Arthur Cottman
1842 - 1879
Biography
Arthur Cottman was an English solicitor and amateur musician whose short life produced a small but durable group of hymn tunes. The near-contemporary British Musical Biography identifies him as born in 1842, describes him as a solicitor by profession, and records his death at Ealing on June 3, 1879. Other hymnological sources place his origins in Hampshire. Reliable sources do not establish a specific denominational affiliation, so one should not be assigned merely from his church-music activity.
Cottman published a collection titled Ten Original Tunes around 1872; later bibliographic sources sometimes give 1874 for the collection, while Hymnary's tune authority dates DALEHURST itself to 1872. His tunes include CATERHAM, COTTMAN, DALEHURST, EVERSLEY, MIRFIELD, and MORN OF GLADNESS. DALEHURST is a Common Meter melody, 8.6.8.6, that entered numerous hymnals and became one established setting for John Newton's Approach, My Soul, the Mercy Seat.
Cottman did not compose DALEHURST for Newton's 1779 text: the tune belongs to a nineteenth-century musical tradition nearly a century later. This distinction matters because Newton's hymn circulated with many Common Meter tunes before and after DALEHURST became associated with it.
Cottman published a collection titled Ten Original Tunes around 1872; later bibliographic sources sometimes give 1874 for the collection, while Hymnary's tune authority dates DALEHURST itself to 1872. His tunes include CATERHAM, COTTMAN, DALEHURST, EVERSLEY, MIRFIELD, and MORN OF GLADNESS. DALEHURST is a Common Meter melody, 8.6.8.6, that entered numerous hymnals and became one established setting for John Newton's Approach, My Soul, the Mercy Seat.
Cottman did not compose DALEHURST for Newton's 1779 text: the tune belongs to a nineteenth-century musical tradition nearly a century later. This distinction matters because Newton's hymn circulated with many Common Meter tunes before and after DALEHURST became associated with it.
Hymns by Arthur Cottman
Approach, My Soul, the Mercy Seat
Role: Composer