Beauties of Sidmouth Displayed

The Beauties of Sidmouth Displayed is attributed to Edmund Butcher (1757-1822), a Unitarian minister. Poor health forced him to retire to Sidmouth, where he lived for many years producing sermons and the local guide. In 1805 he wrote An Excursion from Sidmouth to Chester published by Symonds and Woolmer and this may have encouraged him. Consequently, although the first edition of Sidmouth Displayed, ... being a descriptive sketch of its situation, salubrity, and picturesque scenery, also an account of the environs within fifteen miles round, has no author on the title page and the dedication (to the resident nobility and gentry and to visitors) is signed by the publisher John Wallis, from the Sidmouth Marine Library, the text is attributed to Butcher. The first edition contained a map by Neele and one other illustration (View of the Beach and Peak Hill). Later editions (1820 or later) were richly illustrated (see Somers Cocks entry S.62). A fourth edition appeared in 1830 with the new title A New Guide, Descriptive of the Beauties of Sidmouth. Another book of Views of the Principal Cottages and Residences etc., appeared as Sidmouth Scenery in 1817, also published by Wallis (see Somers Cocks entry S.47) and included the map in revised form.

Third Edition: