Thomas Brown (minister and natural historian)
Thomas Brown FRSE (1811–1893) was a Scottish minister in the Free Church of Scotland who rose to its highest rank, Moderator of the General Assembly in 1890. He was a noted geologist and botanist. He wrote prolifically on the history of the Disruption of 1843. Life. He was born on 23 April 1811 in the manse at Langton, Berwickshire in south-east Scotland, the son of John Brown, minister of that parish. He trained in theology at Edinburgh University and began working as a minister in 1837 at Kinneff in Aberdeenshire. He left the  Church of Scotland at the point of the Disruption of 1843. He spent some years without a ministry before being placed in the relatively prestigious Dean Free Church on Belford Road in north-west Edinburgh in 1849. He remained in the Free Church of Scotland for the rest of his life, serving as its Moderator for 1890/91 and the age of 79 in succession to Rev John Laird. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1861. His address was then listed as 16 Carlton Street in Stockbridge, Edinburgh. Edinburgh University honoured him with a Doctor  of Divinity in 1880. He died at home, 16 Carlton Street in Edinburgh on 4 April 1893. Family. He married 27 April 1848, Marianne (born 30 November 1814, died 9 December 1856 and whose brother was Alexander Wood), daughter of James Wood, M.D., Edinburgh, and Mary Wood of Grangehill, and had issue — Publications. See