Anna Letitia Barbauld nee Aikin

A member of the Cairo Street congregation Anna Barbauld was a poet, novelist and hymn writer. She was the daughter of John Aikin of Warrington Academy a friend and confident of many famous people including John Howard the Prison Reformer, Joseph Priestley, the French revolutionary leader Jean Paul Marat, a student at the Academy and many influential Unitarians. An anti slavery campaigner and supporter of the French Revolution, her writings and commentaries were popular during her life time and are today a source of local and national historical interest. Along with Henry Alford, Dean of Canterbury, she wrote the hymn ‘Come ye Thankful People Come.’