J. H. Brammall

Brammall, John Holland, nephew of John Holland, the biographer of Montgomery and author of the British Psalmists, was born at Sheffield, Dec. 21, 1831, and educated at the Collegiate School of that town. Although engaged in banking, he has found time for both hymn-writing and music. Most of his hymns and some of his tunes were written for the Sheffield Wesleyan Sunday School Union. Of the former, "Onward, children, onward, leave the paths of sin," is best known. It was written for the Wesleyan Sunday School Union of Sheffield in 1870, and first printed on their Whitsuntide fly-sheet of that year. It has been frequently used at similar gatherings of children. In 1879 it was given anonymously in the Methodist Sunday School Hymn Book, No. 283.

-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)