Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Banks, Edward
BANKS, Sir EDWARD (1769?–1835), builder, raised himself from the humble station of a day labourer to the chief control of the firm of Jolliffe & Banks, contractors for public works, and was the builder of Waterloo, Southwark, and London bridges. He owed his fortune principally to these contracts, which he took with the Rev. W. J. Jolliffe, under the superintendence of the Rennies. Among his other undertakings may be mentioned Staines bridge, the naval works at Sheerness dockyard, and the new channels for the rivers Ouse, Nene, and Witham in Norfolk and Lincolnshire. In June 1822 Banks received the honour of knighthood. He died at Tilgate, Sussex, the residence of his daughter, Mrs. Gilbert East Jolliffe, 5 July 1835, in his sixty-sixth year. While working as a day labourer upon the Merstham tram-road, he had been struck with the beauty of the neighbouring hamlet of Chipstead, and, when he died nearly forty years later, desired that he might be buried in its quiet churchyard.
[Brayley's Surrey, iv. 305–7; Gent. Mag. (1835), iv. 444.]