“I will go where you want me to go, Lord,
….Over mountain, and plain, and sea;
I will say what you want me to say, Lord,
….I will be what you want me to be.”
These words, first spoken by a young woman at the Iowa State convention of the Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor in 1890, [1] inspired the creation of one of the most popular missionary and consecration hymns to emerge from the late nineteenth-century gospel song movement. [2] This hymn, known familiarly to Latter-day Saints as “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go,” has been published in more than four hundred different hymnals, [3] and was claimed to be the favorite hymn of such disparate personalities as oil magnate John D. Rockefeller, three-time presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan, opera singer-turned-movie star Grace Moore, and Latter-day Saint apostle Melvin J. Ballard. [4] Yet despite the hymn’s great popularity, relatively little is known concerning the lives of its creators.
Mary Brown, author of the words, has especially remained an enigma. No biography of Brown appeared in any of the many books of hymn stories or hymnal companions issued in the early twentieth century at the height of the hymn’s popularity, and Brown was subsequently forgotten. By the 1950s some hymn scholars began to suggest that Mary Brown was not a real person at all, but merely a pseudonym used by prolific hymnist Charles Hutchinson Gabriel (1856-1932), and this credit can still be found in some hymnals today. [5]
Over the years, various researchers have attempted to solve the mystery of Mary Brown, most notably Gene Claghorn, author of Women Composers and Hymnists: a Concise Dictionary. Following up on a clue provided by hymnologist Frank J. Metcalf that Brown may have lived in Jewett City, Connecticut (which was later widely repeated by Baptist hymnologist William Jensen Reynolds in Hymns of Our Faith), Claghorn wrote a letter of inquiry to officials in Jewett City about Mary Brown and her hymn which was then forwarded to Lillian Cathcart, Griswold Municipal Historian. Cathcart’s response, as printed by Claghorn, is as follows:
I was given your letter at church yesterday as I had known Mary Brown. She and her family lived for many years in my grandfather’s two-family house and they were friends as well as neighbors. She was an active member of the Baptist Church and a Sunday School teacher. The Christian Endeavor Consecration hymn was first published by Silver Burdett & Co. 1892 in a songbook, Our Best Endeavor, with music by Charles E. Prior, a local organist, and the title “Go Stand and Speak.” In a 1904 hymnal it was titled “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” with the tune by Carrie Rounesfell [sic]. I am sure Mary Brown would be happy to know that her little poem was still speaking to people after nearly a hundred years. [6]
Cathcart also provided Claghorn with birth and death dates for Brown (1856-1918), and these almost immediately found their way into other sources, including the 1985 Latter-day Saint hymnal. Today, nearly every biography of Brown includes the birth and death dates first printed by Claghorn, but apparently no one followed up on his research because different sources give conflicting information concerning Brown’s identity. Hymnary.org, for example, lists her name variously as Mary Brown, Mary Ann Brown, Mary A. Brown, and Mary H. Brown, but on the author page includes an obituary for a woman named Mary M. Brown. [7] The Cyber Hymnal gives the same birth and death dates found at hymnary.org, but lists the name of a different woman entirely—Mary Haughton Brown—who was a resident of Viroqua, Wisconsin, rather than Jewett City, Connecticut. [8]
The truth concerning Brown’s identity, however, can be found in the earliest printings of her hymn. “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” first appeared in The New Song, published in Chicago in 1891 by George F. Rosche. In this book the name of the text’s author is printed as “Mary M. Brown.” [9]
“I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” is likewise credited to “Mary M. Brown” in Our Best Endeavor, published in New York the following year. Significantly, in both of these collections Brown’s words are accompanied by a tune composed by Charles Edward Prior (one of the editors of Our Best Endeavor), who was then living in Jewett City, Connecticut. Charles Edward Prior Jr., Prior’s son, confirms that the woman who collaborated with his father on this hymn was also a resident of Jewett City. [10]
Mary M. Brown was born on May 19, 1856 in Natick, Rhode Island (now part of the city of Warwick). She was the oldest of six children. [11] Her father, Joseph R. C. Brown (1829-1903), served as a sergeant in the Seventh Regiment Rhode Island Volunteer infantry during the Civil War, and afterward earned his living as a slasher tender in a cotton mill. [12] Her mother, Lydia Arnold Higgins (1834-1914), was also a native of Rhode Island. Mary was raised in Rockport, Massachusetts (approximately 40 miles northeast of Boston), where she received her education. [13] The Brown family came to Connecticut in 1873, and resided for fourteen years in Fitchville, a village in the town of Bozrah. Mary worked for a time in the cotton mill with her father. [14] In 1887 the family settled in nearby Jewett City, a borough in the town of Griswold. [15] Mary enrolled at the Normal School at Norwich, Connecticut, where she was trained as teacher, and after completion of her course of study she accepted a teaching position in Norwich. She later taught in the Jewett City Schools, and was on the faculty at the Riverside Grammar School for more than twenty years. [16]
Mary Brown was an active member of the Jewett City Baptist Church. She taught in the Sunday School, and was a member of the Ladies’ Aid Society and Mission Circle.
