Background
John Ogilvie was born in 1724 in New York City, the son of Lieutenant William Ogilvie of the British army. He was of Scotch descent.
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John Ogilvie was born in 1724 in New York City, the son of Lieutenant William Ogilvie of the British army. He was of Scotch descent.
John Ogilvie graduated from Yale College in 1748. In 1769 he was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity by Marischal College (University of Aberdeen).
Having officiated as a lay reader in Norwalk and Ridgefield, Connecticut, John Ogilvie went abroad for Episcopal ordination. With him he carried a letter to the Bishop of London from Rev. Henry Barclay, then rector of Trinity Church, New York, but formerly in charge of the Albany mission, which states: "I have engaged the bearer hereof, Mr. John Ogilvie, to undertake the mission to Albany and the Mohawk Indians, if your Lordship shall find him duly qualified for Holy Orders. I look upon him as the best qualified for the Indian Mission of any person I could have found on account of his speaking the low Dutch language, which I found very useful to me, both on account of its conformity to the Indian in pronunciation as well as the service I was thereby enabled to do a considerable number of the Dutch inhabitants who are entirely destitute of religious instruction. " Ogilvie was duly ordained by the Bishop of London and on June 30, 1749, licensed by him to officiate in the Plantations, his appointment to the mission at Albany having been approved by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts.
Returning to America, Ogilvie commenced his labors in the spring of 1750, taking charge of St. Peter's Church and beginning his ministry to the Mohawks. He found the work both among the Indians and at Albany much demoralized because of the border warfare that until recently had been going on, and reorganized it with great success. His ability, sound judgment, social qualities, and unselfish devotion to his calling gave him a high place in the esteem of the people; St. Peter's flourished, and in 1751 the church edifice was rebuilt with a "handsome Steeple, and a very good Bell, " and all the "proper ornaments. " He acquired a knowledge of the Mohawk language and his activities among the Indians were as successful as those among the English.
The Earl of Loudoun, impressed by Ogilvie's "great pains in the performance of his duties, " appointed him, probably in 1756, chaplain to the 62nd or Royal American Regiment of Foot, and in 1759 he accompanied Sir William Johnson on the expedition against Fort Niagara. At the end of the year he was hard at work again in Albany. In 1760 his missionary zeal carried him as far west as Oswego. His work as chaplain had been of such an order that General Amherst commanded him to accompany the army of occupation to Canada. From Montreal he sent to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel a detailed account of the state of religion there, thus helping to prepare the way for the establishment of the Church of England in Canada.
After the treaty of peace in February 1763, Ogilvie did not resume his work at the Albany mission, and in the autumn of 1764 was appointed an assistant minister of Trinity Church, New York. Here he labored with characteristic fidelity and achieved considerable popularity as a preacher. In 1769 there was published The Order for Morning and Evening Prayer. Collected and translated into the Mohawk Language Under the Direction of the late Rev. Mr. William Andrews, the Late Rev. Dr. Henry Barclay and the Rev. Mr. John Oglivie. On Friday, November 18, 1774, while he was officiating in St. George's Chapel, he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and died November 26, in his fifty-first year. An elegy on his death appeared in Rivington's New York Gazetteer for January 5, 1775.
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Quotes from others about the person
Mrs. Anne Grant wrote of him, "His appearance was singularly prepossessing; his address and manners entirely those of a gentleman. His abilities were respectable, his doctrine was pure and scriptural, and his life exemplary added all this a talent for conversation, extensive reading, and a thorough knowledge of life. "
About 1755 John Ogilvie married Susanna Catharine, daughter of Lancaster Symes, Jr. , of New York. They had a daughter and a son, George, who became an Episcopal clergyman. On April 17, 1769, his first wife died, Ogilvie married Margaret (Marston) Philipse, daughter of Nathaniel Marston, Jr. , and widow of Philip Philipse of New York.