John Newton

John Newton was born in Wapping, London, in 1725, the son of John Newton the Elder, a shipmaster in the Mediterranean service, and Elizabeth (née Scatliff). Elizabeth was the only daughter of Simon Scatliff, an instrument maker from London.[2] Elizabeth was brought up as a Nonconformist.[3] She died of tuberculosis (then called consumption) in July 1732, about two weeks before her son’s seventh birthday.[4] Newton spent two years at a boarding school, before going to live at Aveley in Essex, the home of his father's new wife.[5]

At age eleven he first went to sea with his father. Newton sailed six voyages before his father retired in 1742. At that time, Newton's father made plans for him to work at a sugarcane plantation in Jamaica. Instead, Newton signed on with a merchant ship sailing to the Mediterranean Sea.

Statue of Newton in County Donegal, on a wintry day

In 1748, during his return voyage to England aboard the ship Greyhound, Newton had a spiritual conversion. He awoke to find the ship caught in a severe storm off the coast of Donegal, Ireland and about to sink. In response, Newton began praying for God's mercy, after which the storm began to die down. After four weeks at sea the Greyhound made it to port in Lough Swilly, Ireland. This experience marked the beginning of his conversion to Christianity.[11]

He began to read the Bible and other religious literature. By the time he reached Britain, he had accepted the doctrines of evangelical Christianity. The date was 10 March 1748,[12] an anniversary he marked for the rest of his life. From that point on, he avoided profanity, gambling and drinking. Although he continued to work in the slave trade, he had gained sympathy for the slaves during his time in Africa. He later said that his true conversion did not happen until some time later: "I cannot consider myself to have been a believer in the full sense of the word, until a considerable time afterwards."[13]

Newton returned in 1748 to Liverpool, a major port for the Triangle Trade. Partly due to the influence of his father's friend Joseph Manesty, he obtained a position as first mate aboard the slave ship Brownlow, bound for the West Indies via the coast of Guinea. Newton continued to work in the slave trade. After his return to England in 1750, he made three voyages as captain of the slave ships Duke of Argyle (1750) and African (1752–53 and 1753–54). After suffering a severe stroke in 1754, he gave up seafaring, while continuing to invest in Manesty's slaving operations.[14]

In 1780 Newton moved to the City of London as rector of St Mary Woolnoth Church, where he contributed to the work of the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, formed in 1787. During this time he wrote Thoughts Upon the African Slave Trade. In it he states; "So much light has been thrown upon the subject, by many able pens; and so many respectable persons have already engaged to use their utmost influence, for the suppression of a traffic, which contradicts the feelings of humanity; that it is hoped, this stain of our National character will soon be wiped out."[15]

In 1750 Newton married his childhood sweetheart, Mary Catlett, in St Margaret's Church, Rochester.[16]

Newton adopted his two orphaned nieces, Elizabeth Cunningham and Eliza Catlett, both from the Catlett side of the family.[17] Newton's niece Alys Newton later married Mehul, a prince from India.[18]

In 1755 Newton was appointed as tide surveyor (a tax collector) of the Port of Liverpool, again through the influence of Manesty. In his spare time, he studied Greek, Hebrew, and Syriac, preparing for serious religious study. He became well known as an evangelical lay minister. In 1757, he applied to be ordained as a priest in the Church of England, but it was more than seven years before he was eventually accepted.

During this period, he also applied to the Methodists, Independents and Presbyterians. He mailed applications directly to the Bishops of Chester and Lincoln and the Archbishops of Canterbury and York.

Eventually, in 1764, he was introduced by Thomas Haweis to The 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, who was influential in recommending Newton to William Markham, Bishop of Chester. Haweis suggested Newton for the living of Olney, Buckinghamshire. On 29 April 1764 Newton received deacon's orders, and finally was ordained as a priest on 17 June.

As curate of Olney, Newton was partly sponsored by John Thornton, a wealthy merchant and evangelical philanthropist. He supplemented Newton's stipend of £60 a year with £200 a year "for hospitality and to help the poor". Newton soon became well known for his pastoral care, as much as for his beliefs. His friendship with Dissenters and evangelical clergy led to his being respected by Anglicans and Nonconformists alike. He spent sixteen years at Olney. His preaching was so popular that the congregation added a gallery to the church to accommodate the many persons who flocked to hear him.

Some five years later, in 1772, Thomas Scott took up the curacy of the neighbouring parishes of Stoke Goldington and Weston Underwood. Newton was instrumental in converting Scott from a cynical ‘career priest’ to a true believer, a conversion which Scott related in his spiritual autobiography The Force Of Truth (1779). Later Scott became a biblical commentator and co-founder of the Church Missionary Society.

