David Elisha Davy

David Elisha Davy (1769–1851) was an English antiquary and collector from Suffolk.

Life He was the son of a farmer at Rumburgh, Suffolk, and the nephew of Eleazar Davy of Yoxford. Eleazar was locally prominent as Lord High Sheriff of Suffolk in 1770 and acquired some local position by the marriage of his stepdaughter with Sir John Rous. David Elisha Davy was born in 1769, and was educated at Yoxford under Samuel Forster. He entered Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, where he took his B.A. degree as sixth senior optime in 1790; he was ordained as deacon in 1792. In 1803, on the death of his uncle Eleazar, Davy succeeded to his estate, and then took up residence at Yoxford, where he became a magistrate and receiver-general of the county.

Works About 1803 Davy began to collect materials for a history of Suffolk, with a friend, Henry Jermyn of Sibton, barrister-at-law. Jermyn died in 1820, and his Suffolk manuscripts were bought by Herbert Gurney, and presented to the British Museum in 1830. They now form British Library Add MS 8168–8196. Davy continued to add to his collection up to his death, without any idea of publication. He published A short Account of Leiston Abbey as D. E. D. (with descriptive and illustrative verses by B. Barton and W. Fletcher, edited by J. Bird, 1823). Under the signature D. A. Y., Davy was a frequent contributor to the Gentleman's Magazine. To the Topographer and Genealogist he contributed a series of notices of sepulchral monuments in Suffolk churches.