Christopher Anderson

Christopher Anderson (1782-1852)  was originally a banker’s clerk in Scotland. He was converted through the ministry of James and Robert Haldane in 1799 and shortly thereafter became a Baptist and eventually a prominent minister and figure among the Particular Baptists of England, Scotland, and America, especially in regard to this work with the Baptist Missionary Society. At one point he planned to join Carey in India as a BMS missionary but poor health would not allow him to do so. He turned to the ministry instead, studying at Bristol Academy and with John Sutcliff at Olney. He eventually settled in Edinburgh where he organized a small congregation along Baptist lines in 1808. He would remain with that congregation until shortly before his death. He was a staunch supporter of the BMS, especially the Serampore Mission. He helped to form an Itinerating Society of preachers, both in Scotland and Ireland, which later became a part of the Baptist Home Missionary Society. He founded the Edinburgh Bible Society and was involved in the formation of the Edinburgh Gaelic School Society. Anderson was actively involved with Fuller in raising funds for the BMS. On one occasion in 1805, he traveled for several months across England, arriving in London in the middle of May to stay for about a month, during which time he also paid a quick visit to Bristol. In mid-June 1805 he went to Olney to spend time with Sutcliff, attending the Midland Association meeting at Dunstable on his way. His stay with Sutcliff was “as pleasant as it was profitable to him,” his biographer, Hugh Anderson, writes. “Literary advantages, indeed, there were not many; but the conversation and remarks of his revered tutor were valuable, the opportunities he had of public address were numerous, while the free criticisms on his written exercises by his fellow-students, who were not more in number than an ordinary family circle, could not fail to keep in check the self-esteem which his growing popularity in the villages and neighbouring towns might create.” He kept a journal of his travels the month before this letter was written, preaching in Bedford at Hillyard’s church; then at Lavendon; entertaining John Ryland on 2 July in Olney; and preaching in Olney on 7 July. According to his journal, he was in Birmingham on the 19th, though he may have been in Olney on that day. Fuller returned on 14 August from Scotland with nearly £1300. Anderson eventually left Olney for London on 30 October 1805. An account of Fuller’s journey through Scotland that summer raising funds for Carey’s translation work at Serampore can be found in Morris’s Memoir of Fuller. The total amount collected by Fuller and others in Scotland and the north of England appeared in the Periodical Accounts. During the years of the split between the Serampore Mission and the BMS, Anderson served as one of the chief negotiators for Carey and Marshman. See Hugh Anderson, Letters of Christopher Anderson (Edinburgh: W. P. Kennedy, 1854) 59-61, 33-36; J. W. Morris, Memoirs of the Life and Writings of the Rev. Andrew Fuller, 2nd ed. (London: Wightman and Cramp, 1826), 129-153; BMS Periodical Accounts, 3:146-150; Derek B. Murray, “Christopher Anderson (1782-1852),” in The British Particular Baptists, ed. Michael A. G. Haykin, 5 vols. (Springfield, MO: Particular Baptist Press, 1998-2019), 3:171-179; Donald E. Meek, ed., A Mind for Mission: Essays in Appreciation of the Rev. Christopher Anderson (1782-1852) (Edinburgh: Scottish Baptist History Project, 1992).