1752–1784

Introduction

Died: Au­gust 3, 1784, Ips­wich, Suf­folk, Eng­land.

Buried: Tack­et Street Bu­ri­al Ground, Ips­wich, Suf­folk, Eng­land.

Biography

A do­mes­tic ser­vant, Har­ris­on taught her­self to read and write. At age 20, she suf­fered an ill­ness, pos­si­bly tu­ber­cu­lo­sis, from which she did not ex­pect to re­co­ver. She gave ma­nu­scripts of her po­et­ry to John Con­der, a Con­gre­ga­tion­al­ist min­is­ter, who ed­it­ed and pub­lished her po­ems.

The pre­face to the first edi­tion of her col­lect­ed hymns, Songs in the Night (Ip­swich, Eng­land: Pun­chard & Jer­myn, 1780), states she was a ve­ry ob­scure young wo­man, and quite des­ti­tute of the ad­van­tag­es of edu­ca­tion, as well as un­der great bo­di­ly af­flic­tion. Her fa­ther dy­ing when she was young, and leav­ing a large fa­mi­ly un­pro­vid­ed for, she went out to ser­vice at six­teen years of age.

Songs in the Night went through at least 21 edi­tions in Bri­tain and Am­eri­ca, mak­ing it one of the best sell­ing col­lect­ions writ­ten by a la­bor­ing-class po­et in the late 18th Cen­tu­ry.

This in­scrip­tion was placed at her grave:

SUSANNA HARRISON,
DIED 3D OF AUGUST 1784,
AGED XXXII.
DURING TWELVE YEARS’ AFFLICTION
SHE DISCOVERED A GRACIOUS SPIRIT,
AND WAS THE AUTHOR OF
SONGS IN THE NIGHT
BY WHICH, SHE BEING DEAD, YET SPEAKETH.

Sources

Lyrics

Help Needed

If you can help with any of these it­ems,