In 1779 Newton was invited by John Thornton to become Rector of St Mary Woolnoth, Lombard Street, London, where he officiated until his death. The church had been built by Nicholas Hawksmoor in 1727 in the fashionable Baroque style. Newton was one of only two evangelical Anglican priests in the capital, and he soon found himself gaining in popularity amongst the growing evangelical party. He was a strong supporter of evangelicalism in the Church of England. He remained a friend of Dissenters (such as Methodists and Baptists) as well as Anglicans.

Young churchmen and people struggling with faith sought his advice, including such well-known social figures as the writer and philanthropist Hannah More, and the young William Wilberforce, a Member of Parliament (MP) who had recently suffered a crisis of conscience and religious conversion while contemplating leaving politics. The younger man consulted with Newton, who encouraged Wilberforce to stay in Parliament and "serve God where he was".[19][20]

In 1792, Newton was presented with the degree of Doctor of Divinity by the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University).

Newton in 1807

In 1788, 34 years after he had retired from the slave trade, Newton broke a long silence on the subject with the publication of a forceful pamphlet Thoughts Upon the Slave Trade, in which he described the horrific conditions of the slave ships during the Middle Passage. He apologised for "a confession, which ... comes too late ... It will always be a subject of humiliating reflection to me, that I was once an active instrument in a business at which my heart now shudders." He had copies sent to every MP, and the pamphlet sold so well that it swiftly required reprinting.[21]

Newton became an ally of William Wilberforce, leader of the Parliamentary campaign to abolish the African slave trade. He lived to see the British passage of the Slave Trade Act 1807, which enacted this event.

Newton came to believe that during the first five of his nine years as a slave trader he had not been a Christian in the full sense of the term. In 1763 he wrote: "I was greatly deficient in many respects ... I cannot consider myself to have been a believer in the full sense of the word, until a considerable time afterwards."[13]

The vicarage in Olney, Buckinghamshire where Newton wrote the hymn that would become "Amazing Grace".

In 1767 William Cowper, the poet, moved to Olney. He worshipped in Newton's church, and collaborated with the priest on a volume of hymns; it was published as Olney Hymns in 1779. This work had a great influence on English hymnology. The volume included Newton's well-known hymns: "Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken," "How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds!,"[22] "Let Us Love, and Sing, and Wonder," "Come, My Soul, Thy Suit Prepare,"[23] "Approach, My Soul, the Mercy-seat",[24] and "Faith's Review and Expectation," which has come to be known by its opening phrase, "Amazing Grace".

Memorial plaque to Newton and his wife at St Mary Woolnoth in the City of London

Many of Newton's (as well as Cowper's) hymns are preserved in the Sacred Harp, a hymnal used in the American South during the Second Great Awakening. Hymns were scored according to the tonal scale for shape note singing. Easily learnt and incorporating singers into four-part harmony, shape note music was widely used by evangelical preachers to reach new congregants.

In 1776 Newton contributed a preface to an annotated version of John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress.[25]

Newton also contributed to the Cheap Repository Tracts. He wrote an autobiography entitled An Authentic Narrative of Some Remarkable And Interesting Particulars in the Life of ------ Communicated, in a Series of Letters, to the Reverend T. Haweis, Rector of Aldwinckle, And by him, at the request of friends, now made public, which he published anonymously in 1764 with a Preface by Haweis. It was later described as "written in an easy style, distinguished by great natural shrewdness, and sanctified by the Lord God and prayer".[26]

Newton's wife Mary Catlett died in 1790, after which he published Letters to a Wife (1793), in which he expressed his grief.[27] Plagued by ill health and failing eyesight, Newton died on 21 December 1807 in London. He was buried beside his wife in St. Mary Woolnoth in London. Both were reinterred at the Church of St Peter and Paul in Olney in 1893.[28]

Newton's gravestone at Olney, Buckinghamshire, bearing his self-penned epitaph.

Stained-glass image of John Newton at St Peter and Paul Church in Olney, Buckinghamshire, where Newton served as parish priest.

• Newton is memorialised with his self-penned epitaph on his tomb at Olney: JOHN NEWTON. Clerk. Once an infidel and libertine a servant of slaves in Africa was by the rich mercy of our LORD and SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST preserved, restored, pardoned and appointed to preach the faith he had long laboured to destroy. Near 16 years as Curate of this parish and 28 years as Rector of St. Mary Woolnoth.
• When he was initially interred in London, a memorial plaque to Newton, containing his self-penned epitaph, was installed on the wall of St Mary Woolnoth. At the bottom of the plaque are the words: "The above Epitaph was written by the Deceased who directed it to be inscribed on a plain Marble Tablet. He died on Dec. the 21st, 1807. Aged 82 Years, and his mortal Remains are deposited in the Vault beneath this Church."[29]
• The town of Newton in Sierra Leone is named after him. To this day his former town of Olney provides philanthropy for the African town.[30]
• In 1982, Newton was recognised for his influential hymns by the Gospel Music Association when he was inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame.[31]
• A memorial to him was erected in Buncrana in Inishowen, County Donegal, in Ulster in 2013. Buncrana is located on the shores of Lough Swilly.

