Born: 1775, Cum­nor, Berk­shire Eng­land.

Died: Oc­to­ber 12, 1843, South­amp­ton, Eng­land.

Pseudonym: Mrs. Vokes (probable). His “Ye Christ­ian Her­alds, Go Pro­claim” was first pub­lished in John Grif­fin’s 1797 Se­lect­ion of Mis­sion­a­ry and De­vo­tion­al Hymns, cre­dit­ed to “Mrs. Vokes.”

Draper’s fam­ily want­ed him to be­come an Ang­li­can priest, but could not af­ford to ed­u­cate him. In­stead, he joined the Clar­en­don Press in Ox­ford as a print­er’s ap­prent­ice. He be­gan at­tend­ing the Bap­tist church around that time, and af­ter his ap­prent­ice­ship, was ad­mit­ted to the Bap­tist Acad­e­my in Bris­tol, head­ed by John Ryland. Or­dained in 1804, Drap­er be­came pas­tor of the Bap­tist church in Chip­ping-Nor­ton, Ox­ford­shire. Lat­er he moved to a pas­tor­ate in South­amp­ton, where he re­mained the rest of his life. A num­ber of his hymns ap­peared in the Bap­tist Mag­a­zine.

Sources

Lyrics

1. Ye Christ­ian Her­alds, Go Pro­claim