People of Note
Samuel Buck
Family
Samuel Buck, (1696-1779), topographical draughtsman, engraver, and print publisher, was born in Richmond, Yorkshire.
He married Catherine Faussett on 20th April, 1727, daughter of Robert and Mary Ecklyn, former wife of William Faussett, of Dartford, Kent. On the death of her mother, Catherine acquired estate in Cotton Hempnalls with Skeith, Suffolk.
Buck's daughter Anne married Sir Francis L. Wood, of Hickleton Hall Doncaster on 15th January , 1798. Their son Charles Wood(1800-1885),became first Viscount Halifax. Also a politician, he was born at Pontefract on 20 December 1800.They had a daughter, Anne.
Katherine Cooke was the younger daughter of Samuel Buck. Possibly married a Cooke of Wheatley, Doncaster.
His grandson,Samuel Buck of Rotherham and New Grange was Recorder of Leeds. A marble memorial to him - a sculpture by John Flaxman -can be found in Rotherham Minster. He died in 1806.
Landowner
He held considerable estates, in his own right and through his marriage, including Ulley, Rotherham and Loversall, Doncaster.
The Engraver
He was introduced to the antiquary Ralph Thoresby as an amateur artist who introduced him to John Warburton, an antiquary, at the time writing a county topography for Yorkshire. Warburton invited Buck to make sketches for the book, which can be found in the British Library.
In 1720 Buck published proposals for two large engraved prospects of Leeds and Wakefield, which proved to be the first in a series of town prospects. There were ten in the first series from 1720 to 1725, the others being of York, Newcastle upon Tyne, Durham, Stockton-on-Tees , Maidstone, Sunderland, and Lincoln.
By this time Buck had moved to London and worked with the fellows of the Society of Antiquaries, attending their meetings and showing them specimens of his town prospects. In 1724 and 1725 he accompanied the society's secretary, William Stukeley, on two of his antiquarian travels. The resulting drawings included a view of the gatehouse of Thornton College, Lincoln, which carries a Stukeley inscription: Mr. Samuel Buck now with me whom I engaged to begin his drawings of Antiquitys. These drawings are in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.
The Publisher
In January 1726, Buck published a collection of twenty-four perspective views, of York, some of which were based on sketches he had made when with Warburton. The following year, Buck published a set of twenty-four antiquities, representing remarkable ruins in Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire, places drawn when with Stukeley on his travels. He went on to record ruins throughout the country.
Samuel's brother, Nathaniel, was associated with this project from the start, taking in subscriptions at the Golden Buck, Warwick Street, Soho. In 1727 Nathaniel accompanied Samuel on visits to Cheshire, Lancashire and Derbyshire which led to publication of his third collection of antiquities. 1728 saw the brothers covering ruins in Durham and Northumberland. The project was completed in 1742 by which time when they had covered the whole of England and Wales.
From 1728 the brothers had worked on another project producing and publishing a series town prospects, which were marketed in sets of six.
After the death of Nathaniel, sometime after 1759, Samuel continued to sell his antiquities and town prospects. He began to paint in oil and watercolour and advertised to instruct people in this art.He exhibited at the Royal Academy, the Free Society, and the Society of Artists. In 1725 he did drawings of Roche Abbey, dedicated to Sir Thomas Sanderson, and Conisbrough Castle, dedicated to Edward Coke Esq. Both are held at Sheffield Archives. Reference Code: SY/256/Z
Final Years
Samuel Buck's final years were spent in poverty. Richard Gough supported him out of his own pocket and encouraged his friends to follow suit, publishing an appeal in the Gentleman's Magazine and elsewhere, which provoked a generous response, and in his last six months Buck was free from financial anxiety. He died at eighty-three on 17 August 1779, and was buried at St Clement Danes.
The copper plates for printing the antiquities and the principal series of town prospects were acquired by the Fleet Street printmaker Robert Sayer.
Large numbers of the drawings survive in libraries, museums, and record offices which provide a record of England and Wales before the industrial revolution.
