Francis, Samuel Trevor

Arranger & Author

b Cheshunt, Herts 1834, d Worthing, Sussex 1925. Moving in his early years to Hull, S Yorks, he received basic education from his aunt and grandmother. He was a choirboy at the parish church and in his youth wrote verse. Later he joined the (Plymouth) Brethren and became a businessman and merchant in London. He assisted Ira Sankey and sometimes even deputised for him during the Moody and Sankey missions in Britain, 1873–75, and was himself in much demand as an effective speaker indoors and out, travelling widely in the UK and beyond. His hymns appeared in several periodicals including The Life of Faith, and in 1873 in the Enlarged London Hymn Book. He also wrote Gems from the Revised Version, with Poems (1891) and Whence-Whither and Other Poems ( 1898). He died at the Groombridge Nursing Home at the age of 91. His collected verse was issued posthumously in 1926 as O the Deep, Deep Love of Jesus, and Other Poems, and his story is told in H Pickering’s Chief Men among the Brethren (1931). Christian Worship (1976) includes 5 of his hymns; 2 are in MP. No.325.