John Newton (July 24, 1725-December 21, 1807) was the captain of a slave trading ship, who later converted to Christianity and spent the rest of his life fighting slavery. He is best known for writing the hymn, Amazing Grace.
After his mother died, John Newton went to sea at age 11. His rebellious attitude caused him to lose his job and subsequently be caught by a press-gang from the H.M.S. Harwich in 1744. He was put in irons, flogged and eventually put on a slave ship. The slave-trader and his African mistress made John Newton a slave on a plantation, as David Livingstone referenced in his "Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa," (London, October 1857):
<It was refreshing to get food which could be eaten without producing the unpleasantness described by the Rev. John Newton, of St. Mary's, Woolnoth, London, when obliged to eat the same roots while a slave in the West Indies.> 1725JN001
John Newton was then put in the service of the ship Greyhound in 1747, and on the return journey to Liverpool, England, was caught in a terrible storm. He had been reading a copy of Thomas a Kempis' The Imitation of Christ, and was struck with a verse from Proverbs, "Because I have called and ye refused, I will laugh at your calamity." He cried to the Lord.
Newton continued for a time in the slave trade, where captured Africans were purchased at Muslim slave markets and transported to the Americas to be sold. John Newton was a mate and then a captain, until 1755, when he was influenced by John and Charles Wesley. He quit the slave trade and became an ordained Anglican minister in 1764. Poet William Cowper became a member of John Newton's congregation in Olney, England.
In 1769, Newton and Cowper began a Thursday evening prayer service, writing hymns for the meetings. Newton's 280 hymns and Cowper's 68 hymns, called The Olney Hymns, included: "Amazing Grace," "Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken," "How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds," "O For A Closer Walk With God," and "There is a Fountain Filled with Blood."
Throughout the remainder of his life, he kept the anniversary of his conversion, March 10, 1748 (21st N.S.) as a day of humiliation and thanksgiving for his "deliverance."
In 1788, he aided William Wilberforce's efforts to rid England of slavery by publishing his ghastly experiences in the slave trade.
In what is possibly the most famous hymn in history, John Newton wrote:
<Amazing Grace, How sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see.> 1725JN002
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American Quotations by William J. Federer, 2024, All Rights Reserved, Permission granted to use with acknowledgement.
Endnotes:
1725JN001. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Newton. Referenced by David Livingstone in his "Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa," (London, October 1857).
1725JN002. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Newton. Robert Flood, The Rebirth of America (Philadelphia: Arthur S. DeMoss Foundation, 1986), pp. 178-179.