Griffiths, Ann (née Thomas)
1776-1805

Welsh hymn-writer, born at Dolwar Fach, Llanfihangel-yng-Ngwynfa, Montgomeryshire into a devout, Welsh-speaking family. A sermon by Benjamin Jones of Pwllheli led to her conversion and caused her to abandon her worldly pleasures. She joined the Methodist society at Pont Robert in 1797 and wrote hymns rich in scriptural allusions and figurative language. A translation into English by G.R.G. Pugh was published in 1900. She died in childbirth a year after her marriage in 1804 to a Methodist elder, Thomas Griffiths, and was buried at Llanfihangel. She was remembered as 'a woman of extraordinary piety and prayer', to be compared even to Julian of Norwich and a memorial chapel was built at nearby Dolanog.

Sources
  • Evan Richards, A Short Memoir of Ann Griffiths, with a translation of her letters and hymns (1916)
  • D. Tecwyn Evans, Ann Griffiths (Denbigh, 1955)
  • A.M. Allchin, Ann Griffiths: the furnace and the fountain (1987
  • H.A. Hodges, Flame in the Mountains (2017)
  • Dictionary of Welsh Biography
  • Oxford DNB

Occupations

Category: Person
Comment on this entry