Ann Griffith--God-seeker, poet, hymn writer (1776-1805)

In a Celtic Christianity course seventeen years ago in Wales A.M. “Donald” Allchin, noted theologian, mentioned Ann Griffiths, a young hymn writer from mid-Wales. He called her a Methodist-Calvinist poet. I was curious. How did she join these two different theological streams? Why was she remembered?  While the French and American revolutions were raging, she sought strength from her faith. Those in her community worried Napolean would push through England and Wales. She had little education but profound thoughts. She really  intrigued me.  I tucked my page of notes away and turned my attention to the rest of my Celtic course. We traveled to holy wells, monastic ruins and hill forts to see sacred Celtic sites. We boarded a ferry to Dublin to see Trinity College's The Book of Kells, yet it was the snippet of Ann Griffith’s story that grew roots in my imagination. If the chance to return came to Wales, I  vowed to find more about Griffiths. In the meantime, I found a digital library of her works through the University of Crardiff and got acquainted with her hymns. 

On my sabbatical in 2017, I returned to this amazing residential library where you sleep B&B style, eat dinner in a hall that turns into a tea shop by day, and meet interesting people from all over the English-speaking world. 

The crown jewel of the place is a Victorian-era library with spiral staircases, helpful librarians, great wi-fi, and a surplus of old and new books. And when you need a break from study, footpaths through the Gladstone estate wend through green fields of sheep and wildflowers.

First day, the librarians led me to the shelf on Welsh hymnody where I found three books on Ann Griffiths in English.  As I read, I repeatedly encountered a few geographical place names:

Powys—an ancient kingdom, now a sparcely populated region of Mid-Wales
Donalog—the nearest town on a two-laned (main) road to Ann Griffith’s home with a small chapel built in her memory
Pontrobert—where Ann walked to the local Calvinist-Methodist society
Llanfinhangel-yng-Ngwynfa—the village where she was baptized, married and buried
Dolwar Fach—the name of the family farm
River Vyrnwy—the river that wends through the area

In recent years, a seven-mile walking path had been established as a Ann Griffiths pilgrimage route. But how to get there? Would the weather hold out? Could I follow the map with all the Welsh names?  I spent an afternoon researching trains, buses and taxis. It became clear, I needed to rent a car. 

My husband, agreed to drive, if I would plan and navigate (with the help of a GPS). Keeping to the left side of the road was not the hard part. Navigating the roundabouts and narrow one-lane roads where backing up to give way is custom proved the larger challenge.

We were off. 

Ann [nee Thomas] Griffith lived her short twenty-nine years at Dolwar Fach. The youngest of five children, she learned to read and write Welsh through the church school at Llanfinhangel yng Ngwynfa. She was tutored for a brief time in English and managed rudimentary writing skills but did not speak it.   

Small sign on the the 20th century
church that grew from the
Methodist-Calvinist
society of the 19th century. 

At the age of nineteen she joined in the Methodist Calvinist society. [1]  A couple of years earlier, she had become “mistress” of the family farm after her mother died. Her father died, too, within a few years. At twenty-eight Ann married a local farmer named Thomas Griffiths but hers would not be a happily ever after story.  A short ten months after her wedding she gave birth to Elizabeth, who survived just a few days. Ann outlived her daughter by a week more. Death  also claimed her husband within a couple of years. How could this sad tale of lives cut short be the story of one of Wales’ celebrated literary poets and hymn writers?

Ann Griffith's wrote on scraps of paper. If she was caught while writing, she hid her work. She wrote for herself and did not think others would find her words useful. Her friend and house helper, Ruth Evans, found some and sang them, using known tunes. It was Ruth's memory and the oral and singing culture of Wales that enabled Ann's poetry to outlive her. 

A resurgence of interest in the past twenty-five years, has led to significant scholarly work on Ann's poetry. One of her fans is the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who translated of one of her hymns and had it sung at his consecration in 2003.

