Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Owen, Samuel
OWEN, SAMUEL (1769?–1857), watercolour painter, was born about 1769. Nothing is recorded of him before 1791, when he exhibited 'A Sea View' at the Royal Academy. This was followed in 1797, after the victory of Cape St. Vincent, by 'A View of the British and Spanish Fleets,' and in 1799 by three drawings of the engagement between the Director (Captain Bligh) and the Vryheid (Admiral De Winter) in the action off Camperdown on 11 Oct. 1797. These, with three other drawings exhibited in 1802 and 1807, complete the number of his exhibits at the Royal Academy. In 1808 he joined the Associated Artists in Water-Colours, and senteleven drawings of shipping and marine subjects to the first exhibition of that short-lived body. He exhibited also twelve works in 1809, and six in 1810, but after that date he resigned his membership. His works are carefully drawn and freshly coloured, and possess much merit. Among them are the series of eighty-four drawings which were engraved by William Bernard Cooke for his work 'The Thames,' published in 1811, and seven others made for the 'Picturesque Tour of the River Thames,' published by William Westall, R.A., and himself in 1838.
Owen died at Sunbury on 8 Dec. 1867, in his eight-ninth year, but had long before ceased to practise his art. The South Kensington Museum has 'Shipping in a Calm,' 'Indiaman lying-to for a Pilot,' 'Luggers on the Shore,' and seven other river and sea pictures by him. A small half-length portrait of Owen in watercolours, signed 'Montague, 1805,' is in the possession of Dr.Edward H. Ezard of Lewisham High Road.
[Art Journal, 1868. p. 62; Redgrave's Dictionary of Artists of the English School, 1878; Royal Academy Exhibition catalogues 1794-1807; Exhibition catalogues of the Associated Artists in Water-Colours, 1808-10.]