Stuart Wesley Keene Hine

Stuart Wesley Keene Hine was a British missionary, evangelist, hymn writer, translator, and publisher. Born in London in 1899, he served in the British Army during the First World War and later married Mercy Salmon. In 1923 the couple began missionary work in Eastern Europe, including Poland, western Ukraine, Romania, and the Carpathian region. Their work involved preaching, distributing literature, singing, and supporting local Christian communities.

Hine learned a Russian version of “O Store Gud” associated with Ivan S. Prokhanov. His English hymn was not a literal translation of Boberg’s Swedish poem; it was a new paraphrase shaped by the Russian text, the Swedish melody, and Hine’s missionary experiences. In his own 1958 account, Hine connected the first two English stanzas with a Carpathian storm and journeys through Bukovina, the redemption stanza with an evangelistic encounter, and the final stanza with Christian hope after his return to Britain.

Hine completed the familiar four-stanza form by 1948 and published it in the Russian-language magazine “Grace and Peace” in 1949. It appeared in “Russian Melodies and Hymns of Other Lands” in 1953 and as copyrighted American sheet music through Manna Music in 1955. Hine continued publishing hymns and missionary literature and directed much of his royalty income toward Christian mission.