Daniel Burgess (minister)

Daniel Burgess
Daniel Burgess, minister of the Gospel. 1691
Born	1645
Died	1713
Nationality	English
Occupation	Presbyterian minister

Daniel Burgess (1645–1713) was an English Presbyterian minister.

His father, Daniel Burgess, who, after holding the livings of Staines and of Sutton Magna, Wiltshire, was appointed rector of Collingbourn Ducis, Wiltshire, through the influence of his brother Isaac Burgess, high sheriff of the county, was ejected in 1662, and was probably the author of the sermon on Eccl. xii. 1, mentioned by Watts and Allibone.

Burgess was placed under Richard Busby at Westminster School in 1654, and entered commoner of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, in 1660. He studied hard, but did not graduate, declining to conform. The statement that he took orders at Oxford needs confirmation ; deacon's orders he may have had, but more probably only the license of a presbytery.

Leaving the university, he acted as domestic chaplain to Foyl of Chute, Wiltshire, and afterwards to Smith of Tedworth. In 1667, Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of Orrery, lord president of Munster, took him to Ireland, where he remained seven years. He was head master of the school founded by Lord Orrery at Charleville, co. Cork, and had pupils from the Irish nobility and gentry. He afterwards acted as chaplain to Lady Mervin, near Dublin. He was ordained by the Dublin presbytery. At Dublin he married.

In 1674, his father's state of health took him to Marlborough ; he preached there and in the neighbourhood, and was sent to Marlborough gaol. He came to London in his fortieth year (1685), and ministered to a large congregation at a hired meeting-place in Brydges Street, Covent Garden. He had influential friends ; the Countess of Warwick chose him as tutor for her grandson, the future Lord Bolingbroke; in July 1688 Rotheram, one of the new barons of exchequer, took him as his chaplain on the Oxford circuit, and in 1695 he preached the funeral sermon for the Countess of Ranelagh.

His congregation moved in 1695 to a meeting-house in Russell Court, Drury Lane, and in 1705 a meeting-house was built for him in New Court, Carey Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields. Before it was paid for differences arose in his congregation, ending in a large secession from his ministry. On 1 March 1710 the Henry Sacheverell mob gutted Burgess's meeting-house, and made a bonfire of its pulpit and other fittings. The government offered a reward of £100. for the apprehension of the rioters, and repaired the building.