I Need Thee Every Hour

"I Need Thee Every Hour" was written by Annie Sherwood Hawks in 1872 while she was doing housework in her Brooklyn, New York home. Hawks was a 37-year-old homemaker and mother who had been writing poetry since age fourteen and had published nearly 400 poems. She later described the moment of composition as a sudden awareness of God's nearness and her complete dependence on Him, though at the time she was not going through any particular trial. Her pastor, Robert Lowry — himself a gifted hymn writer — added the refrain "I need Thee, oh, I need Thee; every hour I need Thee" and composed the tune. It was first performed at the National Baptist Sunday School Association meeting in Cincinnati in November 1872. Hawks later reflected that the hymn's full meaning didn't come home to her until years later when her husband died and she experienced profound grief — then the words she had written in a moment of sunny contentment became her lifeline in genuine sorrow.