I am holding the hymnal open to
 one of Griffiths's hymns in
her memorial chapel in Donalog.

Thirty-four hymns and eight personal letters comprise her literary legacy. Seven of the letters were written to John Hughes, a weaver by trade who led the local Methodist Calvinist society. The eighth letter was written to Elizabeth Evans, the sister of Ruth Evans, the singing maid who first sang Ann’s poems. Ruth Evans later married John Hughes who became Ann's first biographer a few years after her death. It’s the stuff of legends—a young, hidden poet's work is sung by the farm maid and written down by some literate traveler. Over the centuries, it reaches us .

Ann Griffith’s hymns are theologically astute, spare and beautiful. They weave biblical images with Calvinist views on the sovereignty of God and the depravity of the human condition alongside theological threads emphasizing Methodism’s  hope in experiential salvation.

Ann was raised in a devout and loving Anglican family that paused in the morning and evening to read from the Book of Common Prayer. Her family went to church regularly and the story is told that the dog accompanied them and waited under the pew. When the family didn't attend, the dog did.

Ann’s older brother became a Methodist, and Ann did not think highly of his decision. Then in the summer of 1796, as the story goes, Ann went to a nearby town to go dancing. There, she met a friend, who invited her to attend the independent chapel. For the first time, she heard a description of sin and a call to accept “true religion” which entailed a more serious surrender and sober life. By 1879, Ann joined the Methodists and was hosting, cooking and making socks for the itinerant preaches. Soon her home had become an official preaching point for the traveling Methodist preachers.

Travelling these same narrow roads by car was difficult. After more than an hour of travel none of the place names we were seeking had appeared on the roadside. I could tell my husband was doubting my plan. Then we saw a sign for Pontrobert. As we slowed to a crawl I scrutinized the church we were passing. Stop. “Let’s park and go back!”  We pulled to a side lane and walked by two other churches. One was the Wesleyan-Methodist chapel, now a trendy private home. The other, a tiny congregational church. The church I has first spotted on the main road had a worn sign that said “MC Seiat”.  I knew that ‘seiat’ meant society. The date on the church told me it was post-Ann and the grumpy shopkeeper next door, confirmed the locked church was opened on Sunday. He said we should turn right at the next main road to find the Ann Griffiths trail.

The Hughes home and attached chapel
where the society met still is stills standing.

As we approached the intersection I saw a sign that had John Hughes’s name in a string of Welsh words—“That’s Ann’s friend!” We turned and went up a narrow unpaved drive. There it was! John Hughes’ house with the chapel he had built alongside in the 1880s. A grave yard across the street had markers for Griffiths and Hughes—no doubt Ann’s siblings and their descendants. From my reading, I knew Ann was not buried there. A weathered map behind glass showed us the general direction of all the other sites we sought!

We headed up a narrow road and stopped after many twists and turns to confirm with some teenagers that we were still heading toward Llfinhangel—Ann Griffiths home. Place names are hard to pronounce in Welsh. Stony faces nodded yes. Michael said to me, “They have no idea what you asked them.” I said, “Maybe they do.”  Around another blind corner, we saw a group of people gathered near a pub. Yes, they pointed to the nearby church where Ann Griffith was buried. A nice woman said, "Make time to stop at Lake Vyrnwy." 

In the graveyard, I found the obelisk atop Ann’s grave. I stopped to pay attention. Birds sang and sheep bleated from the surrounding fields. The sky was filled with billowing clouds. Little had changed over the centuries. I sensed the peace of this place. I paused to give thanks for the life of Ann Griffiths, her husband, and their tiny daughter.

We headed down to Dolwar Fach, missed it, but found Donalog and the Memorial chapel where busts of Ann and John top the modest pillars. A hymnbook was open from recent use. How it pleased me to see this congregation still sang her songs.

We retraced our steps to Dolwar Fach, took another wrong turn that took us for a muddy but glorious walk along the River Vrynwy. We eventually found Ann’s family farm, dotted with sheep and protected by the newest owner’s dogs.