Brown was thirty-five years old when her hymn was first published, and had already established a local reputation as a writer. She was described as “a woman unusually gifted with literary talent” whose “everready pen in poetical compositions for occasions of various kinds was in great demand.” It was also claimed that her “verses were always of a beautiful sentiment, expressed in the best of language.” [17] Unfortunately, very few of her poems have survived. [18]
Brown lived the remainder of her life in Jewett City. She never married. She died at William W. Backus Hospital in Norwich, Connecticut, on January 22, 1918, at the age of sixty-one. Some sources claim she died during the flu pandemic of 1918, but this is not true; the impact of the virus wasn’t felt until the spring of that year, months after Brown’s death. The cause of death listed on her death certificate is bronchitis and emphysema, with hematemesis listed as secondary or contributory. [19] A memorial service for Brown was held three days later at the Riverside Grammar School, at which “I’ll go where you want me to go” was sung in her honor, followed later in the day by a more formal funeral service from her home. [20] Her remains were placed in the receiving vault of the Jewett City Cemetery where they remained until spring, when the ground had sufficiently thawed to dig her grave. The burial took place on April 28, 1918, at Johnson Cemetery in Bozrah, Connecticut. [21]
Charles Edward Prior, like Mary Brown, was a member of the Jewett City Baptist Church. A well-known composer of both sacred and secular songs, Prior compiled and published, in collaboration with others, three popular Sunday School hymn books: Spicy Breezes, 1883 (with C. W. Ray); Sparkling and Bright, 1889 (with J. H. Tenney); and Our Best Endeavor, 1892 (with W. A. Ogden). Born at Plainfield, Connecticut on January 24, 1856, Prior moved to Jewett City with his parents, Sarah L. Burleson and Erastus L. Prior, when four years old. He studied music at an early age, and at fourteen became organist at the Congregational Church in Jewett City. He later served for many years as organist and choir leader at the Jewett City Baptist Church, and was the first president of the Christian Endeavor Society in Jewett City. A banker by profession, Prior was elected secretary and treasurer of the Jewett City Savings Bank in 1883. He married Mary Eleanor Campbell in 1875, and four children were born to them, although only one, Charles Edward Prior, Jr., survived to adulthood.
In January 1895, Prior resigned from the Jewett City Bank and moved with his family to Hartford, Connecticut. In 1904 he became vice-president and treasurer of the Security Company of Hartford, and later worked as auditor of the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company. He died June 27, 1927 at Bridgeport, Connecticut. [22]
Prior’s tune was not republished after 1892. Mary R. Deveau, former Municipal Historian of the town of Griswold, Connecticut, maintains this was because Prior’s tune was “unsingable.” [23] In any case, his tune never caught on with the public, and was quickly discarded.
