Short answers, pulled from the story.
John Knox was born sometime between 1513 and 1515 in Haddington, East Lothian. He began life in the shadow of a crumbling medieval church and was educated at the Knox Academy grammar school before studying under the great scholar John Major.
John Knox was chained to a bench in a French galley and forced to row through the Seine for 19 months starting from his capture on the 31st of July 1547. He remained mentally sharp enough to comfort fellow prisoners with prophecies of his return to Scotland despite his failing health.
John Knox published The first blast of the trumpet against the monstruous regiment of women in mid-1558 to demonstrate how abominable before God is the Empire or Rule of a wicked woman. He targeted Queen Mary I of England and Mary of Guise, the Dowager Queen of Scotland, to argue that female rule was unnatural.
John Knox was instrumental in the establishment of the Presbyterian polity by working on the Book of Discipline to organize the newly reformed church. He is considered the notional founder of the Presbyterian denomination, which replaced the established Christian religion with Presbyterianism rather than Anglicanism.
John Knox died on the 24th of November 1572 after preaching at St Giles' until his voice became faint. He left a paltry sum of money to his family in his will, claiming he had not profited from his work in the Kirk and had corrupted or defrauded no one.