George Monro Grant

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For other persons named George Grant, see George Grant (disambiguation).

Grant.

George Monro Grant (December 22, 1835 – May 10, 1902), principal of Queen's College, Kingston, Ontario, was born in Albion Mines (Stellarton), Pictou County Nova Scotia in 1835.

He was educated in Pictou Academy, and West River in Nova Scotia, and from 1853 to 1860, in Scotland at the University of Glasgow, where he had a brilliant academic career; and having entered the ministry of the Church of Scotland in 1861, he returned to serve in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, before being called to the St Matthew's congregation in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he was minister from 1863 to 1877. He quickly gained a high reputation as a preacher and as an eloquent speaker on political subjects. In 1867, Nova Scotia was the province most strongly opposed to federal union. Grant threw the whole weight of his great influence in favour of Canadian confederation, and his oratory played an important part in securing the success of the movement.

When the consolidation of the Dominion by means of railway construction was under discussion in 1872, Grant travelled from the Atlantic to the Pacific with the engineers, including lifelong friend, Sir Sanford Fleming, who surveyed the route of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and his book Ocean to Ocean (1873) was one of the first things that opened the eyes of Canadians to the value of the immense heritage they enjoyed. He, never lost an opportunity, whether in the pulpit or on the platform, of pressing on his hearers that the greatest future for Canada lay in unity with the rest of the British Empire; and his broad statesman-like judgment made him an authority which politicians of all parties were glad to consult. He was very involved with the 1875 Union of the four Presbyterian groups that become the Presbyterian Church in Canada; not all of his contemporaries in the Synod of the Presbyterian Church in the Maritime Provinces of British North America joined with him in this new group, that eventually elected him Moderator of their General Assembly in 1889.

In 1877 Grant was appointed Principal of Queen's College in Kingston, Ontario, by the Third General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Canada; which through his exertions and influence expanded from a small denominational college into a large and influential educational centre; and he attracted to it an exceptionally able body of professors whose influence in speculation and research was widely felt during the quarter of a century that he remained at its head.

In 1888 he visited Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, the effect of this experience being to strengthen still further the Imperialism which was the guiding principle of his political opinions. On the outbreak of the South African War in 1899 Grant was at first disposed to be hostile to the policy of Lord Salisbury and Mr. Chamberlain; but his eyes were soon opened to the real nature of President Kruger's government, and he enthusiastically welcomed and supported the national feeling which sent men from the outlying portions of the British Empire to assist in upholding British supremacy in South Africa. Grant did not live to see the conclusion of peace, his death occurred at Kingston, Ontario on the 10th of May 1902.

At the time of his death The Times observed; that it is acknowledged on all hands that in him the Dominion has lost one of the ablest men that it has yet produced. He was the author of a number of works, of which the most notable besides Ocean to Ocean are, Advantages of Imperial Federation (1889), Our National Objects and Aims (1890), Religions of the World in Relation to Christianity (1894) and volumes of sermons and lectures.

Grant married in 1872; Jessie, daughter of William Lawson of Halifax. His descendants inclde George Parkin Grant and Michael Ignatieff.