Brown’s words might have likewise faded into obscurity had they not found their way into the hands of singing evangelist Carrie Rounsefell. Born Clara Esther Parker on March 1, 1861, in Merrimack, New Hampshire, Rounsefell went by the nickname Carrie. [24] Her mother, Clara A. (Loud) Parker (1833-1881), was a housewife, and her father, James C. Parker (1822-1906), worked variously as a machinist and a carpenter. Rounsefell spent her early years in Epping, New Hampshire, and later moved with her family to Manchester, New Hampshire, where she was married on March 15, 1883 to bookkeeper William E. Rounsefell. [25] Before her marriage she worked as a store clerk, but she later gave up her career in favor of evangelical work. Mrs. Rounsefell, who was a member of the Church of Christ, toured the New England states “playing and singing the gospel” at the various churches, accompanying her singing with a small autoharp “as its tones are sweet and soft and did not drown her voice.” [26]
During a visit to Lynn, Massachusetts, the pastor of the local Baptist church handed her the words of Mary Brown’s hymn and requested her to write appropriate music for it. As Rounsefell later recalled, “I took the words, got down before the Lord with my little autoharp, asked him to give me a tune, and this music was the answer.” [27] She sang her new tune that evening at the church, and the following Sunday used it at the Bowdoin Square Baptist Church in Boston. “Later,” explained music publisher and evangelist Homer Rodeheaver, “a friend of hers wrote it down for her and she had it published in a somewhat modified form.” [28] She also made minor changes to the words. “The words had been sold to a Mr. Rasheau of Chicago,” according to hymnologist Frank J. Metcalf, “but Mrs. Rounsefell bought them so as to own both words and music.” [29] The hymn was first printed on small song sheets by her husband, William Rounsefell, at Manchester, New Hampshire, and was copyrighted in 1894. It was an instant success, selling two hundred copies the first night. [30]
Shortly after the death of her husband in 1922, Carrie Rounsefell obtained a renewal on her hymn. “When the copyright expired in 1922,” wrote Metcalf, “she secured a renewal, and afterward sold both [words and music] to Homer A. Rodeheaver.” [31] She moved from Manchester, New Hampshire, to Durham, Maine, in 1928. She became ill with stomach cancer soon afterward. “For the year, 1929, she was so sick with a cancerous affection that the doctor said she could live only a few days or weeks at most,” added Metcalf, “but she was a firm believer in the efficacy of prayer and obeying the advice of James (‘Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.’ James 5, 14) she was healed, and was able to carry on her mission of song.” [32] However, her cancer returned and she died on September 18, 1930. [33]
It is not known which hymnal was the first to include Rounsefell and Brown’s hymn, but it was published in at least seven different hymnals in the year 1897. [34] “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” is mentioned in an advertisement for J. R. Sweney and J. H. Entwisle’s Gospel Hosannas, published the following year, as one of the “most effective of the new hymns that have gained popularity, and are now being used with gratifying results.” [35] The hymn would continue to be published consistently in gospel hymnals over the next fifty years, and Rounsefell believed the secret of the hymn’s success was that “the Holy Spirit wrote the music.” [36]
In recent years, it is common to see only the first stanza of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” attributed to Mary Brown, while stanzas two and three are ascribed instead to Charles Prior. Though a seemingly new assertion, this appears to have originated with Rounsefell herself. The following was printed in the Congregationalist in November 1899, written by the editor in response to an inquiry concerning the hymn containing the lines “I’ll go where you want me to go, dear Lord / I’ll do what you want me to do”:
Those lines have rung in my mind too until, by various inquiries, I have found the whole hymn and in part as to its authorship. There are three stanzas and the refrain, and they may be found in Good News in Song…The hymn and music are also printed in a leaflet by the composer of the music, Mrs. Carrie E. Rounsefell of Manchester, N. H. On this leaflet the name of “Mary Brown” is given as the author of the hymn, but Mrs. Rounsefell writes: “A Mr. Prior in Connecticut wrote the words and put Mary Brown’s name to them. She gave him one verse and he wrote the rest of the hymn.” [37]
She later made a similar statement to hymnologist Frank J. Metcalf. Sometime in the 1920s Metcalf “saw an autograph copy of this tune and from the dealer obtained the address of Mrs. Rounsefell,” which resulted in a correspondence between the two concerning the hymn’s history. [38] Metcalf stated that “when the composer of the music, Mrs. Rounsefell, wrote me about it, she stated that only the first stanza was by Mary Brown, and that a Mr. Prior, who heard her repeat the words, added the other two, and let Miss Brown have full credit for the entire hymn. She also asked me not to mention his name in connection with it.” [39]
