Winsett grad­u­at­ed from the Bow­man Nor­mal School of Mu­sic in 1899, and found­ed the R. E. Win­sett Song Book Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny around 1903. His first book, Win­sett’s Fa­vor­ite Songs, be­came pop­u­lar in the south­eastern states among the Free Will Bap­tist, Gen­er­al Bap­tists, Ho­li­ness, and the newl­y emerg­ing Pen­te­cost­al Church. In 1907, he pub­lished Pen­te­cost­al Pow­er, which ap­pealed to the fast grow­ing Church of God in the mount­ains of North Car­o­li­na. The same year, Win­sett fin­ished his post­grad­u­ate stu­dies at the con­serv­a­to­ry.

On Jan­u­a­ry 15, 1908, he mar­ried Bir­die Har­ris; they had three sons and two daugh­ters. In their ear­ly years of mar­ri­age, they made their home in Fort Smith, Ar­kan­sas, where the mu­sic bus­i­ness was well es­tab­lished and suc­cess­ful. While in Fort Smith, he be­came ac­quaint­ed with the Church of God (7th Day) and be­came a re­cog­nized min­is­ter of that de­nom­in­at­ion in 1923.

Early in 1927 Win­sett had a dream of two new­ly dug graves, one nor­mal size, the other small. His son Gra­dy died at age 18.

After the death of his wife, Winsett re­turned to Ten­nes­see and start­ed a mu­sic pub­lish­ing bus­i­ness in Chat­ta­noo­ga. His most pop­u­lar song book, Pen­te­cost­al Pow­er, was en­larged and was called Pen­te­cost­al Pow­er Com­plete. In 1930, he mar­ried Ma­ry Ruth Ed­mon­ton; they had one son and two daugh­ters. His wife said that when he wrote, his in­spir­a­tion filled the house be­cause he lived the Gos­pel so strong­ly.

The blue eyed, gray haired Winsett was a home­bo­dy. He didn’t mix with others much ex­cept at camp meet­ings and sing­ing con­ven­tions, where he would lead the live­ly sing­ing. His on­ly rec­re­a­tion was hik­ing in the woods, where he would touch the leaves of the trees and the wild flow­ers that grew in abun­dance in the Ten­nes­see mountains. He would stay in the woods for hours, com­mun­ing with his Cre­at­or, then re­turn to his of­fice for work. Mrs. Win­sett said ne­ver was there a more sin­cere per­son about his re­li­gious con­vict­ions.

Winsett wrote and com­posed about 1,000 Gos­pel songs, ma­ny of which are found in Pro­test­ant song­books to this day. His “Je­sus Is Comi­ng Soon” was vot­ed into the Gos­pel Mu­sic Hall of Fame. Win­sett was list­ed in Who’s Who in the South and South­west in 1947, Who’s Who in Mu­sic in 1951, and in a His­to­ry of the True Church, by Dug­ger and Dodd. Win­sett Pub­lishers has is­sued over 60 dif­fer­ent song­books, some in for­eign lan­guag­es. His last com­pil­at­ion, Best Of All (1951) sold al­most one mill­ion co­pies. Over­all, more than 10 mill­ion of Win­sett’s books have been sold.

Sources

Hymns

1. In the Great Tri­umph­ant Morn­ing
2. Jesus Is Coming Soon
3. The Mess­age of His Com­ing
4. When We All Get to Heaven (© 1936)

Music

1. In the Ci­ty Where the Lamb Is the Light
2. When Je­sus Re­turns for His Own