An early itinerant, born at Kexborough, near Barnsley, Yorks. He was apprenticed in his youth in the wool and worsted business. Influenced by George Whitefield's preaching, for a time he was associated with Calvinistic Methodism, but at 21 heard Peter Jaco and joined the WMs, first as aclass leader and then preacher. When stationed in Cornwall, he was advised by John Wesley not to give class tickets to those 'who deal in stolen goods' (i.e. smugglers). He was one of the preachers named in the Deed of Declaration. He wrote several hymns, some for children, the best-known being 'My heart and voice I raise' (HP 268). In 1787 he published a long poem entited Messiah. He retired to Margate in 1810 and died there on 12 October 1815.
His wife Elizabeth, née Brittan (1759-1836), was born in Scotland, where her father was stationed as a captain in the Queen's dragoons. After being deserted by him, her mother brought her up as an Anglican. Elizabeth eventually found her way to London, where she worked first as a cook, then as a governess and eventually as a housekeeper. During intervals in Beverley and York she came into contact with Methodists, had experienced conversion by 1784 and married Benjamin Rhodes in Bolton on 4 January 1787. They had three daughters. While he was stationed in Cornwall in 1788-1792, she became a class leader and experienced Christian perfection. She was widowed in 1815 and, recovering from a serious illness in 1827, settled in Maidstone, where she published her Memoirs in 1829, and died on 17 April 1836.