Joshua Bayes

Believed to be born in 1671, he received his entire secular education in the grammar school of his native town, Manchester.

This engagement requiring his attendance only in the morning of each Sunday, he also acted as assistant to Christopher Taylor at Leather Lane.

When Matthew Henry died, leaving his Commentary unfinished, its completion was entrusted to a select number of Presbyterian divines, including Bayes, to whom was assigned the Epistle to the Galatians.

Dr. Calamy's death in 1732 caused a vacancy in the Merchants' lectureship at Salters' Hall, and Bayes was chosen to succeed him.

There is a very fine portrait of him (in oil) in Dr Williams's library, engraved in Wilson's History and Antiquities of Dissenting Churches.