The Elusive Author of “How Firm a Foundation”: 

An 1868 Letter by Daniel Sedgwick

In the mid-1860s, when Charles Haddon Spurgeon, famous minister at his newly-built Tabernacle at Elephant  and Castle, South London, set out to publish Our Own Hymn Book, a new hymnal for his congregation and Baptists in general, he asked the leading historian of hymns of his day, Daniel Sedgwick (1814-79), to assist him in identifying, as best he could, the authors of the hymns included in the new hymnal. For the first edition of the hymnal in 1866, Sedgwick identified the author of the popular hymn, “How Firm a Foundation” (no. 732 in Spurgeon’s hymnal), as “Kirkham or Kennedy,” taking from the appellation affixed to the hymn in the 1844 edition of the popular hymnal, A Selection of Hymns, which was originally published in 1787 by Spurgeon’s predecessor, John Rippon (1751-1836). “Kirkham” was most likely a reference to Thomas Kirkham who published A Collection of Hymns in 1788. The reference to Kennedy (Kennady) first appeared in Thomas Nettleton’s Village Hymns (1824).

The following year, when Spurgeon issued a 2nd edition of his hymnal, Sedgwick changed the identification of the hymn to “K—,” which is how it had appeared in Rippon’s Selection of 1787, without any further identification. After this edition was issued, Sedgwick apparently became aware of a reference to the hymn in Alexander Fletcher’s A Collection of Hymns from the Best Authors (1822), in which the author was identified as “Keen” in the Index. According to John Julian, Fletcher was assisted by Thomas Walker (1764-1827), who had also made contributions to Rippon’s Selection of Psalm and Hymn Tunes (1792), a companion to his Selection of Hymns.  In Rippon’s tune book were several tunes composed by Robert Keene, including one “GEARD,” associated with “How Firm a Foundation,” to which a second tune, “BROUGHTON,” composed by Walker, was also affixed. Of these two hymns tune titles, one suggests the popular eighteenth-century hymn writer Anne Steele (1717-78), who lived all her life at Broughton, and the other the Baptist minister John Geard (1749-1838), a former classmate of Rippon’s at Bristol Baptist Academy who eventually replaced Samuel James at Hitchin. Most likely, Walker and Rippon’s tune book were the origins of Fletcher’s use of “Keen” as the author of the hymn. Besides “How firm a foundation,” Rippon’s Selection attributed two more hymns to “K—”: “In songs of sublime adoration and praise” and “The Bible is justly esteemed.”  In later editions of the Selection, the designation simply became “K” and then “Kirkham” or “Kennedy” and finally nothing at all.

Since Keene was clearly associated with Rippon’s Selection, Sedgwick made an immediate enquiry to a representative of Spurgeon’s Tabernacle, which was the current manifestation of what had been Rippon’s congregation at Carter Lane and later at Park Street, Southwark, seeking information on any previous members bearing the name of “Keen” or “Keene.” Sedgwick knew of three names already, but was uncertain if any of the three was the correct person. Below is his letter, placed inside the front cover of the original church book for Horsley-down and Carter Lane (1719-1808), where it has survived for more than a century and a half within the strong room of the Tabernacle in London.

81 Sun St Bishopsgate

June 26. 1868

Dear Sir

         I have just learnt that two hymns in “Our Own Hymn Book” signed K— and taken from Dr Rippon’s Collections 1787 were composed by — Keene who was Clerk at the Doctor’s Chapel at that period. I have written to you as the likeliest person that could establish the truth of the information I have received.

         There are three hymns by K— in Rippon’s Selection 1787 No 110 – 128 – 205 the two first are inserted in O.O. hymn book.

         I find there where [sic] three persons of the name of Keene, viz. Robert Keene Esq a friend of George Whitefield – Henry Keene Esq a deacon at James Dore’s church Maze-pond – and John Keene (who I suppose was with Dr Rippon, a Bookseller I am told) Any information you can give me of the Keene who co^m^posed the hymns will be greatly esteemed. A short account of his history, as Birth, ocupation, date of death &c

         I have searched all the books I have of Dr Rippon but cannot find even the name of Keene recorded.

