ABERDEEN, _March 13, 1637_.
CXXXVIII.--_To_ MR. HUGH HENDERSON.
[HUGH HENDERSON was first minister of Dalry, a parish in the district of Cunningham, Ayrshire; and afterwards of Dumfries. We meet with his name as minister of Dalry in 1643, when he was nominated as one of the eight ministers whom the General Assembly appointed to visit Ireland by pairs, each pair for three months successively, to instruct, comfort, and encourage the Presbyterians in that country, who had been deprived of their ministers through the tyranny of the prelates. In 1645 he was appointed by the General Assembly chaplain to Colonel Stuart's regiment; and in 1648 translated to Dumfries. Shortly after the restoration of Charles II., he, and all the ministers of the Presbytery of Dumfries, were, by the order of the King's Commissioner, carried prisoners to Edinburgh, for refusing to observe the 29th day of May as a religious anniversary, in commemoration of the King's birth and restoration. But he and the rest (with the exception of two) at last yielded so far as to engage simply to preach on that day, knowing it would be the day of their ordinary weekly sermon; a promise hardly compatible with straightforwardness, being something like a disingenuous attempt to make it appear that they were complying with the statute of Parliament, when they were merely discharging a professional duty. Henderson exhibited more consistency and stedfastness the subsequent year, when he preferred being expelled from his charge to conforming to Prelacy. He was ejected in the close of the year 1662, by the Earl of Middleton. After this, Henderson frequently preached in his own house in Galloway.]