Samuel and James Neele 

Neele 1

Samuel and James Neele were active from the 1790s to early 1800s. One or other of the Neeles engraved two of the plans included in Charles Vancouver's work, A General View of the Agriculture of the County of Devon and other county volumes in the same series have county maps signed Neele (see B&B 70). Other county maps of Devon executed by the Neeles are known from 1803 (Wilkes, see B&B 64), and 1819 (B&B 86).

The Beauties of Sidmouth Displayed is attributed to Edmund Butcher  (1757-1822), a Unitarian minister. Poor health forced him to retire to Sidmouth, where he lived for many years producing sermons and the local guide. In 1805 he wrote An Excursion from Sidmouth to Chester published by Symonds and Woolmer and this may have encouraged him. Consequently, although the first edition of Sidmouth Displayed, ... being a descriptive sketch of its situation, salubrity, and picturesque scenery, also an account of the environs within fifteen miles round, has no author on the title page and the dedication (to the resident nobility and gentry and to visitors) is signed by the publisher John Wallis, from the Sidmouth Marine Library, the text is attributed to Butcher. The first edition contained a map by Neele and one other illustration (View of the Beach and Peak Hill). Later editions (1820 or later) were richly illustrated (see Somers Cocks entry S.62). A fourth edition appeared in 1830 with the new title A New Guide, Descriptive of the Beauties of Sidmouth. Another book of Views of the Principal Cottages and Residences etc., appeared as Sidmouth Scenery in 1817, also published by Wallis (views in author´s copy are illustrated here) and included the map in revised form. There were two issues of this work with either 20 or 22 views. The first issue, with text, is believed to be a limited printing for subscribers: the second issue, lacking letterpress, has an extra two views dated 1819 and 1820.

Neele and Son were also responsible for producing a map and a plan for Narratives of two Excursions to the Ports of England, Scotland and Ireland. This work appeared about 1820 and was a translation and critique of Charles Dupin‘s visits to the British Isles made in the three previous years to study engineering projects. This work included a plan of Plymouth Sound by Neele as well as a diagram of the breakwater, recently completed (although extra work was carried out for the next twenty years!).[1] Click here to view Neele 2.

 

Neele 1

Size: 110 x 125 mm.  Scale of Miles (6 = 37 mm). 

THE ENVIRONS OF SIDMOUTH. (CaOS) Signature: Neele, sculpt, Strand (EeOS). A plain two line border. There is a simple compass (Bb) and map is oriented with north rotated approx. 100 degrees to right.

Description: The coast is shown from Tor Bay (Aa) to Lyme Regis (Ae); the inland area stretches to Bow and to Taunton Dean.   

1. 1810        The Beauties of Sidmouth Displayed
                    Sidmouth. J Wallis[2]. 1810. KB.

2. 1817 An extra border has been drawn around the map to include the title (i.e. now within border) and the new imprint. Map printed within a page with text below, not separately. Size now 135 x 120 mm on page 160 x 240 mm. Imprint: Pub'd May 1st 1817 by John Wallis, Marine Library, Sidmouth (Ce).
Additional placenames include Budleigh Salterton, Dunscomb and Shaldon but most noticeable is the adition of three hills, especially Hall Down together with the Obelisk at Chudleigh.


a) Page size is approx. 160 x 240 mm. Map not folded. 

Sidmouth Scenery; or, Views of the Principal Cottages & Residences of the Nobility and Gentry: with a Description of that Admired Watering-Place, and the Environs within Fifteen Miles Around … The Rev. E. Butcher. 
Sidmouth. J Wallis. (1817). P[3].

b) Page size is approx. 140 x 210 mm. Map folded twice. 

The Beauties of Sidmouth Displayed ... Third Edition ... by Revd Edmund Butcher
Sidmouth. J Wallis[4]. 1820. KB.


NOTES:
[1] The whole work was translated from the French and probably appeared first in Voyages and Travels, No. 3, Vol. 1. translated from the French of Charles Dupin, Captain in the Corps of Naval Engineers, and member of the Institute of France. Report of trips made to the British Isles in 1816, 1817 and 1818.
[2] And sold by Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, London; and the principal booksellers in Bath, Bristol, and Exeter.
[3] I am grateful to Graham York of Graham York Rare Books and Patrick Elliott at Madoc Books, Llandudno, for letting me have information on this work. This is listed in Somers Cocks under S.47 but no mention of map.
[4] And sold by Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Browne, London.

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