Gilbert Ainslie

Gilbert Ainslie by Frederick Bacon Barwell

Gilbert Ainslie (2 June 1793 – 9 January 1870)[1] was an English academic and clergyman.

Life[edit]

The fourth son of Henry Ainslie MD FRCP (1760–1834), Ainslie was born at Kendal and educated at Charterhouse. His name was entered at Trinity College, Cambridge, on 3 July 1810, but on 10 January 1811 he migrated to Pembroke, from where he matriculated in the Michaelmas term of 1811, gaining a scholarship. He graduated BA in 1815, when he was Eighth Wrangler, and the same year was elected a Fellow of his college. The next year he was ordained a deacon of the Church of England, and in 1818 a priest. Also in 1818 he proceeded to the degree of MA and in 1828 was appointed Master of Pembroke College, later the same year becoming Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge for the year. In 1829 the university made him a Doctor of Divinity. He was again vice-chancellor in 1836 and remained Master of Pembroke until his death in 1870.[2]

In 1837 Ainslie laid the foundation stone of the Fitzwilliam Museum.[3]

In 1829 he married Emily, a daughter of William Coxhead Marsh, of Park Hall, Theydon Garnon, Essex. Their third son Aymer Ainslie (1841–1901), a mining engineer,[2] was named after Aymer Valence, husband of Mary Valence, Countess of Pembroke, who in the 14th century had founded Marie Valence's Hall, which grew into Pembroke College. Ainslie wrote a life of the foundress.[4]

In succession, Ainslie and his predecessor Joseph Turner held the Mastership of Pembroke College for a total of eighty-six years, becoming the two longest-serving Masters.

Ainslie died at the Master's Lodge, Pembroke College, on 9 January 1870, leaving an estate valued at some £12,000. Probate was granted to his son Gilbert Ainslie, banker, of Cambridge.[5]

Works[edit]

  • Life of Mary Valence (Pembroke College manuscript)[4]

References[edit]

  1. ^ EATH OF THE REV. GILBERT AINSLIE, D. D., MASTER OF PEMBROKE COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE . The Morning Post (London, England), Tuesday, January 11, 1870; pg. 5; Issue 2998
  2. ^ a b John Venn, Alumni Cantabrigienses: A Biographical List of All Known Students, Graduates and Holders of Office at the University of Cambridge, from the Earliest Times to 1900, p. 20
  3. ^ Jonathan Smith, Christopher Stray, eds., Cambridge in the 1830s: The Letters of Alexander Chisholm Gooden (2003), p. 101
  4. ^ a b John Roland Seymour Phillips, Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, 1307-1324 (1972), p. 7
  5. ^ Ainslie 1870, page 5 probatesearch.service.gov.uk, accessed 29 August 2015
Academic offices
Preceded by Master of Pembroke College, Cambridge
1828–1870
Succeeded by