Sam Levy

Samuel L. Levy

Birth: 1845 in New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

Death: January 1, 1923 in Victoria, B.C.

Plot: Row E – Plot 24

Biography:
Samuel “Sam” L Levy was the third born child of Esther Solomon and Benjamin Levy. Sam’s mother, Esther Solomon, came from an impoverished but “respectable” Jewish family in London. The charities in London hoped that assisting penniless but devout young Jewish people to move would help establish Jewish communities in the growing British territories. Esther was sent to New Zealand for a pre-arranged marriage to Benjamin. Their time in New Zealand was duly reported back to the Jewish authorities as “the first”—first Jewish wedding on Wellington, first bris (ritual circumcision), first corpse (their second child), etc. The family moved to Australia, then to the California Gold Rush, back to England, and back again to California. Benjamin had died a few days from Panama of typhoid. Esther, heavily pregnant, continued with her by now numerous children under the age of 11. They were assisted through charity appeals in the Jewish Chronicle in London as well as the British Government, to return to England.

Esther struggled to raise her children as a single mother in London. To support families charities apprenticed young children to work at low paying occupations. Sam was trained as a bookbinder. The eldest son Henry Emanuel, “H.E.” is quoted as saying; “it took us two weeks to earn what we earned in a day in San Francisco.” Unhappy with the conditions in London, at the age of 14, H.E. left London on his own and arrived in Victoria in 1859 from San Francisco. He supported his mother as best he could. With some of the money he earned as a police officer, he established Levy’s Arcade Oyster Saloon in 1865 at the age of 22. With those proceeds, H.E. began bringing his mother and five remaining siblings, including Sam to Victoria.

*****Special thanks to Carolyn Hahn for her suggested edits and for her tireless willingness to help get her family’s story straight.

Inscription:
In Loving Memory of
JACK LEVY
SAM LEVY
sons of ESTHER LEVY
1848-1913
1845-1921

Parents:
Esther Solomon Levy (1824–1911)
Benjamin Levy (1819–1853)

Siblings:
Joseph “Joe” Levy (1841-1935)
H.E. (Henry Emanuel) Levy (1843–1929)
Jacob “Jack” Levy (1848-1913)
Phoebe Levy Levy (1854-1916)
Abraham Levy (died in 1874)