A road marker pointed to Lake Vrynwy. We were hungry and expected a nice view but found a magical place. The woman who sat across from us at dinner said: “It looks like the castle and lake from the Disney movie Frozen!” Yeah, it kinda did. We looked out at the still waters and retraced the day: imagining Ann working the farm, walking to the stone parish church as a child, then turning another direction as a young adult to walk miles meet with the new Methodists in a modest chapel. Throughout her twenty-eight years, she would have walked along the River Vrynwy toward this lovely lake. Being in her local surroundings gave her poetry texture and pathos.

Ann Griffith wrote poetry to help her understand what she was learning and experiencing about God. She had no idea anyone would ever read or sing her words. Two hundred and twelve years after her passing, this pilgrim learned from her faith and enjoyed the beauty of her praise:

Pilgrim, fainting in the tempest

Lift your gaze where he is found,

See the Lamb, our Mediator,

Where his vestments sweep the ground;

Faithfulness, his golden girdle;

Bells around his hem proclaim

Endless mercy for the sinner,

Full atonement in his name.

In your feeble state remember:

Ankle deep, the stream will rise

Like a great unfathomed river,

Measured for you in the skies;

Only resurrection’s children

Swim in floods so deep and wide;

Fathomless and shoreless waters,

From Bethesda’s mighty tide.

O, the depths of our salvation!

Mystery of godliness,

That the God of gods, appearing,

Wore our nature and our flesh;

Here, in his own person, suffered,

All the anger in our stead,

Until justice cried, ‘release him!

Right is done, atonement made!’

O, eternal rest and rapture,

When I labor here no more,

Found within that sea of wonders,

Where one never sees a shore;

Coming in to life abundant,

Where the Three in One is mine;

Boundless sea to swim forever;

One the human and divine!  

Ann Griffith, “Pilgrim, fainting in the tempest,”  Hymns and Letters, translated by Alan Gaunt and Alan Luff, (Stainer & Bell:London, 1999).

---

[1] In Wales the Methodist revival began primarily as a revival within the established church in South Wales. Efforts were made to create educational circuits and materials to educate the laity to read the Bible. In 1783 Thomas Charles settled in  nearby Bala and created a distinctive Methodist organization with new small groups called seiats. These societies met in farmhouses or other common buildings and sponsored outdoor preaching where travelling preachers called for a committed live of faith, a pure heart, and attendance at regular society meetings. Both the established and dissenting churches that embraced these “methods” retained a Calvinistic theology.      

Seeking Susanna Wesley in Epworth

Susanna Wesley (1669-1742) easily becomes a historical figure who reflects the preferred image of the one looking for her.


To prepare lectures and academic papers on Susanna Wesley, I have read her letters and essays*. Her voice is direct, theologically confident, and  focused on matters of faith. She is not prone to small talk beyond relaying family health concerns. She writes to promote right belief and faith in her children, resolve family and church conflicts. and address a lack of money to run her household--a recurring worry.

What might seeing the church in Epworth, standing in Susanna's kitchen and walking through the village where she raised her children and buried her husband reveal that her writings had not? Before heading to Lincolnshire, I had seen the memorial to her at the Wesley Chapel on City Road in London and walked through the nearby Bushkill cemetery where she is buried not far from poet William Blake. These two memorials mark her as mother of the Methodist movement, but they were made of stone and didn't seem to reflect the flesh and blood person behind the monuments.  

Would I find the model methodical mother that homeschoolers love in Epworth? Her most famous son, John, shared her writings “On Educating My Family” with the early Methodists commending his mother’s disciplined ways of teaching her sons and daughters to read and “do well” in the Lord’s sight. She gave birth to 19 children and 10 survived. She was the youngest of 25 children born to Samuel Annesley, a minister whose church in East London counted more than 800 congregants before he was forced out for nonconformist views. Her mother, Mary White, was his second wife, and that is all that is known about her. Susanna's whole life was lived surrounded by a large families.

