John Kinross

MARRIAGES.

On the 6th instant, at Minnamarra, by the Rev Hugh McKail, the Rev. John Kinross, Presbyterian minister, Kiama, to Elizabeth Joanna, eldest daughter of Robert Menzies, Esq., M.P., Minnamarra, Illawarra.⁷

The Rev John Kinross, D.D., Presbyterian minister, who was for many years Principal of St Andrew's College within the University, died somewhat suddenly at Kiama on Saturday morning, the cause of death being heart trouble.

Dr Kinross, who was a Professor of English Language and Literature in relation to religion and of Apologetics and Christian Ethics, was born near Ardoch, in Scotland, in 1833. He was the son of James Kinross, and was educated in the University of Edinburgh and New College, and held the degree of Doctor of Divinity of the Edinburgh University, where he was the contemporary of Professor A B Bruce and Principals Dykes and Dods. He came to New South Wales in June, 1858, having thus completed his ministerial jubilee in Australia, which was celebrated at the last meeting of the General Assembly. He was almost immediately upon arrival called to Kiama, his only pastoral charge, where he ministered for 17 years. The parish is mountainous, and at that time was an extensive one, including Wingecarribee, Moss Vale, and Kangaroo Valley. His journeys to out-stations were all done on horseback, and usually with his well-worn Greek New Testament at his saddle bow. During his Kiama ministry he found time to graduate at Sydney University. In 1861 Dr Kinross married the daughter of Dr Menzies, of Jamberoo, and five of his six children survive him, viz., Mrs D Smith, of Cooerwull Academy, Bowenfels; the Misses Kinross (2); Dr R W Kinross, of Inverell; and Mr J J Kinross, of Jamberoo.

In 1875 Dr Kinross was appointed to the Principalship of St Andrew's College, a position which he filled with eminent success for 26 years. In 1901 he retired in order to enable the church to secure the services as Hunter Baillie Professor of Hebrew of the present Principal, Rev Dr Harper. During his long term of principalship a large number of students of all faculties passed through the college who are now professional men throughout Australia, particularly in New South Wales and Queensland. The esteem in which the doctor was held by all his students amounted to love as well as veneration. In 1880 Dr Kinross visited Britain and America as the delegate of the New South Wales Church to the Pan-Presbyterian Council at Philadelphia. A few years later Edinburgh University conferred upon him the degree of D.D. His annual addresses at commemoration were looked forward to as utterances of a scholarly and exceptionally liberal mind.

After the death of Mrs Kinross in 1895 the doctor again visited his native land, and while there carried through the press a work entitled "Dogma in Religion." This book breathes the professor's characteristically large-minded spirit.

On his retirement from the Principalship of St Andrew's College, Dr Kinross, who had for many years acted as one of the lecturers of the Presbyterian Theological Hall, was inducted as Professor of Apologetics and Christian Ethics, and this office he continued to hold till his death. As this position involved a session of only five months. Dr Kinross resided for the remainder of the year at Jamberoo, a portion of which was once his Kiama parish. Dr Kinross, who had taken a keen interest in the union of the Presbyterian Churches of New South Wales in 1865, was elected Moderator of the United Church a few years later. More recently his name was proposed for the Moderatorship of the Church of Australia, but consciousness of failing strenth led him to at once decline nomination. When not at Jamberoo he resided at Stanmore. He had taken a great interest in many of the suburban churches, viz., Glebe, Newtown, and Chalmers Church, and on many occasions filled the position of interim moderator of session during a vacancy. He was a regular attendant at the church courts, and an active worker on many of the committees of the church.¹²

KINROSS, JOHN (1833-1908), Presbyterian minister, was born on 11 September 1833 at Ardoch, Perthshire, Scotland, son of James Kinross, farmer, and his wife Jessie, née Comrie. He was educated at the Free Church School of Muthill and Ardoch. At 15 he matriculated at the University of Edinburgh and, without completing a degree, entered New College, Edinburgh, for divinity studies. After further study in Berlin he was licensed as a probationer by the Free Church Presbytery of Auchterarder. He arrived in Sydney on 6 June 1858 and in December was ordained and inducted to Scots Church, Kiama, under the jurisdiction of the Synod of Eastern Australia which supported the Free Church of Scotland. On 9 December 1859 he married Elizabeth Johanna (d.1895), daughter of Robert Menzies of Jamberoo, a retired naval surgeon.

Kinross spent seventeen years in Kiama, and pioneered church development in Wingecarribee, Sutton Forest, Moss Vale and Kangaroo Valley. He was moderator in 1863. He believed in the Free Church principle that church and state must be separate and was prominent in negotiations for the union of the Synods of the Presbyterian Church of New South Wales on 8 September 1865. He was admitted to the University of Sydney (B.A. ad eund., 1869). In 1864 he had published a sermon, The Church's Warfare, and in 1870 a Lecture on the Oecumenical Council.

Kinross was elected first principal of St Andrew's College, University of Sydney, in February 1872, but withdrew when the legality of the election was challenged by Rev. J. D. Lang. Next year Kinross became moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of New South Wales. In April 1875, after Rev. Adam Thomson died, he was again elected principal of St Andrew's. He lectured in the Theological Hall within the college and after his retirement on 24 October 1901 he was appointed first Hunter Baillie professor of apologetics and Christian ethics. He lived in Stanmore for the short theological academic year and for the rest of the year on his estate at Jamberoo. He was a trusted leader in the General Assembly and in 1880 represented the Church at the Pan Presbyterian council meetings in Philadelphia. He was chairman of the council of the Presbyterian Ladies College, Croydon, in 1885-1906. In 1885 the University of Edinburgh awarded him an honorary doctorate. In 1897 he visited Edinburgh where he published Dogma in Religion and Creeds in the Church.

Kinross died on 16 October 1908 at Jamberoo where he was buried in a private cemetery, survived by two sons and three daughters. In a memorial address G. A. Wood, professor of history in the University of Sydney, said: 'I have lived in Balliol under Jowett and I have lived in Andrew's under the Doctor. Balliol was undoubtedly the most respectable as well as the most distinguished of the Oxford Colleges. But of the two Colleges, it was Andrew's that had the greater measure of kindliness, good humour, harmony and charity. There was triviality, and foolishness, and sometimes (though seldom) the bad manners of high-spirited thoughtlessness: but no unkindness, no vice; nothing that disturbed the Doctor in the serene possession of his own Soul'.

Slight and spare with a trimmed beard, Kinross's portrait by Ethel Stephens is in St Andrew's College and a memorial window in its chapel.⁴