Olivers, Thomas

(1725-1799)

   Welsh poet born at Tregynon, near Newtown Montgomeryshire, he was orphaned as a young child and lacked a proper education. He became a shoemaker and traveled through England in a wretched state. At Bristol he heard George Whitefield (1714-1770) preach from the text "Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?" (Zechariah 3:2) and experienced a profound conversion that changed his life. He joined the Methodist Society at Bradfordon-Avon, Wiltshire, and John Wesley took him on as a preacher. From 1753 he was an evangelist in Cornwall. He died in London and was buried in Wesley's tomb in the City Road Chapel burying ground, London. He is most widely known for his hymns "The God of Abraham Praise," which is sung to the Jewish melody Leoni; "Come Immortal King of Glory"; "O Thou God of My Salvation" with music by the American Methodist Daniel B. Towner (1850-1919); and "Hymn of Praise to Christ." His elegy "On the Death of the late Reverend John Wesley" was published in 1791.

   Sources: A Sacrifice of Praise: An Anthology of Christian Poetry in English from Caedmon to the Mid-Twentieth Century. James H. Trott, ed. Cumberland House Publishing, 1999. Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. Enchiridion: Biographies (http://www.canamus.org/Enchiridion/Biogs/bo.htm). The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Cyber Hymnal (http://www.cyberhymnal.org/index.htm).