CHAPTER VII.
IT redounds to the credit of the Presbyterian Church of Otago that she appointed her ministers to visit the Gold Diggings in rotation as soon as people began to be drawn to them in considerable numbers. In August 1861 the minister of Knox Church preached at Gabriel's Gully on two Sabbaths, and held meetings with the miners. During his absence Dr Burns of the First Church conducted the services in Knox Chui'ch one jDart of each Sabbath. Sometime afterwards several of the office-bearers who could spare the time, and were possessed of the requisite gifts, were appointed to visit Tuapeka for the purpose of holding religious services with the diggers. Among those who engaged in this work were Messrs T. B. Gillies, T. S. Forsaith, H. Gilbert, &c. On subsequent occasions the minister was authorised to visit the Goldfields, where he usually spent two or more Sabbaths. In September 1862 "the Session, having heard from the minister of the labours and success of Mr Bruard, the missionary on the Tuapeka Goldfields, and that he required assistance to defray the expense of erecting churches there, resolved to grant him an opportunity of obtaining a collection in the church for that object."
In May 1862 it was resolved by the Deacons' Court that a collection should be made in aid of the Canvas Church that had been erected in Stafford street for the benefit of the diggers and other strangers who in large numbers flocked to Dunedin in those days. This structure, which afforded room for 250 sitters, had been opened in November 1861 by the Rev. Dr Burns. Both the site and the material had been gifted by Mr Henry Cook, now of Melbourne, the cost of erection having been subscribed by residents of Dunedin. The Stafford street congregation subsequently developed into St. Andrew's Church, Walker street, which now enjoys the ministrations of the Rev. R. Waddell, M.A. The first minister was the Rev. Adam Dickey Glasgow, who during bis brief incumbency did good service in forming a congregation. Mr Glasgow was born at Ballymena, Ulster, in 1815. After having attended the Grammar School of bis native district, he entered the Royal Belfast Academy, where he greatly distinguished himself as a diligent and successful scholar. He subsequently became a student of the Royal Belfast College, and took a foremost place in the Mathematical class, then taught by the eminent Professor James Thomson, LL.D. He also gained first honours in Logic, Philosophy, and Elocution. His Hebrew and Theological course he finisbed in Edinburgh, where he enjoyed the prelections of Chalmers and Welsh. He was ordained in 1839 as a preacher in connection with the Irish Presbyterian Church, and after labouring as pastor of a congregation in Belfast for a year or two, he felt constrained to join his brother, the late Dr. Glasgow, as a missionary in India, under the Irish Presbyterian Church Mission. He arrived in India in 1842, and after fourteen years of devoted and arduous labours in the mission field, was compelled by enfeebled health to return to his native country. After a time he made choice of New Zealand as his future home, in hopes that a change of climate would improve his health, and thus enable him again to enter on a field of labour. Mr Glasgow reached Dunedin with his wife and family in November 1861, and having been recognised by the Presbytery, he was engaged to do mission work among the miners and others who had located themselves in Stafford and Walker streets and adjacent parts. He and the congregation which he had succeeded in forming were transferred in May 1862 to the more permanent structure that had been erected in Walker street by the joint efforts of the Deacons' Courts of First Church and Knox Church. Here Mr Glasgow did valuable work as long as the state of his health permitted, but he was called away from his earthly labours in March 1863, at the early age of forty-eight. It is recorded of him that "he was a man of genuine piety, and of upright and honourable feeling; that his faith never swerved, and that he cultivated the religion, not of noise, but of a meek and quiet spirit." He left a widow and four children to mourn his loss. Mrs Glasgow and members of her family have been connected with Knox Church for very many years. Ample testimony is borne in this History and in the Annual Reports of the congregation to the many valuable services rendered by that lady and her elder son and elder daughter to the cause of religion in connection with the Sabbath School and other Christian agencies of the church.
On Mr Glasgow's appointment the Deacons' Courts of First Church and Knox Church undertook the joint responsibility for payment of his salary for six months, and on his death the organisation of St. Andrew's congregation was completed mainly under the direction of the Rev. Dr Stuart. The Rev. D. Meiklejohn was subsequently ordained and inducted into the charge. The Knox Church congregation, through its minister and office-bearers, continued to take a warm interest in the welfare of St. Andrew's. Mr E. B. Cargill, one of the elders, and Mr W. P. Hutton, one of the deacons, were requested to attach themselves to it in order to aid in its organisation. In March 1868 the following resolution was passed by the Deacons' Court:—"The Court cordially recommends to the members and adherents of this church to assist the congregation of St. Andrew's in the erection of their proposed new buildings, and appoints Messrs J. Gillies, E. Smith, and J. Wilkie a committee to co-operate with the office-bearers of St. Andrew's congregation, and the said committee are hereby empowered to call upon the several office-bearers of this church to render what assistance may be in their power, in order that the plans it may be determined to adopt may be carried out."