Metcalf later tracked down the granddaughter of Prior, who then put him in contact with her father. Charles Edward Prior, Jr. made a similar claim to Metcalf regarding the authorship of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.” [40] “[Mary Brown] wrote the words at my father’s suggestion,” he stated, “but he found the meter faulty, patched it up and I believe wrote two more verses and gave it a musical setting.” [41]
The statements of Rounsefell and Prior are not above question, however. Neither Mary Brown nor Charles Prior Sr. publicly made any such claims concerning authorship of their hymn, and Rounsefell and Prior Jr.’s testimonies come second-hand, many years after the fact. Rounsefell, in fact, later admitted to Metcalf that she “did not know and was never able to find out” the identity of Mary Brown. [42] Rounsefell obviously did not receive her information concerning this hymn from Brown, nor did she get it from Prior, who would have been able to provide her with at least basic facts concerning Brown’s life. This therefore begs the question: where did she get her information? It is also not known whether or not she was aware of Prior’s tune. If Rounsefell knew about Prior’s earlier musical setting she made no mention of it to Metcalf, who expressed surprise upon learning about if from Prior’s son. [43]
The problem with Charles Edward Prior Jr.’s statement concerning his father’s authorship of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” is that it comes, by his own admission, nearly fifty years after the hymn was written, and only after being questioned about the matter by Metcalf. Moreover, his use of the phrase “I believe” indicates a degree of uncertainty. Furthermore, his memories conflict with those of Brown’s niece, Marian Johnson, who remembered her aunt writing all three stanzas of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.” Johnson, the daughter of Brown’s sister Nettie, was a little girl living in the same household as Brown when the hymn was written. In a 1963 letter to family friend Alice Brown, Johnson expressed dismay upon learning that other individuals were claiming to have written her aunt’s hymn: “I very well remember the hours she [Mary M. Brown] spent writing those verses, and re-writing them again and again to have them just right; then Mr. Prior coming to the house and writing the music, and trying it on our old organ, when we lived on Ashland Street.” [44]
It should be remembered that Charles Edward Prior was primarily a composer of music. He wrote very few hymn texts, and these extant lines credited to him display little evidence of poetic ability. See, for example, the first stanza of his hymn “Songs of the kingdom we will sing,” which is rather awkward, and not very musical:
“Songs of the kingdom we will sing while here we journey;
Songs of our great Captain in whose name we fight;
Songs of rejoicing when the days are full of sunshine,
When around us ev’rything is “Sparkling and Bright.” [45]
Brown, by contrast, had already established a local reputation as a poet. Although very few of her poems have survived for comparison, the overall construction of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” suggests a single author. The hymn is carefully crafted to form a cohesive whole, with each stanza based on a different line of the refrain. For example, the first stanza is entirely based on the idea “I’ll go where you want me to go, Lord”; the second stanza deals with “I’ll say what you want me to say, Lord”; while the third and final stanza expresses the sentiment found in the phrase “I’ll be what you want me to be.”
Unfortunately, it is impossible to state with any certainty whether or not Prior wrote the second and thirds stanzas of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.” In any case, there is no direct evidence of his authorship.
In recent decades, gospel songs like “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” have fallen out of favor with hymnal compilers seeking to elevate the quality of their hymnals. Hymns deemed deficient, either lyrically or musically, are often weeded out. Thus, “I’ll Go When You Want Me to Go” is not often found today in hymnals of major denominations. The Southern Baptists, for example, dropped it from their hymnal in 1975. However, it can still be found in the National Baptist hymnal, as well as the hymnal used by the Seventh-day Adventists, [46] and, of course, in the Latter-day Saint hymnal.
Many of the gospel songs that remain in the current Latter-day Saint hymnal were introduced to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in either the unofficial but widely popular collection The Songs of Zion (1908), or in the official Sunday School collection Deseret Sunday School Songs (1909). This is not the case with “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.” According to the Deseret News, “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” was popularized among the Latter-day Saints by apostle Melvin J. Ballard, who often performed the hymn during his speaking engagements. [47] It made its official Latter-day Saint debut in the 1927 hymnal thanks to the efforts of Ballad, at the time a member of the Church Music Committee, who made sure to include his favorite hymn. “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” has endured in the Latter-day Saint hymnal to the present day, although it remains to be seen whether or not it will be retained when the recently announced forthcoming edition of the hymnal is finally published.
