Gunning, Peter (1614-01-11 - 1684-07-06)

Born 11 January 1614 (new) at Hoo, Kent to Peter Gunning, the vicar there, and his wife, Ellen. Educated at King's School Canterbury; matriculated from Clare College, Cambridge, 1629; BA and fellow, 1633; MA, 1635. Remained at Clare until 1644 when he was ejected by parliamentary commissioners. He departed for Oxford, then in royalist hands, where he was appointed chaplain of New College and vicar of Cassington that same year. Proceeded BD 23 July 1646, the day before Oxford surrendered to parliamentary forces. During the interregnum, he served as tutor in the households Lord Hatton and Sir Francis Compton, and chaplain to Sir Robert Shirley, until his death in the Tower of London in 1656. That year, Gunning began officiating at the chapel of Exeter House on the Strand, where he was permitted to conduct prayer book services. These proved so popular that the Exeter House congregation earned the nickname the "Grand Assembly." He engaged in controversy against the Baptists, engaging in two public disputations with Henry Denne at St Clement Danes Church which he published as A Contention for Truth, in Two Public Disputations upon Infant Baptism in 1658. At the Restoration in 1660 he was restored to his fellowship at Clare, created DD, made Lady Margaret professor of divinity, and appointed master of Corpus Christi College the following year. He resigned those positions later that year to become regius chair of divinity and master of St John's College. He also acquired preferments beyond the university: prebendary of Canterbury Cathedral, rector of Cottesmore, Rutland and Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire, all in 1660. Appointed a delegate for the episcopalian side at the Savoy Conference in 1661. Left Cambridge in 1670 to become bishop of Chichester in 1670; translated to Ely in 1675. Died 6 July 1684.