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Author: Swain, Joseph

Biography:

SWAIN, Joseph (1761-96: ODNB)

He was born in Birmingham and orphaned as a young child. He served an apprenticeship as an engraver, completing his training in London with his brother. In 1782 he had a conversion experience; in 1783 he was baptised in Southwark. In the same year, in Stepney, he married Susannah Buxton, with whom he had four children who were still alive at the time of his early death. Becoming active among evangelical Christians in the area, in 1792 he was ordained as the pastor of a Baptist congregation in Walworth. His Walworth Hymns, according to Benson, "contributed to the permanent body of Evangelical Hymnody" (215). The congregation grew under his inspiring care; he was able also to supplement the family income with evening lectures. He died after a short illness and is buried in the dissenters' burial ground in Bunhill Fields. John Upton, a friend who preached the funeral sermon in 1796, later published it for the benefit of Swain's widow and small children, together with an eight-page autobiographical poem about Swain's conversion, written during his last illness and entitled "A Letter to the Rev. Mr. P----, Birmingham." (ODNB 29 Oct. 2020; findmypast.com 29 Oct. 2020; Benson)

 

 

Other Names:

  • J. Swain
 

Books written (18):

London: for the author by J. Mathews, J. Buckland, and T. Lepard, 1789
London: [no publisher: printed "For the Author"; sold by Mathews], 1791
London: [no publisher: printed "for the Author"], 1792
2nd edn. London: [no publisher: "for the Author's Widow"], 1797
3rd edn. London: Button, Mrs. Gurney, and the vestry of the East-street Meeting House, 1799
3rd edn. London: Jordan and Maxwell, 1806
4th edn. London: 1810
Philadelphia: Hellings and Aitkin, 1811
Philadelphia: Hellings and Aitken, 1811
1st American edn. from the 2nd London edn. Boston: printed by Nathaniel Willis, 1812
4th edn. Edinburgh: Oliphant, Waugh, and Innes, 1814
Charleston SC: Robert Missildine, 1819
1st American edn. from the 5th Edinburgh edn. New York: G. and C. Carvill, John P. Haven, and E. Bliss, 1827
6th edn. Edinburgh/ Glasgow/ Dublin/ London: Waugh and Innes/ M. Ogle/ R. M. Tims/ James Duncan and James Nisbet, 1828
6th edn. Edinburgh/ Dublin/ London: Waugh and Innes/ W. Curry, Jr., and Co./ Whittaker and Co., [1830]
London: J. Eedes, and L. B. Seeley and Sons, 1834