CARVALHO, David Nunes (1800?-1854) — London
Bookseller & stationer. Published The new game of public buildings ca.1830 — an educational race game; The new game of emulation or the road to knowledge ca.1830; Conversation cards on geography ca.1830; The new geographical game of Europe, etc. A prolific publisher of books for children and educational aids, as well as stocking cheap second-hand books, novels, travels, etc.
Born in London about 1800, the son of Samuel Nunes Carvalho (1778?-1849), also a bookseller, and his wife Rachel. Testified at an Old Bailey trial concerning the theft of a pack of cards from his Chiswell Street shop 12 Jan 1826. Married Hannah Solomons (1801?-1849) 6 Sep 1826 at Bevis Marks Synagogue. His employee James Clark was acquitted of stealing a pack of cards hidden in his boots 17 Feb 1831. Granted a patent for improvements of methods of propulsion, “being a communication from a foreigner residing abroad” in January 1837. Granted freedom of the City of London 21 Apr 1837. Testified at the Old Bailey 4 Feb 1839, at the trial of George Dennis Baxter, his sixteen-year-old errand-boy, who had stolen “386 printed books, value 3£.2s.; 20 packs of cards, value 6s.; 9 copy-books, value 2s.; 36 drawing-books, value 9s.; 84 pencils, value 7s.; 11 quires of paper, value 9s.; 85 pictures, value 1£.2s.; 1 box of paints, value 1s.; and 36 hair-pencils, value 1s.”. Recorded as a bookseller in Fleet Street in 1841, resident with his wife Hannah and seven children. Also resident at the same address was his father, Samuel Carvalho, a bookseller aged sixty-three. He held a directorship in an Irish railway company in 1845, while an 1846 directory gives “cheap book warehouse, & repository for second hand novels, travels, &c”. In 1848, at a meeting of London’s Jewish community, Carvalho proposed a motion that “it is a cause of great gratification to this meeting to know, that the First Minister of the Crown has introduced a Bill into Parliament, having for its object the removal of such results of exclusive legislation as tend to deprive us, Her Majesty’s Jewish subjects, of a full enjoyment of every right participated in by others of a different religious opinion” (Morning Advertiser, 1 Feb 1848). He had become a widower by 1851, still in Fleet Street, with five daughters, the two eldest apparently engaged in bookselling, and a servant. He died at 62 Lamb’s Conduit Street 29 Sep 1854, at the age of fifty-four (Patriot, 12 Oct 1854). Probate of his will dated 27 Aug 1854 was granted 10 Nov 1854.
74 Chiswell Street, Finsbury Square — 1826-1832
167 Fleet Street — 1833-1835
147 Fleet Street — 1836-1854
BBTI. BNA. Brown. Census 1841-1851. LHD. OB. Whitehouse.