• Cowper and Newton Museum

• Aitken, Jonathan (2007), John Newton: From Disgrace to Amazing Grace, Crossway Books, ISBN 978-1-58134-848-4
• Bennett, H. L. (1894), "Newton, John (1725–1807)" , in Lee, Sidney (ed.), Dictionary of National Biography, 40, London: Smith, Elder & CoCS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Brown, Christopher Leslie (2006), Moral Capital: Foundations of British Abolitionism, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, ISBN 978-0-8078-5698-7, OCLC 62290468
• Dunn, John (1994), A Biography of John Newton (PDF), New Creation Teaching Ministry
• The Gospel Music Association (2015), Gospel Music Hall of Fame, archived from the original on 8 October 2016
• Hatfield, Edwin F. (1884), "John Newton", The Poets of the Church: A Series of Biographical Sketches of Hymn-Writers, Anson D.F. Randolph & Company, retrieved 4 May 2017
• Hickling, Alfred (5 April 2007), "African Snow", The Guardian, retrieved 6 May 2017
• Hochschild, Adam (2005), Bury the Chains, The British Struggle to Abolish Slavery, Basingstoke: Pan Macmillan
• Howe, Janet, ed. (2017), Welcome to the Olney Newton Link, retrieved 6 May 2017
• Ku, Andrew, ed. (2017), "Amazing Grace", Playbill Vault, Playbill Inc, retrieved 6 May 2017
• Lewis, Frank (1976), Essex and Suger, Philimore
• McInnis, Gilbert (3 December 2015), "The Struggle of Postmodernism and Postcolonialism in Caryl Phillips's Crossing the River", postcolonialweb.org, retrieved 6 May 2017
• Morgan, Robert J, Then Sings My Soul, Thomas Nelson Publishing
• Newton, John (1764), An Authentic Narrative of Some Remarkable and Interesting Particulars in the Life of John Newton. Communicated in a Series of Letters to the Rev. Mr. Haweis, Rector of Aldwinckle. And by him, at the request of friends, now made public, London: J. Johnson. Preface by Haweis
• Newton, John (1788), Thoughts Upon the African Slave Trade (PDF) (Internet Archive with funding by Associates of the Boston Public Library ed.), London: J. Buckland & J. Johnson, retrieved 24 May 2019
• Newton, John (17 August 2018) [1776], "Preface to Pilgrim's Progress", Banner of Truth, retrieved 24 February 2019
• Newton, John (1793), Letters to a wife, by the Author of Cardiphoni, London: J. Johnson, No. 72, St. Paul's Church-Yard – via Eighteenth Century Collections Online. Gale.
• Newton, John (2003), Hillman, Dennis (ed.), Out of the Depths, Grand Rapids: Kregel
• Pollock, John (1977), Wilberforce, New York: St. Martin's Press, ISBN 978-0-09-460780-4, OCLC 3738175
• Rouse, Marylynn, ed. (2 January 2014), Newton's death, retrieved 5 May 2017
• Tackett, James (2017), "John Newton (1725–1807)", The Paperless Hymnal, retrieved 4 May 2017
• Theatreland Ltd (2014), "Why see Amazing Grace?", chicago-theatre.com, retrieved 6 May 2017
• Thomson, Andrew (1884), Samuel Rutherford, London: Hodder & Stoughton

• Armstrong, Chris (2004), "The Amazingly Graced Life of John Newton", Christianity Today, 81, retrieved 6 May 2017
• Bruner, Kurt; Ware, Jim (2007), Finding GOD in the Story of AMAZING GRACE, Tyndale
• Foss, Cassie (9 July 2013), "Faith-based film to shoot scenes in Southeastern N.C.", Wilmington Morning Star, retrieved 14 August 2014
• Nemetz, Andrea (31 May 2013), "Hector Replica Takes Centre Stage", Halifax Chronicle-Herald, retrieved 14 August 2014
• Rediker, Marcus (2007), The Slave Ship: A Human History, Viking
• St. Margaret's Church (2014), St. Margaret's Church, archived from the original on 18 September 2014, retrieved 14 August 2014
• Turner, Steve (2002), Amazing Grace: The Story of America's Most Beloved Song, New York: Ecco/HarperCollins

• Media related to John Newton at Wikimedia Commons
• Quotations related to John Newton at Wikiquote
• Works related to Thoughts upon the African Slave Trade at Wikisource
• The John Newton Project
• Biography & Articles on Newton
• Works by or about John Newton at Internet Archive
• John Newton Papers Collection from the Digital Library of Georgia
• John Newton on Poeticous