                                                         Yours truly

                                                                     Daniel Sedgwick

Mr Olney Esq

Address: none

Postmark: none

The Robert Keene mentioned by Sedgwick was indeed a friend, follower, and correspondent of the evangelist George Whitefield, managing some of his London properties. He was never a member at Carter Lane and is not the author of the hymn. Sedgwick was also correct about Henry Keene, a prominent London Baptist layman and deacon at Maze Pond. The John Keene mentioned above is probably a mistake on Sedgwick’s part, and probably the reason why he would soon believe he had found the writer of the hymn. He may have been correct about looking for a bookseller, but the one he settled on was not a John Keene but rather George Keith (d. 1782), a bookseller who was the son-in-law of John Gill (1697-1771), Rippon’s predecessor at Carter Lane.

According to Julian, Sedgwick learned of the connection from an old woman he met in an almshouse. On his personal copy of the 1867 edition of Spurgeon’s hymnal (now belonging to the Burke Library, Union Theological Seminary, New York) Sedgwick wrote next to “K—” the name, “George Keith 1787.” In a copy of Rippon’s Selection of Hymns (also belonging to the Burke Library), Sedgwick wrote in the back of the hymnal that Keith “used to make his hymns from the heads of the Dr’s Sermons while he was delivering them.” Sedgwick signed the note August 13, 1868, just six weeks after the letter below. Most likely, within days of his letter, he was directed to the woman in the almshouse and felt confident enough to add a note to his copy of Rippon’s Selection a few weeks later and soon thereafter to relay his information to Josiah Miller, where it appeared in his Singers and Songs of the Church the following year and, by 1873, in the 6th edition of Our Own Hymn Book. To his credit, Julian was not convinced, dismissing Sedgwick’s attribution largely based on his source and leaving the hymn without a definitive author (1892, p. 537).  Julian was not completely successful in containing claims of Keene's authorship of the hymn. In 1937, Carey Bonner identified the hymn as authored by Robert Keene (without any comments, however, upon him) in a brief article in the Baptist Quarterly on early Baptist hymn writers.

Chris Fenner, the best source for information on this hymn, rightly notes that Keith left Carter Lane upon the arrival of Rippon in 1773 and was never known to compose hymns, thus reinforcing Julian’s rejection of Keith.  Taking his cue partly from Ken Manly’s study of John Rippon, Fenner points instead to Robert Keene, who, as mentioned above, was a member and precentor at Carter Lane during Rippon’s tenure as minister and who contributed several hymn tunes in Rippon’s  known composer of hymn tunes, several of which appeared in his Selection of Psalm and Hymn Tunes. He also notes the account by H. L. Hastings of Boston, who in 1886 met with an aging member of the church, Charles Gordelier, who had led the singing in Rippon’s congregation a half-century earlier. He attributed the hymn to Keene, taking it from oral tradition among members of the church.

Most likely this Robert Keene is the author of the great hymn, “How Firm a Foundation.” He joined the church on 16 December 1776 (p. 45), living at that time in St. Thomas’s Street, Maze Pond, very close to the Maze Pond meeting-house. For a time he ws the precentor at Carter Lane, yet despite his musical contributions to the church and to Rippon’s Selection and tune book, Keen was excluded from the church for drunkenness in 1793. The minutes for Monday, 22 April 1793, noted that Robert Keene “stood chargeable with a breach of trust and also of the sin of drunkeness.  Agreed that he be suspended from communion and Brethren Sharp and Westley were appointed Messengers to him and make their report” (n.p.).  At the next church meeting on 20 May 1793, Keene was excluded by the church and “no longer considered as a member.” He probably became a hearer only at another Baptist church in London, but so far he has not been found among the members of any other congregation whose records from that period have survived.

See Horsley-down and Carter Lane Church Book, 1719-1808, Metropolitan Tabernacle, London; John Julian,  “How firm a foundation,” A Dictionary of Hymnology (London: J. Murray, 1892), 537; The Christian (May 1887), qtd. in Benson, Studies (1903), 43-44; Ken Manley, Redeeming Love Proclaim: John Rippon and the Baptists (Waynesboro, GA: Paternoster Press, 2004), 37; Louis Benson, “How firm a foundation,” Studies in Familiar Hymns (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1903), 44-45; Corey Bonner, “Some Baptist Hymnists,” Baptist Quarterly 8.5 (January 1937): 256-62; and 8.6 (April 1937): 302-11 (reference above on p. 310); and especially Chris Fenner, “How firm a foundation,” Hymnology Archive, https://www.hymnologyarchive.com/how-firm-a-foundation?rq=how%20firm.