Introduction

Biography

May was the daugh­ter of Tho­mas Row­land. He died while she was young, and she then lived with her grand­par­ents at Woot­ton, Ox­ford­shire.

She was edu­cat­ed at the Bueau Down House School (prob­ab­ly a trans­cript­ion er­ror for Brean Down House School), Burn­ham-on-Sea, So­mer­set.

She worked at All Souls Church, East­bourne, East Sus­sex, and ran a Bi­ble class for lads for ma­ny years. The All Souls Par­ish Ma­ga­zine lat­er not­ed that ma­ny men now en­gaged in the com­mer­cial and bu­si­ness life of the town re­mem­ber her with real af­fect­ion.

As of 1956, she was liv­ing at 25 Bed­ford Grove, East­bourne.

Works

In 1927, Row­land won a con­test spon­sored by The Hymn So­ci­ety, which sought a Hymn for Air­men. Charles Lind­bergh had just com­plet­ed the first trans­at­lant­ic flight in May 1927, spark­ing a glo­bal avia­tion craze. The So­ci­ety ca­pi­tal­ized on this cul­tur­al mo­ment by search­ing for a sac­red text de­di­cat­ed to pi­lots and avia­tion. The next year, Rowland was elect­ed to mem­ber­ship in the so­ci­ety on the ba­sis of her prize-win­ning en­try, God of the Shin­ing Hosts.

Her text Come! Peace of God won ano­ther Hymn So­ci­ety con­test so­li­cit­ing hymns deal­ing with in­ter­na­tion­al bro­ther­hood and world peace—a pro­min­ent theme in the post-World War I era.