John Purchas

Purchas, John, M.A., was educated at Christ's College, Cambridge (B.A. 1844) and became in 1866 the Minister of St. James's, Brighton. The prosecution which he underwent in connection with his ritual observances, is matter of history. His hymn in the St. Margaret's Hymnal (East Grinstead), "Evensong is hushed in silence" (Evening), was written for St. James's, Brighton, circa 1866, and was pub. with music by J. E. Roe. It is a hymn full of hopefulness with a sad undercurrent of weariness and pain. Mr. Purchas was born in Cambridge in 1823, and died Oct. 18, 1872.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907)