(28 Aug. 1800-3 Feb. 1879), clergyman. Born Williamstown, GC. Parents: Rev. John Bethune and his wife Veronica (Véronique) Waddens. Though his father was a Presbyterian clergyman, Alexander Neil chose the Church of England, and he was ordained a Church of England clergyman in 1824. He was closely associated with the Rev. John Strachan, at whose school he was educated in Cornwall, and in succession to Strachan he became in 1867 the second bishop of Toronto. He was the first editor of the Church of England newspaper, the Church, founded in 1837, and he was the author of a life of Bishop Strachan (Memoir of the Right Reverend John Strachan, 1870) and other books. He died at Toronto. He was married to Jane Eliza Crooks. He seems to have had little connection with GC after the death of his father in 1815 (at which time his mother moved to Cobourg) but he was one of the best known Canadians of his time. Anglicans were few in number in Glengarry and no Anglican church was built there until after his time (see F.W. Squire), and there was accordingly little professional reason for revisits to his old county. His son the Rev. Charles James Stewart was headmaster of Trinity College School at Port Hope and as a distinguished entomologist was a prominent early Canadian scientist. His son, Robert Henry Bethune, was a prominent banker and founder of the Dominion Bank.

Life in Dictionary of Canadian Biography X, Rose, i, 303, and MDict * life of his son Rev. Charles James Stewart Bethune in Rose i, 36, and Charlesworth * life of his son Robert Henry in Dictionary of Canadian Biography XII and Rose, ii, 764 * MacGillivray & Ross 222-223 on Church of England in Glengarry