Notes
[1] W. A. Ogden and Chas. Edw. Prior, eds., Our Best Endeavor (New York: Silver, Burdett & Company, 1892), 123. Note at the bottom of page reads: “Rev. F. E. Clark [Francis Edward Clark], D. D., tells of hearing the words of this refrain repeated by a young lady in a consecration meeting at the Iowa State Convention Y. P. S. C. E. [Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor], 1890.” See also Anna Ballantine, “Dialogue of Six Girls, Members of C. E. Society,” American Missionary 46, no. 10 (October 1892): 338, and E. M. Stone, “European Turkey. Report of the Bible Women,” Light and Light for Woman 22, no. 8 (August 1892): 356.
[2] “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” is technically a gospel song, a type of hymn popularized in the late nineteenth century in the revivals of Ira Sankey and Dwight Moody. These so-called gospel songs, or gospel hymns, are characterized by a refrain (or chorus), and the use of “energetic rhythms and exhortative texts.” Karen Lynn Davidson, Our Latter-day Hymns: The Stories and the Messages (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1988), 12.
[3] “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go,” Hymnary.org, accessed March 1, 2020, https://hymnary.org/text/it_may_not_be_on_the_mountains_height.
[4] George W. Sanville, Forty Gospel Hymn Stories (Winona Lake, Ind.: Rodeheaver-Hall Mack Co., 1943), 86; Richard L. Metcalfe, “Mr. Bryan in Defeat,” Pearson’s Magazine 21, no. 3 (March 1909): 276; George D. Pyper, “Hymns We All Sing,” Deseret News, January 4, 1941, 7.
[5] Richard Clothier, 150 Years of Song: Hymnody in the Reorganization 1860-2010 (Independence, Missouri: Herald Publishing House, 2010), 78. The earliest known hymnal to credit “I’ll go where you want me to go” to Charles Gabriel is Worship and Service Hymnal for church, school and home (Carol Stream, Ill.: Hope Publishing Co., 1957), hymn no. 359. Gabriel, who composed more than 8,000 hymns during his lifetime, is known to have used many different pseudonyms over his long career, including Charlotte G. Homer, Carl Fisher, Adolph Jesreal, and Jennie Ree. Gabriel also did, in fact, use the name Mary Brown on at least one occasion. See “Bless the Lord,” words Mary Brown (pseud. of Charles H. Gabriel), in Catalog of Copyright Entries, Third Series, Vol. 4, pt. 14B. no. 1, Renewal Registrations–Music, January-June 1950 (Washington, D. C.: Copyright Office, Library of Congress, 1950), 7.
[6] Charles Eugene Claghorn, Women Composers and Hymnists: A Concise Biographical Dictionary (Metuchen, New Jersey: Scarecrow Press, 1984), 33, “Letter dated March 22, 1982 from Mrs. Lillian Cathcart, Jewett City, Connecticut.” It is not known to whom Claghorn’s original letter was addressed or where it was originally sent.
[7] “Mary Brown,” Hymnary,org, accessed March 1, 2020, https://hymnary.org/person/Brown_Mary.
[8] “Mary Haughton Brown,” The Cyber Hymnal, accessed May 20, 2012,
http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/b/r/o/w/brown_mh.htm.
Incidentally, Mary Haughton Brown was also a poet, which is probably where the confusion has arisen. She was born in Canada on February 1, 1849. Her father, the Rev. William Haughton, was also a published poet, and her mother was either Margaret Armstrong or Margaret Clemons. Mary Haughton was married to Theodore Harding Brown on May 9, 1867, in Grey, Ontario, Canada, and together they raised several children. The Browns resided for many years in Viroqua, Wisonson. They moved to Northfield, Minnesota, around 1904. and shortly afterward to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Brown spent the last five years of her life. She died in Minneapolis on April 10, 1909, and was buried at the cemetery in Viroqua, Wisconsin. Two lines from one of her poems is found in Thomas William Herringshaw, Poetical Quotations: Comprises Excellent and Appropriate Sentiments and Choice Selections Collected from the National, Local and Anonymous Verse-Writers of America Now Living (Chicago: American Publishers’ Association, 1892), 333. Another of her poems was printed in full in the Rockport (Illinois) Register-Republic, May 27, 1966, 18B. (In this newspaper article she is also incorrectly identified as the author of “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.”)