Susanna  famously is remembered by her children for throwing her apron over her head when she needed some solitude and for allotting one-on-one time with each child. John’s time was on Thursday, his brother, Charles’, on Saturday.  One biographer, John Newton,  claims Susanna functioned as an informal spiritual director to John throughout his life. He claims John met with her after “heart, strangely warmed” experience in 1739 to do a life-review—a Puritan practice of retelling of God’s work to a trusted mentor after a major spiritual or religious experience to gain a larger view of God's ongoing guidance.

Most of the furniture in the Old Rectory
is representative of the time period. This
is though to have belonged to the family. 

Would I find  in Epworth a prototype of self-assured public female leadership sought by women in ministry?  Susanna knew her own mind and was convinced that ministry that brought glory to God would make one seem “peculiar” to the world. Wagging tongues did not change her mind or actions. Early in life, at 13, she aligned herself with the Church of England, choosing a different path from her Presbyterian parents. At 19 Susanna married Anglican Samuel Wesley, who had  turned away from his father's nonconformist views, too. After a brief time in London, Samuel became curate at Epworth, where the couple lived for the next 40 years. Samuel was a poet as well as a minister and spent lots of time and money on his literary dreams. His debts were a source of marital stress. Susanna and Samuel were also known to harbor conflicting political views. Differing ideas about who was England's rightful monarch, led Samuel to declare if she did not pray for the king, they would not share the same bed. Samuel soon left for London, but John's birth, proved that he returned and that this vow was not ultimately kept.

Michael and Rebecca at
Samuel & Susanna's place 

In 1711, Susanna conducted family prayers on Sunday afternoons in her home when her husband was again away in London. Dozens of people came to hear her teach and read one of her absent husband's sermons. (She did this because the curate left in charge of St. Andrew’s Church in Epworth did not “do well” and people were not attending church). Her husband, Samuel heard about the controversy and wrote home for her to stop. She said she would do so if he “commanded” her to do so. He  (wisely) did not.

 After Samuel died, Susanna left Epworth  and moved in with Samuel, Jr. who died before she did. She moved among her daughters' homes in her widowhood before ending her years with John at the Foundry in London.

Shortly before she died, she wrote a broadside pamphlet stepping into the theological controversies between John Wesley and Charles Whitefield, an early member of Oxford’s holy club and successor to John’s and Charles’s failed mission to Georgia. Susanna weighed in favor of  ‘universal salvation’ vs.  ‘limited election.’ Now in her 70s  she both defended the reputations of her sons and made the case for God’s love extending to all who would receive.  

St. Andrew's Church, Epworth

Getting to Epworth required navigating many roundabouts while driving on the left side of the road. It was a relief to turn into the village and find Wesley House, the local bed and breakfast, that is kept in business by people like me seeking a connection with the Wesleys.

Epworth is a charming, rural village with lots of green, open areas. St. Andrew’s Church, a 12^th century, stone structure is tucked away at the edge of town next to a large field. The tidy graveyard remains serene with walking paths and a marker identifying  Samuel’s grave.  John famously preached standing upon it on June 6, 1742 when his offers to assist at services were refused. The early Methodists were labeled “enthusiasts”  and the new curate did not want the Wesleys stirring things up in his church. John’s father had served the parish for 40 years, and John had returned there from Oxford to serve the nearby church at Wroot before going to Georgia as a missionary. The local community knew him well. He did not experience a hometown welcome and the experience left an uneasiness in John about Epworth for many years.

We visited 265 years after first John preached outdoors In Epworth. He recalled in his journal, “I stood near the east end of the church upon my father’s tomb and cried, ‘The kingdom of heaven is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost!’”  It was easy to imagine dozens of people standing on the slight rise near the grave listening to him on a summer night.

A short walk from the church, the worn market cross near the square is said to also be a location where he preached. Would I have gone to hear John preach? Probably. Would I have been drawn by his spirited preaching and rousing antics? I am not sure. Curiosity would have made me want to hear him and evaluate his claims for myself.  

