Pilsbury’s The United States Sacred Harmony

A recent addition to the Archive.org book family:

• The United States Sacred Harmony, Amos Pilsbury, Boston, MA: Isaiah Thomas and Ebenezer Andrews, 1799.

Additionally, there is an article about this book in The Hymn, July 1981:

• “A Yankee Tunebook from the Old South: Amos Pilsbury’s The United States Sacred Harmony,” by Karl Kroeger.

And this one is American Music, Winter 1995:

• “Seven ‘New’ Tunes in Amos Pilsbury’s United States’ Sacred Harmony (1799) and Their Use in Four-Shape Shape-Note Tunebooks of the Southern United States before 1860,” by David W. Music (must log in to JSTOR.org to read)

Thanks to Barry Johnston!

Amos Pilsbury was born in Massachusetts in 1772, and died in 1812 in Charleston, South Carolina. In addition to being a composer and book compiler, he was a schoolteacher, silversmith, and a clerk in the Presbyterian Church. In 1809 he published a collection of hymn texts titled The Sacred Songster: or, a Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs, For the Use of Religious Assemblies (Charleston, SC: G. M. Bounetheau). Apparently he was also a music teacher, and his Find-A-Grave memorial suggests he preached at the Methodist Church in the years prior to his death.

The Charleston Mercury, November 3, 1828, p 3