[9] George F. Rosche, ed., The New Song; for the Sunday School, Societies of Christan Endeavor, and Other Religious Exercises (Chicago: Geo. F. Rosche & Co., 1891), 50; see also W. A. Ogden and Chas. Edw. Prior, eds., Our Best Endeavor (New York: Silver, Burdett & Company, 1892), 123.
[10] Frank J. Metcalf Papers, 1917-1945, Mss boxes B, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester MA.
[11] The obituary for Lydia Arnold Higgins Brown (Mary Brown’s mother) indicates that she gave birth to six children, only three of whom were still living at the time of her death (Norwich Bulletin, March 20, 1915, 2). The following are the names and dates of her children (where known):
1. Mary M. Brown (1856-1918)
2. Elisha Frank Brown (1860-1939)
3. William D. Brown (1861-1876)
4. Nettie M. Brown Johnson (1867-1963)
5. Marian Brown (1874-1876)
6. Unknown. I have not found any information concerning the sixth and final child, but presumably he or she died in early childhood.
[12] William Palmer Hopkins, The Seventh Regiment Rhode Island Volunteers in the Civil War, 1862-1865 (Providence, Rhode Island: The Providence Press, 1903), 379.
[13] “Jewett City,” Norwich Bulletin, January 23, 1918, 2.
[14] “United States Census, 1880,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MFZ9-Y34 : 19 August 2017), Mary Brown in household of Joseph R Brown, Bozrah, New London, Connecticut, United States; citing enumeration district ED 109, sheet 541A, NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), FHL microfilm 1,254,108.
[15] “Jewett City” [“Sudden death of Joseph R. C. Brown”], Norwich Bulletin, December 9. 1903, 2; “Obituary” [Mrs. Joseph R. C. Brown], Norwich Bulletin, March 20, 1915, 2.
[16] “Jewett City,” Norwich Bulletin, January 23, 1918, 2.
[17] “Jewett City,” Norwich Bulletin, January 23, 1918, 2.
[18] Hymnary.org credits Brown with writing five additional hymns, but none of these were written by her: 1.“Arise the Master calls for thee” was first published in Charles Gabriel’s Vineyard Songs (1892), and in this collection the text is credited to C. H. G. [Charles H. Gabriel], who also composed the hymn’s tune. 2. “Bless the Lord, O my soul” was originally published under the name Mary Brown, but this was actually a pseudonym used by Charles Gabriel (see note 4). 3. “Every sky that glistens with the golden day” was written by the Rev. M. S. Brown. See The Victory (1908). 4. “Saw ye where the Savior kept” was written by “Miss Mary Ann Brown” and published in The Harp (1840) sixteen years before Mary M. Brown was born. 5. “So sweet her rest” is credited to Mary M. Brown in The Evangelist’s Songs of Praise (1891), but this is a typographical error. The author is Mary M. Bowen. See Mary M. Bowen, “In Memoriam,” Peterson’s Magazine 77, no. 3 (March 1880), 212.
The only surviving poems by Mary M. Brown (other than her famous hymn) are found in a 1903 cook book published by the women of the Baptist Church at Jewett City: A Book of Recipes compiled and published by the Ladies of the Baptist Church of Jewett City, Conn. (1903). In an article published in the Norwich Bulletin three years after Brown’s death this book is mentioned, as is Brown: “The late Mary M. Brown, with her well known aptitude and skill, furnished the several introductions and verses.” (“Jewett City,” Norwich Bulletin, June 21, 1921, 7). While Brown is not credited with any of these poems in the book itself, we can infer from the above article that she is the author of all the verses appearing in this book, including the following:
Bread
A golden staff, the growth of western plains,
Gives to the world its shining, heavy head;
But woman’s alchemy transmutes the gold
Into the mystery we christen bread. [p. 61]
Pies
Since famous Jack Horner of nursery rhyme
….Encouraged each mortal to try,
What showers of wit have rained on the world,
….Called forth by American pie! [p. 67]
Cake
When Abel was a lad outside of Eden,
He wearied of the food of nature’s make,
So mother Eve, with cunning wisdom, mixed it
And thus began the genesis of cake. [p. 105]
Two additional poems appear in this book. See pages 7 and 9. A copy of this book is in possession of author.