A short walk to the east, is the Old Rectory. The brick Queen-Anne style house replaced the thatched house that burned when John Wesley was six-years-old nearly trapping him in the flames. His  mother saw his rescue as providential proof that God had something in store for John. Now restored with 18^th century furnishings, it was easy to imagine the large family climbing the stairs, gathering by the fire or crowding into the sunny kitchen. My favorite places were outside in the physic garden where John’s favorite medicinal herbs are grown and the orchard where some of the trees date from the time the Wesleys were in residence. I could imagine the family picking herbs and apples and the kids sneaking off to play among the trees. (Susanna did not prioritize play. Learning, devotion and service were higher priorities).

Standing in the orchard, I looked across the nearby field and could see the statue of John Wesley that was erected in 2003 on the 300^th anniversary of his birth. It seemed fitting that John was standing in a preaching pose looking out at a field of sheep. He was always seeking the lost ones.

Susanna was present in photos in the house and stories told. The guide pointed out a small bed with a very old patchwork quilt. It was original; she would have used to keep warm. That was a personal glimpse but little else gave me a sense of her outside of her role as mother and mentor. The kitchen was in a sunny corner. It was easy to see the children working nearby as she cooked or rocked a baby but it was harder to imagine dozens straining to hear her on a Sunday afternoon reading out a sermon or holding a class meeting. 

Just a few blocks south, is Wesley Memorial Church built after the Methodist church separated from the Church of England. John and Charles are remembered in portraits in the entry and in life-sized stained-glass profiles over the chancel. The communion table is said to have come from Saint Andrew's and been used by two generations of Wesleys.

I walked to the brass baptismal font and saw my own reflection in it as I bent to read the inscription, “Erected to the Glory of God and Given in Reverent Memory of Susannah Wesley, Mother of the Rev. John Wesley, M.A.”  Seeing myself in the bowl of Christian initiation moved me as the stone memorials and sunny kitchen had not. Susanna Wesley had once written, “There are few if any, that would entirely devote above twenty years of the prime of life in hopes to save the souls of their children, which they may be saved without so much ado; for that was my principle intention, however unskillfully and unsuccessfully managed.” She had given her life to the primary vocation of all Christians, to give one’s life to serve those nearby and witness to God's persistent love in a challenging world.


I stood there and thought about her children, those nearest to her. She had buried nine, including a couple sets of twins. Daughter Molly lived with a disability making walking a challenge.  After one of the fires that decimated her home, the children had been scattered to various families. No doubt grateful for help, she also rued the habits and attitudes they brought back home. She watched her three sons go to Oxford and return clergyman, but then the younger sons choose revivalism and non-ecclesial tactics that did not initially make much sense to her or to her oldest son, Samuel, who opposed the Methodist movement. Six of her seven daughters had disastrous marriages. The stories of abuse, polygamy and early death are heartbreaking. Only Anne and son, Charles, seemed to marry happily. Then as her life was near its end, the revivals were taking off, and it looked like her sons may "do well" for God, they came under attack. It is my conclusion that she wrote her furious tract defending them and the family name as much as their shared theological view.

Leaving Epworth, I ruminated on what I had seen. Susanna Wesley knew that lowering a child into the waters of faith would not inoculate against hardship, misunderstanding, suffering or early death. She knew, however, that it would ready them to face life trusting that provisions might be slim or friends fickle, but faith in God's saving and sustaining action was a sure thing. She bet her life on it.

The Susanna Wesley, I found at Epworth became three-dimensional while looking in the baptismal waters. Birthing, Washing, Cleansing. Claiming. Purifying. Sustaining. Saving. Sanctifying. Burying. Raising. Co-laborer with Christ is who I saw reflected back at me.

* Read her letters, essays and pamphlet in Susanna Wesley: The Complete Writings, ed. Charles Wallace, Jr. Oxford University Press, 1997.