[Link to Royal Pavillion and Brighton Museums blog entry for Frederic William Lucas]

Birth, Early life, etc.

Frederic William Lucas was the second son and fourth child of Joseph Lucas (1811-1903). He was born in Battersea, Surrey, in 1842, but moved with the family to Upper Tooting, Surrey around 1845. He attended grammar school at Brighton College, then went to Cambridge, and eventually became a solicitor in London, where he worked with his father and younger brother Edgar. He was older by four years from Joseph Lucas, the hydrogeologist.

Contemporary description of, by his nephew Hugh Wilson

Fred Lucas, as I knew him was a tall, lean, and powerful man, of many interests, with the means and leisure for their full enjoyment. By profession he was a Solicitor, but I do not think that his heart ever had to be or was in the practice of Law.

His principal hobby was collecting, and a large room on the first floor of his house held, though with some difficulty, everything. There was no entry to this room except by invitation, and such dusting as it got was by its owner, and year by year it successfully defied the blockade of spring cleaning. From floor to ceiling it was packed!

On the walls hung Japanese suits of armour, and swords, while below them, under glass, were cases of netsukes and inros; and then narrow tables supporting the skeletons of small vertebrates, and the skulls of large. Carved tusks, whale’s teeth; narwhal teeth, horns, carved everything; books, manuscripts, and lastly, if you felt strong enough, ‘homo sapiens’ or the skeleton in the cupboard, an articulation of what had been in life an enormous man, inches over six feet. A very remarkable room, and a headache for Aunt Clara. Latterly be disposed of many curios, and con­centrated on comparative zoology, on which he spoke with authority.

He was also a talented musician playing the double bass in orchestra, and the organ as a soloist. An early memory of mine is hearing him play Handel’s Occasional Overture on his piano organ, and thereafter, whenever I was the sole visitor, I would ask him to play it for me, and goodnaturedly he would do so.

Uncle Fred’s progress to the office of Messrs Lucas & Sons of Surrey Street, Victoria Embankment, was by four-wheeled cab, known as a ‘growler’ which called at his house every morning. How placid and unambitious a means of transport this was, only those who have tried it can tell you. You got there without time being of the essence of the contract.

The cab remained at call until the evening, but where I don’t know. I think of the bored driver and his horse as enjoying undisturbed slumber, for not yet could be heard the honk of the ill-mannered motorist; not yet did the fumes of his exhaust, poison the air. In those ‘bad old days’ one might walk the streets of London without fear of mayhem, vapour-poisoning, or shock from sheer noise.

Britain dominated the seas, and a fifth of the globe was painted pink, chiefly because the ultimate uses of petroleum had not yet been realised. Outside the three mile limit the seas were ours ‘usque ad coelum et ad inferos’. Anyone who questioned the ‘right’ took a dig from the trident.

On fine Sundays, it was the custom of our family, accompanied by Aunt Clara and Uncle Fred to visit the house of my grandfather John Wilson. We used to troop in from the back, and walk the entire length of the garden, and what a garden it was ! ‘Rus in urbe’. Just that! On the left ran a beautiful and seemingly endless Georgian wall, covered with the branching spread of peaches, nectarines and apricots, which in season called for better acquaintance, for we children had the rights of ‘estover’ over anything that was going, including walnuts. Great fun these last; they made one in such a mess.

When we reached the house the ritual was always the same. Uncle Fred, with mock solemnity, would bore a hole in a flower bed with his stick, and bury his half-smoked cigar. I used to wonder whether it would grow again in ready-to-smoke trim.

I don’t think that the grown-ups of those days had quite the easy entrance into the child’s mind of today. The child did not yet wish to join in, but just to understand what was said, and if he didn’t, he was bored. My elder brothers, fortified by the dignity, of adolescence stuck it out, as did my sisters, because they had to.. It meant little to me that Bismarck had had a smack in the eye. Who was Bismarck, and why should anyone want to smack him?

One day, after tea, I slipped off for the nectarines, and feasted to my heart’s temporary content. Thereafter retribution! Perhaps the fruit was not yet ripe. It must remain a matter for conjecture whether Henry 1st would have gone off lampreys, had he survived. For myself I am still faithful to the nectarine – when I see one.