[19] “Jewett City,” Norwich Bulletin, January 23, 1918, 2; Death certificate for Mary Brown, January 22, 1918, File no. 42, State of Connecticut Bureau of Vital Statistics, certified copy in possession of author. For more information on the 1918 flu pandemic see Gina Kolata, Flue: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus that Caused it (New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999), 5, 8, 12-13; Alfred W. Crosby, America’s Forgotten Pandemic: The influenza of 1918, 2nd ed.(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 21, 25, 39.
[20] “Jewett City,” Norwich Bulletin, January 26, 1918, 2.
[21] “Died,”Norwich Bulletin, January 23, 1918, 7; “Burial of Miss Mary M. Brown,” Norwich Bulletin, April 29, 1918, 8; Mary R. Deveau to Brett Nelson, March 5, 2011, letter in possession of author.
[22] J. H. Hall, Biography of Gospel song and hymn writers (New York: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1914), 341; J. A. Spalding, Illustrated popular biography of Connecticut (Hartford, Conn.: Case, Lockwood & Brainard Company, 1891), 61-62; Colonel N. G. Osborn, ed., Men of Mark in Connecticut: Ideals of American Life Told in Biographies and Autobiographies of Eminent Living Americans. Vol. III (Hartford, Conn.: William R. Goodspeed, 1907), 60-64.
[23] Mary R. Deveau to Brett Nelson, March 5, 2011, letter in possession of author.
[24] “New Hampshire Birth Records, Early to 1900,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FLPS-JFM : 22 May 2019), Clara C Parker, 01 Mar 1861; citing Merrimack, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, United States, Bureau of Vital Records and Health Statistics, Concord; FHL microfilm 1,001,030; “United States Census, 1870,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MH52-8Q7 : 18 March 2020), Clara E Parker in entry for James C Parker, Epping, Rockingham, New Hampshire, United States; citing NARA microfilm publication M593 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), FHL microfilm 000552346.
[25] “United States Census, 1870,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MH52-8Q7 : 18 March 2020), Clara E Parker in entry for James C Parker, Epping, Rockingham, New Hampshire, United States; citing NARA microfilm publication M593 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), FHL microfilm 000552346;
“United States Census, 1880,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MHRN-KP2 : 12 August 2017), Carrie E Parker in household of J C Parker, Manchester, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, United States; citing enumeration district ED 126, sheet 98B, NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), FHL microfilm 1,254,763;
“New Hampshire, Town Clerk, Vital and Town Records, 1636-1947,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QPMX-6VNT : 23 March 2020), William E Rounsefell and C E Parker, 15 Mar 1883; citing Marriage, Manchester, Hillsborough, New Hampshire, United States, New Hampshire Bureau of Vital Records and Statistics, Concord; FHL microfilm 004284247.
[26] Frank J. Metcalf Papers, 1917-1945, Mss boxes B, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester MA. Rounsefell was a member of the Church of God, but often performed at churches of many different denominations, including at the Bromfield Street Methodist Church in Boston, and the Park Street Congregational Church, also in Boston. See “Those Bromfield Street Noon Meetings,” Boston Post, February 24, 1894, 3; “Local Lines,” Boston Globe, February 26, 1894, 8; “Local Varieties,” Boston Herald, March 7, 1894, 6; “Special Evangelistic Meetings,” Boston Post, April 22, 1895, 4: “Religious Intelligence,” Boston Herald, May 20, 1895, 3.
[27] Metcalf Papers.
[28] Homer A. Rodeheaver, Hymnal Handbook for Standard Hymns and Gospel Songs (Chicago: The Rodeheaver Company, 1931), 153.
[29] Metcalf Papers. No information could be found concerning a “Mr. Rasheau,” and it is likely Metcalf was referring to George F. Rosche, who had first published the hymn in his collection The New Song. Mary Brown’s niece Marian Johnson later complained in a letter to a family friend that Brown and Prior had failed to secure a copyright on their hymn, leaving anyone free to make alterations and thus claim authorship, but this does not appear to be the case here. A comparison of the hymn’s 1892 printing with later printings reveals only minor changes, the most noticeable being the addition of the word “dear” throughout. For example, Brown had originally written “I’ll answer, Lord with my hand in Thine.” In Rousefell’s version this became “I’ll answer dear Lord, with my hand in Thine.” Likewise, Rounsefell altered “I’ll go where you want me to go Lord” to “I’ll go where you want me to go, dear Lord,” etc. (It should be noted that the original text went through some minor changes from the 1891 to 1892 printings. For example, the original “I’ll go where thou want me to go, Lord” was altered to “I’ll go where you want me to go, Lord” in 1892)
[30] Metcalf Papers. See also “Notes and Queries,” New Outlook, August 20, 1898, 992, which gives the following information: “It [“I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go”] is published by W. E. Rounsefell, 18 Blodget Street, Manchester, N.H., set to music by C. E. Rounsefell.”
