Bryan, Alfred Mgready, Dd

Bryan, Alfred M'Gready, D.D.

a Cumberland Presbyterian minister, was born in Logan County, Kentucky, August 19, 1805. He professed religion at the age of seventeen, and studied under Dr. William Price. The Logan Presbytery received him as a candidate for the ministry at Pilot Knob, April 2, 1823; he was licensed April 7, 1825, and ordained at Glasgow. October 8, 1829. To the latter date he labored in different parts of Kentucky, and then was appointed to what was called the Mercer District, in the northern part of the same state. About 1830 he took charge of a congregation in Nashville, Tennessee, where he remained about two years. Then, by appointment of the General Assembly, he went as a missionary to Western Pennsylvania, and after serving eighteen months as such took charge of a church in Pittsburgh, with which he was identified until the time of his death. In December 1833, the congregation completed and occupied a house of worship on Smithfield street. When this became too small a larger church was built, and was dedicated in June 1842. The great fire which visited Pittsburgh in 1845 partially disabled the congregation, and he visited Tennessee and Kentucky to raise money for its relief. He accepted a call to Memphis, Tenn., in 1856; but in 1859 returned to Pittsburgh as pastor of his former church. While Conducting a meeting, by appointment of the presbytery, in Van Buren, Washington County, Pennsylvania; he fell back unconscious, and died the following day, Jan. 22, 1861. See Beard, Biographical Sketches, 1st series, page 292; Wilson, Presb. Hist. Almanac, 1862, page 283.