Were You There
American spiritual first printed in 1899
"Were You There (When They Crucified My Lord)" is an African-American spiritual that was first printed in 1899. It was likely composed by enslaved African Americans in the 19th century.
The song was first published in William Eleazar Barton's 1899 Old Plantation Hymns but was described in writings prior to this publication. In 1940, it was included in the Episcopal Church hymnal, making it the first spiritual to be included in any major American hymnal. It is also unique in that it is the only African-American song included in the Catholic Church's Liturgy of the Hours.
As reported in Howard Thurman's autobiography, the song was one of Mahatma Gandhi's favorites. The song has been recorded by artists including Paul Robeson, Marion Williams, Marian Anderson, Johnny Cash, Roy Acuff, Phil Keaggy, Max Roach, Diamanda Galás, Harry Belafonte, The Seldom Scene, Diamond Version (with Neil Tennant), Bayard Rustin, Rajaton, Millennial Choirs and Orchestras, and Chris Rice. A writer from the Indianapolis News wrote about Paul Robeson's rendition, saying that "It was as startling and vivid a disclosure of reverent feeling of penetrating pathos as one could imagine."
Lyrics
The following lyrics are those printed in the 1899 Old Plantation Hymns; other variations exist.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Were You There” is american spiritual first printed in 1899. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through There, American and spiritual, not as a finished interpretation.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 12, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q17035491. The Library of Congress control number is n2006057299. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1899 and 1940.
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This entry incorporates text from “Were You There” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.