Erasmus Middleton

At the time it was said that Selina, Countess of Huntingdon had sponsored them; in the case of two of the students, at least, there was a definite connection.

Its tolerant Principal George Dixon had tried to raise numbers, and had no part in the expulsions, though he did not share the Calvinist tone of the beliefs of the group.

[4] One of the charges against Middleton individually was that he had officiated at a service in the chapel of ease at Chieveley, though a layman.

[10] One of Nowell's claims was that Middleton's acquaintance with Thomas Haweis was supposed to be enough to get him holy orders, refused by the Bishop of Hereford (Lord James Beauclerk) on the grounds of insufficient learning, through unspecified influence.

[11] Two further prominent defenders of the students were George Whitefield and "The Shaver", the pseudonym of the Baptist minister John Macgowan, who waxed satirical against the academics.

[5] The matter was still a live one in 1806, after Middleton's death, with George Croft raking it up in the Anti-Jacobin Review.

He awarded George Dixon "indelible infamy", and said Middleton's edition of Leighton's works was "illiterate".

[17] Her plans to bring another of the expelled students, Thomas Grove, to one of her Scottish chapels as resident preacher, were later blocked in 1776 by the Church of Scotland.

[19][22][23] He was lecturer of St. Benet, Gracechurch Street and St. Helen, Bishopsgate, and curate of St. Margaret's Chapel, Westminster.

[4] During the late 1770s, Middleton was a close supporter of Lord George Gordon and the Protestant Association.

They were procedurally lax but required civility, concentrated on opposition to Popery, and were made fun of by George Kearsley.