[31] Metcalf Papers. William Rounsefell died January 3, 1922.
[32] Metcalf Papers.
[33] “New Hampshire Death Records, 1654-1947,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FSJJ-4YJ : 10 March 2018), Carrie E. Rounsefell, 18 Sep 1930; citing Durham, Androscoggin, Maine, Bureau Vital Records and Health Statistics, Concord; FHL microfilm 2,130,334.
[34] “I’ll go where you want me to go” was published in the following hymnals in 1897:
*Barney E. Warren and Andrew L. Byers, eds., Songs of the Evening Light for Sunday Schools, Missionary and Revival Meetings and Gospel Work in General (Anderson, Indiana: Gospel Trumpet Company, 1897).
*John R. Sweney, H. L. Gilmour, and J. H. Entwisle, eds., Songs of Love and Praise No. 4, for use in Meetings for Christian Worship or Work (Philadelphia: John J. Hood, 1897).
* Chas. J. Butler and Charles Bentley, eds., Heart Melodies No. 4: Solos and General Hymns for Religious Meetings (Philadelphia: John J. Hood, 1897).
*R. H. Meredith, ed., Select New and Old Hymns (Chicago: R. H. Meredith & Co., 1897).
*W. S. Martin, ed., Sowing and Reaping (Boston; J. Frank Giles, 1897).
*A. F. Myers, ed., The Seed Sower: a Collection of Songs for Sunday Schools and Gospel Meetings (n. p.: W. W. Whitney Company, 1897).
*A. B. Simpson, ed., Hymns of the Christian Life no. 2 (South Nyack, New York: Christian Alliance Publishing Co., 1897).
[35] See advertisement for J. R. Sweney and J. H. Entwistle’s Gospel Hosannas (Philadelphia: Union Press, 1898) in Sunday-School World 28, no. 11 (November 1898): 382.
[36] Metcalf Papers. In the 1985 Latter-day Saint hymnal the tune is named CONSECRATION. In other sources it is known as MANCHESTER, a name given the tune by the editors of the Baptist Hymnal (1956) in honor of the residence of composer Carrie Rounsefell. See William Jensen Reynolds, Hymns of Our Faith: A Handbook for the Baptist Hymnal (Nashville, Tenn.: Broadman Press, 1964), 98.
[37] “Corner Scrap-Book (For the Old Folks),” Congregationalist, November 16, 1899, 733.
[38] George D. Pyper, “Hymns We All Sing,” Deseret News, January 4, 1941, 7.
[39] Metcalf Papers.
[40] Pyper, 7.
[41] Metcalf Papers.
[42] Metcalf Papers.
[43] Metcalf Papers.
[44] Marian H. Johnson to Alice A. Brown, February 17, 1963, Griswold Historical Society, Jewett City, Connecticut. Marian Helena Johnson (1889-1967) was the daughter of Nettie M. Brown (1867-1963) and Newton Lathrop Johnson (1863-1937), who were married on November 17, 1885. They divorced shortly after her birth. Johnson’s memories may not be entirely reliable—she would have been little more than two years old when “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go” was written.
[45] John Harrison Tenney and Charles Edward Prior, Sparkling and Bright (Chicago: S. Brainard’s Sons Co, 1890), 2.
[46] “SDA Hymnal 573—I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go,” SDA Hymnal, accessed February 27, 2020, https://sdahymnal.net/sda-hymnal-573-ill-go-where-you-want-me-to-go/;
New National Baptist Hymnal (21st Century Edition), accessed March 1, 2020, https://hymnary.org/hymn/NNBH2001/204.
[47] Pyper, 7.
Latter-day Saint Hymnology 