Author: Sansom, Francis
Biography:
SANSOM, Francis (1756-1810: ancestry.co.uk)
He was born on 18 Feb. 1756 and baptised on 17 Mar. at St. Anne and St. Agnes, Gresham Street, City of London, the son of John Sansom, clothworker, and his wife Mary Sleep (or Sleepe), who had married in 1743. His elder brother was James Sansom (q.v.). He was originally apprenticed to a clothier but at some stage took up engraving. He was one of the chief engravers for William Curtis (1746-1799), first for his Flora Londoniensis (1777-98) and then for the Botanical Magazine. He became a Mason in 1782, with his occupation given as engraver, Maiden Lane, but he later moved to Kensington, probably to be closer to the Brompton Botanic Garden which had been founded in 1790. He married first Mary Hopkins, on 3 Apr. 1779 at St. John Zachary, Gresham Street. They had at least one son. She died in 1802, whereupon he married Elizabeth Delaney on 15 June 1802 at St. Mary’s, Lewisham. The Preface to A Poetical Epistle on the Abolition of the Slave Trade (1808) identifies him as “having followed the art of engraving for thirty-seven years” and having engraved more than 1600 botanical plates. His eyesight began to fail in 1806 and he went blind in Sept. 1807. In his Preface he linked his plight to that of slavery but the idea does not intrude into the poem. He died at Yeoman’s Row, Kensington, and was buried at St. Mary Abbott on 15 Nov. 1810, leaving his unspecified estate to his wife Elizabeth. His prints are sought after and regularly come up at auction. (ancestry.co.uk 10 Jun. 2022; “Curtis, William,” ODNB 10 Jun. 2022; Sansom, Preface to Poetical Epistle [1808]) AA