Robert Walmsley

WALMSLEY, Robert. b. Manchester, 18 March 1831; d. Sale, Cheshire, 30 October 1905. He was in business as a jeweller in Sale from 1870 to 1904. He was a member of the Congregational Church and closely involved in the work of the Manchester Sunday School Union, for which many of his hymns were written. In his view the existing hymns used in Sunday schools were often too pessimistic for young children, and he sought to strike a positive note and use ‘bright’ tunes popularised in the Union’s Festival Hymns and Tunes (1895). In 1900 he published a collection of forty-four of his hymns as Sacred Songs for Children of All Ages, in which many of the pieces emphasise love, hope and praise. Hymns by...