On starting for home, Uncle Fred would unscrew the handle of his tubular walking stick, turn it head downwards, and a cigar would drop out. I have since wondered how the fragile outer leaf stood up to this treatment, but it must have done, for I remember this stick over a term of years.

It was from Fred Lucas that the story came of a visit with my father, when they were both young men , to an Uncle at Weybridge. Both [a couple of lines missing here]

A distinction enjoyed by Fred Lucas was that of honorary membership of the Senior Common Room Mess of King’s College. On occasions I was privileged to go there as his guest, and I still have the memory of listening to the wit and wisdom of such people as Sir William Crookes and his contemporaries.

Publications

Although he was a solicitor by profession, he had a great interest in history, particularly early exploration and voyages to America. He published two books. The first was in 1891 and has the wonderful title of “Appendiculae Historicae, or, Shreds of History, Hung on a Horn”. If I ever publish a family history I’ll use his title. This amazing book is about a scrimshaw map of eastern North America about 1763, etched on a powder horn.  The dedication is “To all my many nieces and nephews”. He also indicates that the horn is in his possession, and of course the big mystery is whatever happened to that horn after he died.

In 1898 he published a book with the great long title “The Annals of the Voyages of the Brothers Nicolo and Antonio Zeno in the North Atlantic about the end of the Fourteenth Century and the Claim founded thereon to a Venetian Discovery of America: A Criticism and an Indictment”.

This book is a refutation of the claims of the two brothers and caused quite a stir in the circles interested in these voyages. [Attach some of the docs here]. The University of British Columbia Special Collections Department has copies of both of the books. Note that both catalogue records contain errors.

There was a third book titled “The new laws of the Indies for the good treatment and preservation of the Indians, promulgated by the emperor Charles the Fifth, 1542-1543; a facsimile reprint of the original Spanish edition, together with a literal translation into the English language; to which is prefixed an historical introduction by the late Henry Stevens of Vermont and Fred W. Lucas”. Henry Stevens refers to this publication with the following comments:

In 1893 I issued to the subscribers that elegant folio volume which my father always considered as his magnum opus. It was entitled The New Laws of the Indies for the good treatment and preservation of the Indians, promulgated by the Emperor Charles the Fifth, 1542-1543. A facsimile reprint of the original Spanish edition, together with a literal translation into the English language, to which is prefixed an historical introduction. Of the long introduction of ninety-four pages, the first thirty-eight are from the pen of Mr. Henry Stevens, the remainder from that of Mr. Fred. W. Lucas, whose diligent researches into American history are amply exemplified in his former work, Appendiculae Historicae, or shreds of history hung on a horn, and in his recent work, The Annals of the Voyages of the Brothers Zeno.

The publisher of both of the books was Henry Stevens, Son, and Stiles,with the wonderful address of “39 Great Russell Street, Over Against the British Museum.”

Appendiculae Historicae

In December 2004 I ordered a copy of this book through AbeBooks from a bookseller in France. It arrived on my birthday! What a lovely present to myself! Great fun, although it is uncut so a bit of a pain to read and I’ll have to decide whether to cut it or not. There is a signature on the flyleaf of the previous owner “Henri Harrisse”. He turns out to be fairly well known in the same area of historical bibliography. Like Fred Lucas he was nominally a lawyer although he obviously spent enormous time and energy on his hobby. He was born in France, lived for a while in the US, returned to France but considered himself an “Americanist”.

The Lucas Book

I suspect that Fred Lucas had quite a bit to do with the compilation of the Lucas Book, at least from John Lucas the Younger on down on his side (ours) of the family. There are a few scraps of paper we have that have a recognizable handwriting, and I also found some scraps of paper at the Friends Historical Library in London relating to the Rudd family that are in the same handwriting. This is all speculation and a hunch.

Colleagues and Aquaintances

Miller Christy – Victorian

Henry Stevens of Vermont – American born antiquarian bookseller. Lived in London the greater part of his life and was an agent for the British Museum buying American books. Also was a publisher. He

Henri Harrisse – His name is on the flyleaf of the copy of “Appendiculae Historicae”. He was from France but lived part of his life in America and was a bibliographer and “Americanist”.