CHRISTOPHER GOODMAN.


Fasti Ecclesiae Scoticanae, H Scott (1915) rev 1917, 1920
vol 5 p 230 St Andrews, 1560

 CHRISTOPHER
GOODMAN, born Chester, about 1519, son of William G., merchant, the
representative of an old Cheshire family; educated at Brasenose College,
Oxford; B.A. (4th Feb. 1541), M.A. (13th June 1544); app. senior student
of Christ’s Church (in 1547) and Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity in
1548; B.D. (1551). During the reign of Queen Mary he went into exile at
Strasburg, and joined the Reformers at Frankfort, but, disputes having
arisen about Church order, he withdrew to Geneva, where he was elected
joint pastor with John Knox in Sept. 1555, and assisted him in the
preparation of his Book of Common Order and was also employed with
Coverdale in translating the Geneva edition of the Scriptures. At the
urgent entreaty of Knox he went to Scotland in Sept. 1559, when he acted
as escort to Knox’s wife and family. In Nov. he became min. of Ayr; was
nominated by the Lords of the Congregation min. here 19th July 1560 was a
member of first General Assembly 19th Dec. that year, and of the
Assemblies June 1562, June and Dec. 1563, June and Dec. 1564, and June
1565; returned to England in Nov. or Dec. 1565; became chaplain to Sir
Henry Sidney, Lord-Deputy of Ireland, Jan. 1566; was coll. in 1570 to the
Archdeaconry of Richmond and to the rectory of Alford, of which offices he
was deprived shortly afterwards for nonconformity. He died at Chester
after 4th June 1603 (on which date he was visited by Archbishop Ussher,
who in after days used to repeat some of the dying man’s “grave, wise
speeches”) and was buried in St Bride’s Church there.