The Search for a Common Identity

"Thorough research has enabled Brian Talbot to lay bare how the Baptists in Scotland, few and divided in 1800, grew over seventy years into a sizable and united denomination."

-- David Bebbington, University of Stirling



"Groundbreaking historical research is characterized by two things in particular: focused concentration on the primary sources and close attention to details. This new work by Brian Talbot on the origins of the Scottish Baptist Union has both in abundance. Moreover, in locating this important event in the larger framework of British Baptist history, he shows why this event is significant not only for Scottish Baptists but for others impacted by them in the British Isles and places further afield like Canada. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the history of Dissent in the British Isles."

-- Michael Haykin, Toronto Baptist Seminary and Bible College



"Brian Talbot, by discovering much new material and reinterpreting what was known, sheds light on the struggle for union among Scottish Baptists before 1869, and convincingly challenges several assumptions. He deftly weaves together history, biography and theology and asserts the importance of the several varieties of Baptists in the life of late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Scotland."

-- Derek B. Murray, University of Edinburgh