John Marshall Lang


John Marshall Lang CVO was a Church of Scotland minister and author. He served as Moderator of the General Assembly in 1893.

Life

He was born in the manse at Glassford into an eminent ecclesiastical family on 14 May 1834. His father was the minister Gavin Lang. His mother was Agnes Roberton Marshall. He was the second of eleven children, including Robert Hamilton Lang.
He studied Sciences at Glasgow University but did not graduate. He then trained as a minister at Divinity Hall In Glasgow, He was ordained by the Church of Scotland at the Kirk of St Nicholas in Aberdeen. In 1858 he moved to the more rural parish of Fyvie. He later served in Anderston in Glasgow and Morningside Church in Edinburgh.
He served as Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1893. His third son Cosmo Gordon Lang was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1928 to 1942; his fifth son Marshall Buchanan Lang was Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from 1935 to 1936; and another son, Norman MacLeod Lang was Bishop suffragan of Leicester.
In early 1900 he moved to Aberdeen having been elected as Principal of Aberdeen University in March that year. He lived at Chanonry Lodge at 13 Chanonry, midway between King's College, Aberdeen and St Machar's Cathedral. In his role as Principal he was created a Commander of the Royal Victorian Order by King Edward VII during a visit to the university in 1906.
He died on 2 May 1909 and is buried in the eastern enclosure attaching the east end of St Machar's Cathedral.

Publications

In 1859 he was married to Hannah Agnes Keith, daughter of Hay Keith, a minister, of Hamilton.
They had seven sons and one daughter, his third son Cosmo Gordon Lang later becoming Archbishop of York.