Mrs. Vokes

Pseudonym. See also Draper, B. H. (Bourne Hall), 1775-1843)

Votes, Mrs . A long correspondence has failed to elicit any information concerning this hymn-writer beyond the facts that the earliest work in which her hymns are found is a Selection of Missionary and Devotional Hymns, edited by the Rev. J. Griffin, a Congregational minister at Portsea, and published in 1797. Several of these were repeated in J. Dobell's New Selection of Seven Hundred Evangelical Hymns, &c, 1806. There are also 7 of her hymns, all with the signature "Mrs. Vokes," in W. B. Collyer's Collection, 1812. Of her hymns the following, all published in 1797, are still in common use:—
1. Behold the expected time draws near. Missions.
2. Behold the heathen waits to know. Missions. This begins with st. iii. of No. 1.
3. Proud Babylon yet waits her doom. Fall of Babylon predicted.
4. Ye messengers of Christ. Missions.

-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

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Vokes, Mrs., p. 1227, i. Other hymns attributed to Mrs. Vokes, but not satisfactorily authenticated, are:—
1. Hasten, O Lord, that happy time. Missions.
2. Soon may [shall] the last glad song arise. Second Advent.
3. When shall the last bright song arise. An altered form of No. 2.

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907)