Emma F. R. Campbell

Emma F. R. Campbell
Born
Emma Frances Riggs Campbell

(1830-11-16)November 16, 1830
Newark, New Jersey, U.S.
DiedFebruary 25, 1919(1919-02-25) (aged 88)
Morristown, New Jersey, U.S.
NationalityUSA
Occupation(s)Hymnwriter, author

Emma Frances Riggs Campbell (November 16, 1830 – February 25, 1919) was an American hymnwriter and author. She is best known for her hymn "Jesus of Nazareth Passeth By".[1]

She was born on November 16, 1830 in Newark, New Jersey, one of eleven children of Abner Campbell, owner of a looking-glass and picture-framing business, and Deborah Conger. Her sister Catherine Smith Campbell married future Florida governor Ossian Bingley Hart.[1][2]

Campbell graduated from the Packer Institute for Girls in Brooklyn, New York in 1959. She and a sister opened a school in Morristown, New Jersey in the 1860s. She taught Sunday school for 37 years at the First Presbyterian Church in Morristown.[1]

"Jesus of Nazareth Passeth By" was inspired by an 1864 religious revival in Newark held by the Rev. Edward Payson Hammond, specifically a sermon mentioning Luke 18:37 and the story of Jesus healing the blind Bartimaeus. Campbell's hymn was first published using the Greek letter Eta as a pseudonym, which has led to Campbell being misidentified as Eta or Etta Campbell. The hymn was anthologized numerous times and was frequently performed by the gospel singer Ira D. Sankey.[1][3]

Campbell published several other hymns, a collection of verse, several children's novels, and a short biography of her brother-in-law Ossian Hart.[1][2]

Campbell died on February 25, 1919 in Morristown, New Jersey, aged 88.[4]

Bibliography

  • Paul Preston; or, Who is the Hero? (1864)
  • Green Pastures (1866)
  • Better than Rubies; or, Mabel's Treasure (1869)
  • Toward the Mark (1875)
  • Biographical Sketch of Honorable Ossian B. Hart, Late Governor of Florida, 1873 (1901)
  • The Hymn "Jesus of Nazareth passeth by" and Its History, and Other Verses (1909)

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Claghorn, Charles Eugene (1984). Women composers and hymnists: a concise biographical dictionary. Internet Archive. Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press. p. 41. ISBN 978-0-8108-1680-0.
  2. ^ a b Brown, Canter Jr. (1997). Ossian Bingley Hart: Florida's loyalist Reconstruction governor. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. p. 44. ISBN 0-585-34095-1. OCLC 47010135.
  3. ^ Campbell, Emma F. R. (1909). "Introduction". The Hymn "Jesus of Nazareth passeth by": its history and other verses. Princeton Theological Seminary Library. New York : M.E. Munson. pp. v–xi.
  4. ^ "Miss Emma F.R. Campbell, Writer". The New York Times. 1919-02-27. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2022-08-23.