original editors of the 'Bible Christian,' with Fletcher Blakely [q. v.]and William Bruce (1790–1868) [q. v.] In 1846–7 he contributed to the 'Irish Unitarian Magazine' a valuable series of 'Outlines of the History of Presbyterianism in Ireland.'

[Funeral sermon by McAlester, 1866; Life, by John A. Crozier (his son-in-law), 1875, vol. i. (portrait, no more published, extends to 1831); Henry Montgomery, 1888 (short life, by the same); Unitarian Herald, 29 Dec. 1865; Christian Unitarian, January 1866; J. L. Porter's Life and Times of Henry Cooke, 1875; Classon Porter's Irish Presbyterian Biog. Sketches. 1883, pp. 34 sq.; Latimer's Hist, of the Irish Presbyterians, 1893, pp. 192 sq.; Minutes of General Synod and of Remonstrant Synod; information from the Revs. J. A. Crozier and T. H. M. Scott.]

A. G.

MONTGOMERY, HUGH of, Earl of Shrewsbury (d. 1098). [See Hugh.]

MONTGOMERY, HUGH, third Viscount Montgomery of the Ards, and first Earl of Mount Alexander (1623?–1663), born about 1623, was eldest son of Hugh, second viscount Montgomery, and his wife, Jean Alexander, eldest daughter of Sir William Alexander, first earl of Stirling [q. v.] In his childhood his left side was severely injured by a fall, and an extensive abscess was formed, which on healing left a large cavity through which the action of the heart could be plainly discerned (Harvey, Works, Sydenham Society, pp. 382–4). He wore a metal plate over the opening. Notwithstanding, he had a fairly good constitution, and before reaching his twentieth year travelled through