Born: April 22, 1830, Windham, New Hampshire.
Died: April 27, 1906, Braintree, Massachusetts.
Buried: Old North Cemetery, Truro, Massachusetts.
Samuel was the son of Robert Morrison and Nancy McCleary, and husband of Rachel Frances Hughes Collins (married September 17, 1884, when she was the widow of William Thomas Collins).
He was educated at the Atkinson Academy, New Hampshire (said to be the second oldest co-educational school in America); Amherst College, Massachusetts (1859); and Bangor Theological Seminary, Maine (graduated 1864; school is no longer open).
He then served as principal of the McCollom Institute, Merrimack, New Hampshire, for two and a half years.
He preached in Belfast, Maine, and was pastor of the St. Lawrence Street Congregational Church, Portland, Maine (1865–68), until failing health compelled him to resign.
He visited Cuba, and spent several years in the American Midwest. He taught and preached in Prescott, Wisconsin, and Sheboygan Falls, Michigan, and moved to Washington, D. C., in 1877.
Morrison spent several years mainly studying and composing music. He contributed music to several Sunday school papers and song books.
He was living in North Truro, Massachusetts, in 1883, and Charlton, Massachusetts, in 1893.