Significant Scots
Alexander Ross

ROSS, ALEXANDER, frequently confounded with the former, was the son of James Ross, minister at Strachan, in Kincardineshire, and afterwards at Aberdeen. The date of his birth has not been ascertained, but it was probably between 1570 and 1580. He was for some time minister of the parish of Insch, in 1631 he was appointed minister of Footdee, a catechetical charge in the close vicinity of Aberdeen; and in 1636, was chosen one of the ministers of St Nicholas’ church in that city. Ross, like his colleagues, supported the episcopal form of government, and subscribed the "Generall Demands" propounded to the commissioners, appointed by the tables to enforce the subscription of the covenant in Aberdeen The day before their arrival, he thundered from the pulpit against their proceedings, and exhorted his hearers to resist their threats. He appears also to have been in correspondence with Laud. In March 1639, the covenanting forces approached Aberdeen, and the chiefs of the episcopal party fled. Ross was unable to quit the town from a sickness, from which he seems never to have recovered: he died on 11th August, 1639. His only publication appears to be the following, which is extant in Bishop Forbes’s Funerals (p. 149 to 178): "A Consolatorie Sermon, preached upon the Death of the R. R. Father in God, Patrick Forbes, late Bishop of Aberdene. By Alexander Rosse, Doctour of Divinitie, and Minister of the Evangell in Aberdene, in Saynct Nicholas Churche there, anno 1635, the xv of Aprill."