SEMPLE, Robert Baylor, clergyman, born in King and Queen county, Virginia, 20 January, 1769; died in Fredericksburg, Virginia, 25 December, 1831. After receiving a good education he taught in a private family and then began to study law, but abandoned it and devoted himself to the ministry, in 1790 he was chosen pastor of the Bruington Baptist church, and he continued in this relation until his death. He soon became one of the most useful and popular men in Virginia, performed frequent and extensive preaching tours, and with equal vigor and wisdom promoted the new enterprises of benevolence that were beginning to attract the attention of his denomination. The interests of missions and education found in him a powerful friend. He received many testimonies of public confidence and esteem. He was for some time financial agent of Columbian college, and president of its board of trustees, declined an invitation to the presidency of Transylvania university in 1805, and in 1820 was elected president of the Baptist triennial convention, continuing to hold this office until his death. He received the honorary degree of D.D. from Brown in 1816. Dr. Scruple was the author of a "Catechism" (1809); a "History of Virginia Baptists" (1810); "Memoir of Elden Straughan" ; "Letters to Alexander Campbell," etc.