The Twickenham Museum
People : Surveyors and Mapmakers

Samuel Lewis
Mapmaker
1769 - 1804

Samuel Lewis was born at East Bergholt, Suffolk where, in due course, he married Sarah Falkard, of the same place.

He is noted at Twickenham for his plan of the town made in 1784 and an unsigned survey of Pope's Grotto in the following year.

Both were probably drawn to be included in Edward Ironside's “the history and antiquities of Twickenham : being the first part of parochial collections for the co. of Middlesex : begun in 1780”, though not actually published until 1797. This history also included engravings of Pope's Villa (as extended by Sir William Stanhope) and a view of the grotto beneath, both made from drawings by Lewis.

No records of the birth, marriage or death of Samuel have been found, though his father may also have been Samuel. In the parish records of East Bergholt there is mention, on 2 May 1733, of a Mrs Samuel Lewis paying rates of £60.

Lewis's survey of the grotto contains a private joke: there is actually somebody in the cold bath.

He worked in Essex, Suffolk and Middlesex. In the Suffolk Record Office there is an undated record of a Samuel Lewis preparing a plan of Brantham Glebe. Brantham is about 2 miles east of Bergholt.

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