The Olney Hymns were first published in February 1779 and are the combined work of curate John Newton (1725–1807) and his poet friend William Cowper (1731–1800). The hymns were written for use in Newton's rural parish, which was made up of relatively poor and uneducated followers. The Olney Hymns are an illustration of the potent ideologies of the Evangelical movement, to which both men belonged, present in many communities in England at the time.
Amazing Grace
John Newton was an English evangelical Anglican cleric and slavery abolitionist. He had previously been a captain of slave ships and an investor in the slave trade. He served as a sailor in the Royal Navy and was himself enslaved for a time in West Africa. He is noted for being author of the hymns Amazing Grace and Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken.
Contemporary portrait of Newton
The parish church of St Peter and St Paul, Olney, where Newton became curate in 1764.
St Mary Woolnoth in the City of London, where Newton was rector from 1779.
The vicarage in Olney, where Newton wrote the hymn that would become "Amazing Grace".